Sweet Temptations

Chapter Twelve

I need honest opinions about this chapter. Please let me know how you feel about it and what could be done to improve it and what you'd like to see added to it. It's adding another element to the story and I want to be sure about before I move onto the next chapter. So the quicker, I get opinions on it, the sooner I can get started on the next chapter. Thanks. 

Chapter Twelve

“So Selene, why don’t you tell us a little bit more about you?” Adrienne said as Arturo rubbed her stomach comfortably.

Selene bit back a sigh of irritation. For the past fifteen minutes Adrienne and Adrian’s brothers had been asking her questions about her personal life under the guise of getting to know her better. The first question that they had asked had been,”Are you and Rafael in a relationship?” It had been annoying. She had already Adrian that they weren’t an item. They were just friends and that was it. She hadn’t wanted to come to this stupid dinner in the first place but Rafael and Adrian had pretty much made that decision for her when they were busy playing caveman.

Lifting the fork to her mouth she quickly took a bite of the food to avoid answering the question right away. She was eating a perfectly delicious meal that she knew Adrienne had prepared. The meal was a simple but flavorful meal, steak marinated in olive oil, some type of Italian seasoning, herbs, garlic and a variety of other seasonings that she recognized as she bit into the steak. It was juicy and tender. All in all it was the perfect steak. The steak was sided with mashed potatoes that were cooked in buttermilk. The last side with the meal was biscuits and asparagus. She didn’t really care too much for the woman’s seemingly all knowing personality but her food was absolutely scrumptious.

She looked around the fancy table that she was seated at. It was large enough to fit at least thirty people. However, it was set up so that the fourteen of them were seated perfectly. Adrian was at the head of the table, she was to his left and Adrienne to his right side. Next to Adrienne was her husband, Arturo followed by Adrian’s brothers, Alessandro, Armand, and two other brothers whose names she didn’t know. Seated on her right side was another brother, a woman, another brother, two other women and then Rafael. She was kind of irritated that they had isolated him down at the other end of the table. He was the only person keeping her calm in the midst of these people. Otherwise she would’ve felt like she was in the den of lions, not that she didn’t already but he soothed her.

 She couldn’t help but notice that—ever since they had arrived fifteen minutes ago and sat at the table—all eyes seemed to be on her. Chewing slowly she looked over at Adrienne and saw a slight look of disdain in the other woman’s eyes. She smiled inwardly. This woman didn’t really care for her, but it wasn’t like she gave a damn. She wasn’t trying to impress anyone, least of all Adrian’s family.

“What would you like to know?” she asked when she finished chewing five minutes later.

“Well tell us more about what you do on a daily basis,” Arturo said into the silence.

She looked down at the food on the plate and studied fortuitously before answering. “Well as you should know I work full time at a bar as a bartender. Majority of my time is spent there and then the rest of the day is mine for the taking,” she said.

“What bar do you work at?” one brother asked with his accent.

She looked down. Oh hell, they wanted to come to her place of work. Two brothers had already intruded. She didn’t need the others to come. The strippers at work would go crazy. She sighed and looked over at Rafael. He was seated at the end of the table and looking over at her with a gentle smile. She smiled back in return. She knew he had to feel unwanted in their presence, especially considering that they were ignoring him. If he had been at her end of the table she would have held his hand and squeezed it in comfort. The seating arrangement had been purposely set up that way and she knew it had been done purposely. However, she was just glad that Adrian hadn’t tried to touch her throughout the time they had been seated.