LWLU – Take Down

Rather than bother with the formality of the dining room, Nika ordered the guys to grab some extra chairs to put around the circular kitchen table while she served enchiladas.  For all her faults, Nika was an amazing friend, always ready to diffuse tension when needed.  After everything that came out in that brief exchange, Sara was grateful for that.

How had they missed his zipper?  Damn.

Once she had her food, Sara sat at the table.  Something was up with the guys.  Since bringing the chairs in, they were all shooting dirty looks at each other.  Great.  If she didn’t do something, Paul might really stab Lincoln with his fork.  Thinking fast, she patted the seat to her right when Lincoln stalked over.

Veronica locked eyes with Sara as Lincoln dumped his plate on the table before going back for a beer and quickly set her things down two seats to the left of where Sara was.  Nika handed both of them their water and surveyed the table with a quick sweep of wide blue eyes, nodding.  She sat to Veronica’s left and nudged her in the shoulder.  “Margarita bucket isn’t frozen yet.  Looks like it’s water until after dinner for us.”

Jane walked over to the table, plate in one hand, beer bottle in the other.  She stopped in her tracks, frowning at the table.  “Okay, y’all obviously have a seating chart going on that nobody bothered to tell me about.  Where do I go?”

Nika pointed at Sara.  “Sara’s there.  Lincoln’s to her right.  You sit next to Lincoln.  Mike sits next to you.  I’m here.  Roni’s there.  Paul sits by Sara.  And we’re back to Sara.  Do I need to do that again?”

“No.”  She set her plate on the table.  “I think I’m good.”  She glanced over her shoulder and lowered her voice.  “What the hell happened to them?”

Nika shrugged.  “They decided to measure their dicks while they were getting the chairs and it was cold in there?”

Veronica choked on her water so Nika slapped her on the back.  “Thanks.”

Sitting, “You don’t mince words, do you?”

“No.  Why would I do that?”  She fixed her attention over Jane’s shoulder and put out her hands gimme-style.  “Yum.  Thanks, Mike.”

He handed her the plate and sat next to her, somehow managing not to spill his own food and beer in the process.

Sara looked around.  “Where did Paul and Lincoln go?”

Michael’s eyes locked in on hers.  “Paul wanted to talk to him.”

She heard the sound of wood scraping against tile before she realized she was on her feet.  “Which way did they go?”  Was that her voice that seemed high-pitched?

“Are you okay?”  Roni reached over and touched her hand.

“No.  I am so not okay.”  She scrubbed her hands over her face then turned on Michael.  “What would possess you to leave them alone?  He’s pissed as hell at him.  He’ll kill him.”

“But if y’all were just talking then why would Paul be so mad?”

Nika looked at Jane.  “Are you stupid?  They were so totally doin’ it.”

“Nika!”

“Fine.  They were so totally about to do it.  You can tell they didn’t because she’s still all stressed out.  I mean, look at her.”  Nika gestured toward her.  “If Linc had given Paul enough time to finish then her eyes would be sort of glassy right now…”

Sara opened her mouth to say something, but there were literally no words to respond to that.  She sunk down into the chair and wished she could sink all the way into the core of the earth so she wouldn’t have to pretend not to feel everyone’s eyes on her as her friend spoke.  This would be so much less embarrassing if one person at the table didn’t have first hand knowledge of what she looked like before, during and after sex.

“…and she’d have this goofy-happy grin on her face right now instead of the I hate Nika death look.”  She paused.  “I don’t like that look, Sara.”

Veronica cleared her throat.  “Stop talking, Nika.  Stop talking now.”

“So…uh…”  Jane used her fork to cut into her chicken enchiladas.  “Why didn’t you think it was important to stop Paul from killing your brother?  Still pissed about him punching you in high school?”

“Maybe I thought he could handle himself if Kellerman tried anything.”  Michael glared at Sara.  “He’s not as great as you think he is.”

