Mastered(61)
“Oh! Jax, I almost forgot. Can you do something for me, please?”
Hell, she could ask him for damn near anything and he’d do it or die trying.
“Sure thing. Just name it.”
“There’s a box of cupcakes on the bar in the kitchen. Can you get it for me? I was going to just keep them here for Drake, but since we’re going to the club and there are plenty to go around, I thought I’d bring them for the guys.”
He was at a momentary loss of words. Cupcakes? She was bringing the guys at Impulse cupcakes? Drake might never live this one down, so it was with glee that he cheerfully agreed to collect the box and wait for her in the kitchen.
Evangeline carefully put the dress into one of Drake’s garment holders, grabbed an overnight bag and stuffed the shoes and all her toiletries and makeup inside and then hurried into the kitchen to see Jax stuffing what was left of a cupcake into his mouth.
When he heard her, he looked up, ignoring her accusing look and the hand on her hip. “Holy shit, these are fucking awesome. Where did you buy them?”
She fidgeted uncomfortably. “I made them.”
His eyes bugged out. “You made them?”
She ducked her head but nodded. “I like to cook. And bake.”
“Oh my God, I’m in love,” he groaned. “Any chance you can forget that you were bringing the box for all the guys and let me take it home with me?”
She grinned. “No. But I’ll pretend you didn’t already have one so you can have another when we get to the club.”
“Good. I’m starving. Haven’t had a chance to eat yet.”
Evangeline frowned and put her stuff down on the counter and then shoved a startled Jax around to the other side of the bar and made him sit.
“What are you doing?” he asked, clearly baffled.
“Feeding you. I have leftovers from the dinner I made Drake last night. It won’t take but a few minutes to warm up and as you said, we’re already late, so what’s a few more minutes, right? Traffic was so terrible.”
Jax laughed. “I like you already.”
“It won’t be as good as it was last night,” she said in an apologetic tone. “But it won’t be bad. Promise.”
“You actually cooked dinner for Drake?”
“Yeah. I thought I screwed up and pissed him off. He had placed an order with a delivery service for seven, but I misunderstood when he said he’d be home at six and that we were eating in. I assumed he wanted me to cook, so it was kind of awkward. Until he tasted my cooking,” she added with a grin.
A few minutes later, she set a plate of leftover fish and the sides, minus a baked potato, in front of Jax and blinked as he literally inhaled it.
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” Jax muttered. “You’re a goddess. If that was supposed to be not as good as last night, then it’s a wonder Drake survived and is alive and working today. Because that was heaven in my mouth. Is there anything you can’t do? A beautiful, sweet, compassionate woman and she can cook? Why do I never find them first,” he said mournfully.
Evangeline flushed with pleasure over the obvious sincere compliment, but then she swiftly took the plate and set it in the sink.
“Okay, we better get going or Drake is going to strangle both of us,” she said, only half joking.
On cue, Jax’s phone rang and he groaned. “That’s the boss wondering where the hell his lady is.”
“Yeah, you need to tell him about the horrible traffic jam we’re in,” she said with a perfectly straight face.#p#分页标题#e#
Jax laughed and then said the strangest thing. “Oh man, Drake is going to supply the guys with the most amusement we’ve encountered in a damn long time.”
Drake stifled the urge to look at his watch again, knowing that Silas and Hatcher would pick up on the fact that he wasn’t focused on what he should be focused on, which was the current handling of an issue that needed to be acted upon quickly. And Maddox, damn the man’s hide, who perpetually lurked in the shadows, a mere raised voice away, would know exactly where Drake’s mind was and it wasn’t on one Eddie Ryker. For that matter, Justice and Thane were currently sitting on Drake’s sofa for reasons unknown to Drake, leaning back as if they had nothing better to do than be on permanent break. He’d address their purpose for being here as soon as he dealt with the most pressing issue.
“So what do you want done, Drake?” Silas asked in his quiet, unruffled tone.
Silas was an enigma, one that Drake would never admit to not having ever figured out. He knew enough about the man he considered one of his most trusted and valued partners to not worry that his loyalty would ever lie elsewhere, and he knew, only from what he’d been able to dig up as public record, that Silas’s childhood had been the worst kind of hell, but he didn’t know much else.