Maybe Leo was a good guy. Maybe he didn’t know what his dad had been up to in the beginning, and when he got wind that Omar was interested in meeting his sister for his own selfish reasons, he dropped the ass**le like he deserved to be dropped. If this were all true, it might be a good thing. Angel couldn’t always be around to protect her, so knowing she had a defensive brother who didn’t take kindly to anyone messing with his sister was a damn good thing. But until he knew for sure, Angel would be keeping his guard up. He trusted no one.

Chapter 11

Sarah

It had only been three weeks—three games since the season started—and Alex had been out of commission for two of them. Angel had told Sarah about how increasingly bitter his brother was about it with every practice he wasn’t allowed to participate in. Luckily, it was Alex’s first ankle injury ever. He hadn’t broken it, just fractured it pretty badly, but the docs were giving him the green light to join practices and play in this week’s game against Hawaii.

As bad as Valerie felt for Alex, Sarah knew she would’ve loved for him to be out at least one more week. Now he’d be making the trip to Hawaii, and there was no telling how he’d be celebrating out there now that he was back in shape to play.

Sarah and Angel had only talked about Dana one other time since the day Sarah mentioned the stuff Dana had been blogging about and the countdown. Sarah didn’t want to worry about Dana because she was such a nonissue, but Sarah couldn’t help wonder not if but how stupid Dana would be about this.

With less than an hour left of her shift at the restaurant, Sarah shook any thoughts of Dana away and began to mentally prepare for that night’s first meeting with Leonardo. Angel was picking her up there at the restaurant after his practice, and they’d head to the marina where they’d meet Leonardo. There was a seafood fest going on at the marina, and they’d all agreed it would be a nice casual place to meet and walk around. Leonardo had a friend who lived in San Diego. He’d be staying with him for the night then heading back to Phoenix in the morning.

Sarah was a little nervous but glad now that she’d waited. The many chats they’d had so far made her feel as though she’d already met him. She’d since decided that his calling her beautiful often was just his way. He often referred to his stepsister and his mom in similar sweet ways—even calling his mom his queen. Just as Angel and all his brothers often called Sofie sweetheart, some guys were just like that. She wouldn’t admit it to Angel, but she liked it. Too often she’d felt a little jealous of Sofie and some of her other friends who had siblings they were so close to. Not that she expected to ever be that close to Leonardo, but this was a nice start.

The day they decided to meet, Sarah brought up the possibility of Omar being there as well. Leonardo admitted to having put in a call and a few texts to Omar, all of which had gone unanswered. Then he said something so reminiscent of what Angel would say. “Fuck him. If this is how he’s gonna be, then we don’t need his ass.” He went on to say he wasn’t waiting on him, and they planned their meeting—just the two of them. And Angel of course.

“No!” Sarah turned at the sound of a man’s loud voice a few tables over from the one she was waiting on. “I asked for hot tea, not iced.”

Cindy, the newer waitress waiting on his table, apologized, taking the glass of iced tea he was shoving at her.

“Is the service here always this bad?” he asked loudly as his embarrassed date or wife hid behind her menu. “Read back my order,” he demanded. “I wanna make sure you got it right.”

Cindy started to, and he immediately interrupted her rudely. “On the side!” he said. “How hard is that to get? I said I want the pico on the side, but the guacamole and sour cream I want on the taquitos.”

Writing it down and apologizing again, poor Cindy finally finished taking their order and rushed away.

Sarah finished delivering the plates to her table and asked if there was anything they needed as she glanced in the direction of the back office. Alex was here tonight since his release to be able to practice wasn’t scheduled for another few days.

She hurried toward the kitchen where Cindy was making sure the cooks got the order right. “What an ass**le,” Sarah said as she approached, tacking another order slip up for the cooks.

Cindy shook her head, rolling her eyes. “I need those salads on the fly, Raul,” she added loudly.

“Why?” Alex came up from behind Raul in the kitchen taking a closer look at Cindy’s order slip. “How long have they been waiting?”

“Not long at all,” Cindy said. “I have others who’ve been waiting longer. He’s just a real jerk, and I’d rather not piss him off.”

“There’s others who’ve been waiting longer?” Alex’s brows furrowed.

“Well, not that much longer,” she explained.

“They just got here,” Sarah clarified for Cindy. “He’s just one of those loud mouth idiots who like talking down to the waitresses.”

Alex looked out into the dining room. “Table eight?”

“Yeah,” Cindy said as she poured the hot tea into a cup. “And I know he said iced tea not hot, but he let me have it for bringing him the iced one. Maybe he meant hot, but he ordered iced.”

“He can wait,” Alex said, still peering at the guy. “Take care of the slips in the order they came in,” he said to the Raul then turned back to Cindy and Sarah. “Let me know if he gets disrespectful.”