Sara fought to control her temper.  “He’s better than you think he is, Mike.  And he’s stronger, too.  But if you’ve never been taken down by one of his moves then you wouldn’t know that.”

Nika started waving her hand around while she tried to finish chewing.  Veronica swatted her hand down.  “Sara’s talking about martial arts take-downs.  We don’t need to know he’s taken you down already.  Just take another bite and stay quiet.”

“Huh?” Michael and Jane asked in unison.

“Don’t change the subject.  I want to know why you didn’t stop them, Mike,” Sara demanded.

With vicious force, Michael began cutting into his food.  “Because I don’t care, Sara.  I don’t care about your sex life.  I don’t care if Lincoln interrupted anything.  I don’t want to hear about it because I don’t fucking care.  Got it?”

The room went silent and all eyes ping-ponged back and forth from Michael to Sara.  Tension became the sixth person at the table with them.  No one ate.  No one dared breathe.  Poor Nika had a mouthful and was forced to swallow, drawing everyone’s attention from the stalemate for a nanosecond.

What was wrong with Michael?  He’d never been so brusque, so hateful before.  Did she have things all wrong?  Instead of coming onto her, was he really just trying to make her miserable?  It almost felt like…

It was like he hated her.

She wanted to look away, to look at anything other than him right now; she couldn’t.  For whatever reason, the intense steel in his eyes mesmerized her, just as she’d been mesmerized that night.  She could almost hear the words…No.  She wouldn’t go there.  Not now.  Not with all her friends around.  Not with him right there, apparently hating her.

From the corner of her eye, she could see Nika take a sip of her water.  Her friend started to set the glass back on the table, but stopped short, instead tilting the glass over Michael.  “Oops.  I spilled my water.  You’d better go change.”

He glared at Nika, threw his napkin on the table and stalked out of the room.

Jane let out a sigh of relief.  “What just happened?”

Nika resumed eating.  “Must have been really, really cold when they were measuring and Mikey lost.”  She gave Veronica a preemptive smack on the back.  “Don’t go choking on me.  I don’t want to have to give you the Heimlich again.  You know that’ll just get Linc going because he’ll think we’re about to start some girl on girl action.”

“I am really out of the loop, aren’t I?”

Sara shook her head.  “Don’t worry, Jane.  Sometimes that’s best around here.”

“What’s best around here?”  Paul kissed the top of her head and set his food down on the table.

She nearly jumped out of her skin at the sound of his voice.  Any sooner and he might have witnessed a very uncomfortable moment.  “It’s best when your boyfriend gets his butt back to dinner.  Where’ve you been?”

“I was talking to Linc.”

“I know that.”  She pushed her food around on her plate.  Lowering her voice, “You, uh, weren’t exactly happy with him when we came in here, Paul.”

He put his arm around her shoulders and gave her a squeeze.  “Stop worrying.  Everything is fine.  I just needed to get something from him.”

“What could you possibly…”  Understanding blossomed in her mind as she remembered what he’d told her he would get from Lincoln for later that night.  “Okay.”

Lincoln sat next to her.  “Happy birthday, Sara.”  Before her face could go red he added, “Where’d Mike go?”

“Uh…”  They all looked at each other and Nika smiled.  “He had an accident and needed to go change his pants.”

“Isn’t my little brother a little old to be having accidents at the table?”

Nika shrugged.  “Hand job.”  Without waiting, she smacked Veronica on the back.

But this time it wasn’t Roni who started choking, it was Paul.  Veronica grinned and smacked him on the back.  “Don’t die on us yet.  Besides, it wasn’t Nika that caused the accident.  It was Jane.  She got bored waiting on you to come back, Lincoln.”

Lincoln exchanged a look with Paul over Sara’s head while the women giggled.  “We really missed something.  They’re all on drugs.”

Michael walked back into the room and glanced around.  “What’d I miss?”

They’re on drugs, bro.  Just eat before you get a contact high from them.”

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