NFH 02 Perfection (28 page)

Frowning, Zoe raised her hand to at
least wave to her friend, wondering what Jason's problem was, when
she found herself in a similar situation.

"Don't," Trevor said, gently pushing
her hand down as he continued to usher her towards a row of empty
booths near the large bay windows overlooking the parking
lot.

"I was just going to say hello," Zoe
explained as Trevor placed their receipt down to claim the
table.

"You can't," Trevor said, giving her a
little nudge in the direction of one of the buffet lines, the black
bag still firmly in his left hand.

"Why not?"

"Because she's with the enemy," Trevor
said tightly.

Zoe shot a look over at Haley to find
Jason glaring in their direction. "Jason's the enemy?" she asked,
starting to feel a little confused. She'd come for entertainment,
but instead she'd found a new level of insanity among the Bradford
males. Well, it was entertaining, but a different form of
entertainment than what she'd been expecting.

"Now you're getting it," Trevor said
approvingly. "Every bastard from my family is a potential threat.
We need to maintain our distance and watch our backs," he said,
sounding completely serious, which she found rather
cute.

Really, who would have thought a large
paranoid man could be cute? She certainly hadn't, but she just
couldn't help but find the dirty looks he was sending his cousin
anything but cute, especially the way he scowled when Jason
discretely flipped him off.

"Why exactly are they the enemy?" she
asked, drawing his attention away from Jason, who appeared to be
glaring down at his son as Cole grabbed another fistful of
spaghetti from Jason's plate.

"Because one of them is going to get
banned today and if we're not careful he'll take us all down with
him," Trevor said, handing her a plate. "Now go get some food, some
real food."

With a little sigh she took the plate
from him and wandered around the long self-serving tables as she
looked around to see how many Bradfords were there. After Jason,
she spotted Jared and his wife sitting at the far end, but they
didn't seem to see her or rather they didn't acknowledge her in any
way. She found several of the Bradfords that either worked for
Jared or stopped by the office from time to time and several large
devastatingly handsome men that could have passed for
Bradfords.

As she walked along the buffet tables,
trying to figure out what wouldn't upset her sensitive stomach she
wondered which Bradford would get banned. That of course led her
back to her earlier thoughts.

How exactly did someone get
on a restaurant's banned list? Or more importantly how did
the
entire
family
get on the list? The possibilities simply boggled the
mind.

"You're with Trevor?" a gruff voice
demanded, drawing her attention. She looked up from adding French
cut green beans onto her dish and kept looking up until she saw a
rather stern, yet incredibly handsome older man with peppered short
black hair looking down at her and looking way too serious for a
man with deeply etched laugh lines around his mouth and
eyes.

"Yeah, I guess, I mean we're friends,"
she said nervously.

The man nodded firmly, once, before
shooting a look of what could only be described as a warning across
the room at Trevor, who was sitting at the booth with two
overflowing plates and several glasses of water. Trevor either
didn't realize he was the object of a glare or simply didn't care
as he dug into his food.

"You tell him as long as Jared's boys
don't screw the rest of the family over like they did in Las Vegas
we'll forgive them for Disneyworld," the man said, never taking his
eyes away from Trevor.

Wow, there was so much in that warning
that caught her attention, but she found herself asking, "Jared's
boys?" As far as she knew Jared only had one son.

The man nodded. "Jason and Trevor.
Although we all have a soft spot for the boy, Jared's the one who
kept the boy in line and was able to be there from the start
because he lived closer. He also took over when my beautiful baby
sister passed away," he explained, his scowl softening as he
continued to look at Trevor.

He looked away from Trevor to send her
a faint smile. "That doesn't mean we didn't care. I lost count how
many times I asked Sarah to allow Trevor to come live with us, but
she was damn determined to raise the boy on her own, of course
Jared just ignored her wishes and made sure they had everything
they needed and that included keeping Trevor in line."

"Jared's a very good man," Zoe
mumbled, feeling close to crying. When the hell did she become this
pathetic woman where everything made her cry? Last night when she
was watching television one of the old Downy commercials came on
with that cute little bear and she found herself bawling her eyes
out. Thank god Trevor hadn't been there, but poor Toby didn't fare
as well. She'd hugged the dog, crying into his fur until he managed
to break free and run to safety in Trevor's apartment.

The man looked at her with a little
more than curiosity. "Will we be seeing you this
Thursday?"

"For Thanksgiving?" she asked,
wondering why the man would think she'd be joining a family dinner.
When he nodded she said, "No, I have plans." The same plans she had
every year since she was fifteen. It was a tradition mostly because
she'd never had another choice, but one she actually enjoyed
immensely.

He sighed heavily as he absently
reached out and took her plate from her and starting piling it with
food almost as if he wasn't aware of what he was doing. "Alright,
sweetheart, you make sure you give Trevor the message and have
yourself a nice Thanksgiving," he said, placing two large dinner
rolls on the plate. He leaned down and pressed a kiss to her
forehead and even more surprising, placed the large plate filled to
the rim with food back in her hands.

"Thank you," she murmured, looking
down at her plate and feeling her eyes tear up at the gesture. A
Bradford giving up food? It was unheard of and very sweet, she
thought as she made her way over to Trevor. Thankfully by the time
she was sliding into the booth across from Trevor her eyes had
dried up and her traitorous stomach was demanding food, which was a
blessing after the weekend she'd had.

"What the hell did my Uncle Ethan say
that upset you?" Trevor asked, starting to get up and presumably go
have a word with his uncle.

Zoe rolled her eyes as she reached out
and placed a hand on his arm. "Nothing. He was very
sweet."

