Lover Eternal: A Novel of the Black Dagger Brotherhood by J. R. Ward

already, and she was the antifun, buzz-kill type. Serious by nature, with some hard-core experience.
    And she didn't look like a party, either. The unremarkable hair growing out of her head was pulled back tight and cinched in a scrunchie. The creamy Irish knit sweater she had on was baggy and warm. Her khakis were comfortable, and her flats were brown and scuffed at the toes. She probably looked like the mother she would never be.
    When she walked into the restaurant, she found the hostess and was led to a booth in the back corner. As she put her purse down, she smelled green peppers and onions and looked up. A waitress whipped by with a sizzling iron plate.
    The restaurant was busy, a great cacophony rising up from all the life in the place. While waiters danced around with trays of steaming food or piles of used dishes, families and couples and groups of friends laughed, talked, argued. The mad chaos struck her as more awesome than ordinary, and sitting by herself she felt utterly separate, a poser among the real people.
They all had happy futures. She had… more doctor's appointments to go to.
    With a curse, she clipped her emotions into place, trimming off the panic and catastrophizing, leaving behind nothing but a resolve not to dwell on Dr. Delia Croce tonight.
Mary thought of topiaries and smiled a little, just as a harried waitress came up to the table. The woman put down a plastic glass of water, spilling some.
"You waiting for someone?"
     
"Yes, I am."
     
"You want a drink?"
     
"This is fine. Thanks."
     
As the waitress took off, Mary sipped the water, tasted metal, and pushed the glass away. Out of the corner of her eye she caught a flurry of movement at the front door.
     
Holy… Wow.
     
A man had walked into the restaurant. A really, really… very fine man.
    He was blond. Movie-star beautiful. And monumental in a black leather trench coat. His shoulders were broad as the door he'd come through, his legs so long he was taller than anyone in the place. And as he strode through the knot of people at the entrance, the other men looked down or away or at their watches, as if they knew they couldn't measure up to what he had going on.
Mary frowned, feeling like she'd seen him somewhere before.
     
Yeah, it's called the big screen , she told herself. Maybe there was a movie being shot here in town.
    The man stepped up to the hostess and ran his eyes over the woman as if trying her on for size. The redhead blinked up at him in stunned disbelief, but then clearly her estrogen receptors came to the rescue. She pulled her hair forward, as if she wanted to make sure he noticed the stuff, and then kicked out her hip as if she'd popped the thing out of joint.
Don't worry , Mary thought. He sees you, honey .
     
As the two of them started coming through the restaurant, the man surveyed every table, and Mary wondered who he was eating with.
    Aha . Two booths away there was a blonde seated alone. Her fuzzy blue sweater was skintight, the angora shrink-wrap showing off a dazzling display of assets. And the woman was radiating anticipation as she watched him come through the restaurant.
Bingo. Ken and Barbie.
    Well, not really Ken. As the guy walked along, there was something about him that wasn't WASPy handsome in spite of his amazing looks. Something… animalistic. He just didn't carry himself as other people did.
    Actually, he moved like a predator, thick shoulders rolling with his gait, head turning, scanning. She had the discomforting sense that if he wanted to, he could wipe out everyone in the place with his bare hands. Calling on her willpower, Mary forced herself to stare into her water glass. She didn't want to be like all the other gawking fools.
Oh, hell, she had to look up again.
     
He'd bypassed the blonde and was standing in front of a brunette directly across the aisle. The woman was smiling broadly. Which seemed only reasonable.
     
"Hey," he said.
     
Well, what do you know . Voice was spectacular,