Page 30 of Revelry (Cowgirls Do It Better #2)

His cheeks flushed and he ducked his head.

I flinched, I hadn’t meant to make him feel bad.

“No, it’s a good thing!” I rushed to reassure him.

“When me and Gary used to go out for dinner, I’d always want to order the same thing but he hated it and always made me order something new.

Like, I’ve come here because there’s something specific I want, why would I order something else and be disappointed that I can’t have the thing I wanted, you know? ” I ranted.

His eyes narrowed, assessing me and he took my menu away, putting it on the table in front of me and covering it. “So what are you having?”

“Classic cheese,” I replied.

“And? Crust? Sauce? Side? Drink?” He counted them off on his fingertips.

“Thin crust, BBQ sauce. Don’t hate on me!” I insisted when his expression blanched, and he stuck a tongue out. “Side of garlic dippers, cheesy bites and a root beer float.”

“BBQ sauce with a plain cheese pizza? Girl, you’re weird.”

I laughed. “I am not! Fine Pizza King, what’s your order?”

“Pepperoni, stuffed crust, sweet tomato sauce and chicken wings.” He shot me a triumphant smile that I felt all the way to the tips of my toes.

“Pepperoni, interesting.”

He shrugged, picking at a crack in the vinyl booth. “I like the circles. My OCD likes the circular meat on a circular base.”

“Lord in Heaven above!” Tony exclaimed, appearing at the end of our booth, a hand to his chest as he looked between me and Tate. “He’s brought a girl here!”

“Hey Tony,” I laughed, reaching up to give him a hug.

“My little Gertie!” He wrapped me in a big hug, squeezing tight before letting me go and turning back to Tate. “Ah, now it all makes sense. Now I see why you were always here alone, it was the one next door all along, huh?”

“No, Tony, it’s not like—” Tate began, but Tony was on a roll.

“I used to see the way you watched her, so lovesick it hurt my own heart.” Tony clapped his hands over his chest and shook his head woefully. “But not anymore! What a beautiful couple you two make. What do you want? It’s on the house,” he effused.

I watched Tate’s expression grow more chagrined with each sentence from Tony’s mouth.

“I will have words with you later about this,” he growled to Tony who just winked shamelessly.

We ordered and Tony left, spouting more merriment about our budding romance. I turned to Tate, my lips rolled in to stop my laughter.

“I did not watch you like a lovesick fool,” Tate grumbled.

I shrugged, my heart growing ten sizes in my chest. “Yeah, you did. But it’s fine, I watched you too.”

I hadn’t meant it to be the statement it was, I just wanted to relax him. He must have felt a little overwhelmed being out in public with me. But his shocked expression said I’d revealed more than I meant to.

I was desperate to change the subject. “So, OCD? That’s a bummer, huh?”

He shook his head, chuckling. “Yeah, it kinda is.”

“You mentioned therapy? How’s that going?”

We paused to greet Tilly Cartwright who brought us our drinks. I groaned inwardly about the side-eye she kept giving us. The small smirk on her face that said Kat was definitely going to hear about this. Damn small towns.

“I think it’s going okay. Could be better but definitely could be worse too,” he said when we were alone again.

“How long have you been in therapy?” I played with my paper straw, watching as it unraveled in my glass.

“On and off for years but I’ve been with my current therapist for a year. He’s different from the others, he’s not conventional. He cares about me as a person but he pushes me too.”

“How does he push you?”

“He sets me goals and when I lie about achieving them, he calls me out on my shit.”

I laughed. “Good! What goals has he set for you?”

Tate rubbed the back of his neck and went to push his glasses up his nose but remembered he wasn’t wearing them. Another anxiety-related habit.

“We’re working on ERP at the moment, it’s Exposure and Response Prevention treatment. Essentially exposing me to things that cause my anxiety to flare and then stopping my compulsory response. He wanted me to make friends, socialize.” He cleared his throat. “Get laid.”

I spat my drink out. “Get laid?”

Tate rolled his eyes and offered me a napkin. “Well, no, I just called it that. He wanted me to go on a date, try and meet someone.”

I dabbed at my mouth. “So, I’m helping you with your therapy? Not the getting laid, just the having fun,” I rushed to clarify.

His mouth quirked. “Something like that.”

“How does ERP help you?”

He rubbed the back of his neck again, his bicep flexing in a distracting way. “We’ve got a hierarchy starting from something minor like leaving my desk untidy or kitchen messy and it goes up from there on the scale of things that would make me anxious.”

“What’s the thing that makes you the most anxious?” I was desperate to know what his biggest fear was, to have that vulnerability from him and also figure out if it’s something we could conquer together. It was foolish of me but I was invested now.

Then our pizza came and interrupted us. Tony once again congratulated us on our newfound romance and Tate kept trying to set him straight, but I grabbed his hand and called him snookums and enjoyed watching that hard jaw clench in frustration.

Tate bit into his pizza and groaned. “So delicious. It’s so good having something you know is good.”

I bit into mine, the cheese contrasting beautifully with the BBQ sauce and groaned too.

“Perfection.”

We talked until late, outlasting all the local teenagers. I was sure Tony was staying open later just for us. Our previous topic was forgotten and I didn’t feel like I could bring it up again. When it was almost midnight, we tried to pay our bill but Tony refused.

“He’s too sweet,” I said when we left, heading over to our bikes.

“He is. He’s a devil though,” Tate grumbled, and I laughed. “Where to now?”

“You want more?” I asked, arching a brow.

“Always,” Tate said, nudging my shoulder. I checked the time and on seeing how late it was realized there was nowhere else open, including the bar. But I had an idea.

“The night’s only just beginning. Follow me,” I said, swinging a leg over my bike and pedaling off towards The Lonely Bison.