The glare he sent his uncle, who was
now carrying a large plate of food to an area well away from Jared
and Jason clearly stated that he didn't believe her. He looked like
he wanted to tear his uncle's head off and that just made Zoe want
to cry again.

"Are you crying?" Trevor whispered,
sounding truly horrified.

"No!" she snapped, grabbing a napkin
and dabbing at her eyes. "I'm just tired." Which was sadly true and
she really couldn't understand it since she should be caught up on
her sleep considering she'd slept most of the weekend
away.

Trevor looked at her for a moment
before letting out a heavy breath. "You need to make a doctor's
appointment to make sure you didn't make yourself sick with that
diet. You could be anemic," he said as he reached out and snagged
one of her biscuits.

She frowned at the thought. She really
hadn't considered that possibility when she decided to go on her
diet, but she'd lost weight and while her energy had gone up in the
beginning it was lagging most of the time now and she felt tired
and weak lately. With her luck she'd probably made herself really
sick with that damn diet.

"I'll make an appointment tomorrow,"
she promised. Hopefully they could get her in before the holiday
weekend started on Thursday, because she really wasn't sure she
could keep this up.

"Good," he said, giving her the look
that meant he would spank her ass if she didn't.

"Can I ask you a question?" she said
as she scooped up a bite of meatloaf.

"Shoot," he said, not bothering to
look up from his plate while he ate or when his hand shot out and
stole her second roll.

"What happened in Las Vegas and
Disneyworld?

His fork stopped halfway to his mouth
as his eyes shot to her. He pointed a mashed potato filled fork in
her direction. "What did that bastard tell you? Did he tell you we
got the family banned?"

"Well, he-," but he wouldn't let her
finish.

"Because that's bullshit. Okay, maybe
the Las Vegas thing was our fault, well mostly Uncle Jared's and
Jason's fault, but it was supposed to be a twenty-four hour
buffet," he explained. "And that Disneyworld thing," he shook his
head in disgust, "was all a simple misunderstanding. There was no
need to get the police involved," he said on a sniff.

"Um, okay," she said even more
confused and admittedly a little frightened. Seriously, what had
they done? And would they do it again so that she could
see?

Chapter
24

"Wow, I've never seen Jason look so
angry before," Zoe whispered.

He didn't bother looking up from his
large plate of fried chicken, but he did smile. The look on Jason's
face when he'd stolen the last piece of chicken off his plate was
priceless and he may have rubbed it in Jason's face a little bit
until he thought his cousin was going to lunge for his
throat.

He probably would have too if Haley
hadn't handed their infant daughter over to Jason. The murderous
glare on Jason's face was instantly replaced by one of adoration as
he pressed little kisses on the little baby girl's face. That is
until he saluted Jason with a drumstick a minute ago.

Ah, good times, he thought, as he
focused his attention on Zoe, who looked a little bored. If she was
a Bradford she wouldn't be bored. This would be like winning the
lottery to her, but alas she wasn't and he couldn't exactly
encourage her to kill time by eating since she would probably bitch
slap him for the suggestion, steal his chicken, and give it to
Jason just to screw him over.

Granted, he wouldn't mind seeing her
eat a little more food. He really missed how much fuller her curves
used to be, he thought with a little inward groan. Then again she
had been doing pretty good with that plate his uncle put together
for her until halfway through she suddenly stopped eating, looking
a little pale and pushed the food towards him as if she was afraid
it was going to attack her.

Damn food poisoning.

Since he'd had food poisoning more
than once in his life he could sympathize with her. It wasn't a
whole hell of a lot of fun, especially not being able to eat.
Although the cup of tea he went and grabbed for her did anything
but calm her stomach she did manage to sip the glass of ginger ale
he gave her.

"Is there going to be a riot?" she
asked, looking and sounding hopeful. "Or a fight? How exactly do
you guys get yourselves banned?"

"I cannot believe you took advantage
of our weakness for your own entertainment," he said in mock
disgust since it actually turned him on and he'd been struggling
off and on with the desire to drag her adorable ass to his truck
where he could show her just much it turned him on, but that would
have to wait until the restaurant closed down for the night or they
kicked him out, whichever came first.

She rolled her eyes as she gestured to
the buffet tables. "I get entertainment and you get food. I really
don't see what the problem is."

"I would have gotten at least a week's
worth of the buffet if you hadn't told everyone," he grumbled,
giving her his best pout.

"Would it make you feel better if I
promised not to tell anyone but you about the next time that I spot
a new buffet restaurant?"

"Yes, yes it would," he said, feeling
somewhat appeased.

"Fine, you big baby," she said,
sighing as she looked around the restaurant again. "Do you think it
would be okay if I went over and asked Haley if I could borrow one
of her books so that I have something to do while I wait for my
entertainment?" she asked, gesturing across the room to Haley who
had a small stack of paperback books on the table next to
her.

"I'm not entertaining enough?" he
asked, biting into a large juicy breast.

"Sadly no."

Even though he was damn entertaining
and she knew it, he decided to take pity on her. "Here," he said,
picking the black shopping bag off the seat next to him and handed
it to her.

"You're giving me your condiments?"
she asked, looking confused as she took the bag.

"Not that you deserve it after what
you pulled today," he said, gesturing to the bag, "but I got you a
little something. It's fully charged and it has a hundred dollar
balance on it so you can start downloading whenever you're
ready."

Nibbling her bottom lip in that
nervous way of hers, Zoe shot him a curious look before placing the
bag on the bench next to her and opening it. The stunned look on
her face pleased him greatly.