The F King: A Bad Boy Romance(24)

“Nice to meet you!” said Andy, his eyes looking between the two of us at slightly over my head height.

“You too!” I said.

“First time at Unseen?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Ryan.

“OK, you’re gonna love it! Follow me through here, we’ll go through a little room first, that’s our light-trap, and then into the Englert room. Oh first though, another question.”

“What’s that?” asked Ryan.

“How’s my hair?”

Ryan and I laughed.

“Looking sharp,” I said.

“Great! It’s tough to be sure, as you can imagine, so thanks for your help. Right this way.”

Andy led us through the light-trap, then we formed a hand-holding train as he took us directly to our table in the middle of the room, guiding us into our seats. The darkness was truly complete, even after a couple of minutes of adjusting I couldn’t see the faintest outline or hint of movement anywhere.

“So the menu is very simple here at Unseen, since you effectively have to memorize it to compare and contrast your choices. Basically, you can choose from the beef, chicken, fish or vegetarian options, and our award-winning chef will prepare you something that will blow your socks off. Would you like any drinks while you decide?”

“A bottle of champagne, please. The last one I bought got broken somehow,” said Ryan.

“That’s a shame, sir.”

“Yes it was,” I said, “and, I’ve already decided on my food. I’ll have the chicken, since I’ve recently had a wide variety of beef dishes.”

“Very good, ma’am.”

“Well, if you’ve decided, then so have I. I’ll have the beef just to be different,” said Ryan.

“You two make a great couple, very decisive.”

The darkness hid my latest blush.

“A couple small points before I leave. Sir, if you feel on the table along the right edge as you’re facing it, you’ll feel a button. We don’t like to intrude much, so if you need me for anything at any stage, just press that button and it delivers a non-lethal electric charge to myself. I’ve been conditioned to respond very quickly. OK?”

“Got it.”

“And if nature calls, you’ll find a door on the opposite side of the room to where we entered, so that’s behind you and to your left, ma’am, that will take you through another light trap and to the restrooms. If there’s nothing else, I’ll be right back with your champagne.”

Andy was lightning quick with our champagne, and even filled up the first glasses for us, and left us with some bread and various oils to dip it in, if we could figure out how to aim for them. After a bit of small talk, I tried to get some information out of Ryan.

“So you’ve got me at a disadvantage,” I said.

“How so? You think I’m blind too? Makes the drive over here all the more impressive, huh?”

I laughed. “No, like, I feel like you know a lot more about me than I do about you. You’ve been in my dorm more than I have, you know what I’m studying, you know I’ve never… well, before you… I’m just not usually like that. And you, you’re this big mystery.”

“Well, how do you think we can even up the scores?”

“Tell me about, well, what is it you do? Mmmm, try the oil closest to you, that’s a good one.”

“I’m self-employed. I own a cosmetics company,” Ryan said.

“Cosmetics? Can I get discounted lipstick from you?”

“Sure.”

“How did you even get into that? Did you take, what, chemistry at Highston?”

“No, engineering actually, but I wish I’d taken marketing. That’s what the company really is when you get down to it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, all I did was source some generic cosmetic lines from overseas. Things like moisturizing cream and lipsticks are incredibly cheap and easy to make. I slap my brand on it, and I have a pretty good marketing system in place. Orders are all either fulfilled by Amazon or drop-shipped if ordered via my website or social media. I keep the marketing budget flowing, and swap out the marketing materials when it looks like people are getting tired of them. Pretty much everything is automated or outsourced. I haven’t had my hands on any cosmetics in almost a year.”

“You serious?” I asked.

“Of course.”

“I never would have guessed that.”

Andy returned with our food, then promptly excused himself after making sure we had everything we needed. The food smelled delicious, and my stomach rumbled as I tried to guess just how my chicken had been prepared.