No Strings Attached. Susan Andersen

tabletop, she leaned down until she was nearly nose to nose with him. “Nobody messes with my people in my restaurant,” she said flatly. “You wanna be a lowlife, kid, go home and trip your dog.”

      “Not the dog!” one of the girls from a nearby table protested. “Go home and trip yourself,” she suggested alternatively and her friend nodded in earnest agreement.

      Tasha stooped to scoop up a pizza pan whose lazy elliptical spin on the floor was rapidly losing steam. She put it back in the tub. “You okay?” she asked Jeremy in a low voice.

      Muscles jumped in his jaw, and his pale blue eyes burned with outraged pride. She thought he was going to come up swinging, thus starting a bare-knuckles brawl with Davis—and wondered what it said about her that she intended to let him get a shot in before she intervened.

      But Jeremy merely nodded in answer to her question and pushed back to sit on his heels. Silently, he helped her gather the other plates and glasses that had escaped.

      She couldn’t help but be impressed. Not many eighteen-year-old males would have reined themselves in the way he was doing.

      A sudden idea made her pause mid-stretch for the plastic soda glass she’d intended to nab before it rolled out of reach. Letting it go, she sat back on her heels and contemplated him for several heartbeats while she silently debated the merit of her brainstorm.

      Then leaving him to deal with the tub, she rose and turned her attention to Davis. “As the sign on the wall clearly states, I reserve the right to refuse service to anyone. I’m exercising that right. If you want to come back and play nice another time, you’re welcome to do so. But you’ve lost your pizza privileges today.”

      “Big deal,” he said, shoving back his chair and standing. “Your pizza’s only so-so.”

      Jeremy surged to his feet as if that, of all things, was the final straw.

      But before he could say anything, a football player named Sage from a few tables down demanded, “Have you and me been eating the same pizza, Cokely? ’Cause Bella T’s makes the best damn slices in the county.” He gave Tasha a guilty look and held up his hands. “Sorry, Miz Riordan—don’t shoot. Best darn slices, I meant to say.”

      She merely grinned, and red crept up Davis’s neck at the reprimand from one of his teammates. Ignoring everyone else in the restaurant, however, he gave Peyton an imperious jerk of his chin. “Let’s go.”

      She didn’t budge from her chair. “You go ahead,” she said coolly, making Tasha wonder if she ought to reevaluate her original impression of the girl. “I’m going to stay. I like the pizza here.”

      He swore under his breath and stomped over to the door. A moment later it slammed closed behind him.

      “We’ve got a number of orders stacking up, boss,” Tiffany called, and Tash nodded.

      “You might want to take the meat lover’s slice off mine,” Peyton said in her I’m-much-too-cool-to-ever-get-rattled way.

      “Will do,” Tiffany said, then grimaced apologetically. “I’m afraid you’re stuck paying the tab for the two pops.”

      With a haughty lack of concern, Peyton hitched a slender shoulder. “Not a problem.”

      “Then I guess I’d better get back to the kitchen so no one has to wait too long for their pizza,” Tasha said and turned toward the kitchen.

      Only to find herself looking straight at Luc’s amused face.

      Her heart gave a hard thump. Oh, perfect. He’d been in here at least once a day every day this week to grab himself something to eat. Sometimes he tried to talk to her, and other times he didn’t. But always, she caught him watching, watching, watching her. He’d already been in earlier for a cup of coffee to go, so she’d mistakenly thought she could relax for the rest of the day.

      More fool she, clearly, for here he was once again, this time lounging bonelessly at one of the tables, his long jeans-encased legs stretched out and one elbow hooked over his chair back—watching her once more. She’d chew her tongue off before admitting this out loud...but his constant scrutiny was disconcerting.

      When their gazes met, he gave her a one-sided smile and a thumbs-up—the latter presumably for her handling of the tripping altercation. Without acknowledging either, she looked away and turned back to Jeremy. And acknowledged the decision she’d come to several minutes ago as a really good idea. “Bring the tub to the kitchen,” she said a bit more brusquely than she’d meant to. “I’d like a word with you.”

      * * *

      JEREMY FOLLOWED SO CLOSELY behind Tasha he came within centimeters of tromping on her heels. Crap. He should have known the past few weeks were too good to be true. Now she was probably going to fire his ass for losing her Richie Rich’s business. He wasn’t stupid; he knew the after-school crowd was a big part of her low-season profits—and growing bigger all the time, from what he’d heard Tiffany say.

      He liked working here. It was...cheerful. Except for Cedar Village in a lesser way, that wasn’t an environment he’d had much experience with. Which didn’t mean he couldn’t recognize it when he was surrounded by it. People tended to laugh and smile in Bella T’s. It made for some nice working conditions.

      Even nicer was the way Tasha had stood up for him just now. My people, she’d said, as if she considered him a part of her team. But not only wasn’t he a Razor Bay native, he was from the Village, which probably already put a black mark next to his name. Tasha ran a tight ship around here. She didn’t tolerate even mild swearing in Bella T’s, though he had heard her swear like a sailor—but never when clients were in the restaurant. Even after having been here only a short while, he could point out several kids who’d testify to her lack of tolerance, having seen them run afoul of Tasha’s Ping-Pong ball gun the same way Cokely had. He was surprised she’d let the football player get away with saying damn, even if it had been in defense of her kick-ass pizza.

      If he lost this job, he didn’t know what he would do. Right now he still had a roof over his head, but he was graduating the Village’s program on the thirtieth, so he knew he was on borrowed time being able to live there. He sure as hell didn’t want to go back to his White Center neighborhood on the southern outskirts of Seattle. Not when he couldn’t say with any certainty—even given all the coping skills he’d learned from his counselors—that he wouldn’t go back to his old bad habits. If he took up again with his old friends—and face it, they were the only people he knew outside of the few friends he’d made at the Village—it was pretty much guaranteed that he’d fall back into the same old pattern.

      A pattern that spelled L-O-S-E-R.

      He was so engrossed in the What Ifs that he didn’t realize Tasha had stopped until he bumped up against her back. Rattled, knowing he was probably gonna get it for not watching where he was going, he jumped back. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled. Then, clearing his throat, he added, “I’m sorry about out there, too. I didn’t—”

      “Don’t you apologize for something that was not your fault,” Tasha said fiercely. “You have zip to be sorry about in the Cokely incident—that one is all on Davis. Actually, watching the mature way you handled yourself when I’m sure you would’ve preferred smacking him silly made me want to talk to you about something else.”

      He wasn’t in trouble? His counselor Jim had said he had to stop blaming himself for everything that went wrong in people’s lives, but when you grew up the way he had, it was a hard habit to break. But he took a breath, crossed his arms over his chest and gave her a jerky nod. “Okay.”

      She pulled the orders from the wheel Tiffany had clipped them to and went over to the industrial-sized fridge to get out two round dough balls and several triangular ones. Swiftly, she began rolling out the full pizza crusts atop pizza stones. She glanced at him over her shoulder. “You want a Coke?”

      He nodded. His throat was drier than Mr. Mitchell’s math class back at his old school.

      “Go