Page 103 of Spies Don’t Fall for Their Best Friend

He looks at me.

“I’m checking jaw function.”

“My jaw functions.”

“Then say it.”

“No.”

Suspicious.

We park near the Inner Harbor, and Miles grabs his navy jacket from the trunk before we head to The Copper Heron. It is exactly as awesome as the pictures I’ve seen. And by “awesome,” I’m referring to the large, burnished-copper heron standing beside the entrance. It’s nearly eight feet tall, has one leg raised, and its long beak angled toward the street with an expression of elegant judgment.

I stop beneath it. “It knows.”

Miles follows my gaze. “Knows what?”

“That I kicked you.”

“The heron doesn’t know anything.”

“It has already found me guilty. We have to get a picture.” I ask a man walking by to take a picture of us, and we pose like we’re feeling the heron’s judgement as he looks down at us.

Miles pulls open the restaurant door. It’s on the ground floor of a restored brick building near the waterfront with tall windows and warm pendant lights. Inside, the hostess smiles brightly when he gives his name.

Then her smile falters. “I’m sorry. I’m not finding that reservation.”

Miles’s expression remains pleasant. “I confirmed it yesterday. Five forty. Window table.”

“I’m so sorry,” the hostess says. “We don’t have a window table available, but we can seat you as soon as another table opens.”

“How soon?” Miles asks.

“Fifteen or twenty minutes.”

His eyes flick toward his watch, and his jaw tightens. Then he seems to regret tightening it.

The hostess’s eyes go wide as she pulls a paper out from a folder under her tablet. “Oh. We do have your reservation. Someone just…” She takes a deep breath. “We’ll make this right as quickly as we can.”

Ten minutes later, we are seated at a small table they brought out just to make it right for us. But I guess the only place they could find to put it was crammed into the route servers use to reach the kitchen. It does not have a waterfront view. It does, however, have an excellent view of swinging doors into the kitchen.

A server named Lucas appears and introduces himself. His gaze lands briefly on Miles’s jaw, which is more swollen than it was when we left iFLY. I know what Lucas is doing because it’s the exact same thing I would be doing if I were in his shoes— constructing a backstory about Miles’s still-forming bruise.

I lean closer to help him out. “I kicked him in the face while indoor skydiving, but only after he ignored a safety boundary in an attempt to rescue me.”

Lucas blinks.

“First date,” I add.

Miles closes his eyes.

A bit later, Lucas returns with water for us. As he reaches across the narrow table, another server comes through the swinging door and bumps him. The glass tips, and ice water pours directly into my lap.

I gasp.

Lucas makes a sound of absolute horror.

Miles is out of his chair before the empty glass reaches the table. “Are you okay?”