Lise didn’t see any sign of the bodyguards who usually stayed close to Raed when he went outside the palace, but no matter. This was about a date. Not about bodyguards. She climbed into the passenger seat and buckled in while Raed rolled up the windows and tested his hands around the steering wheel. His shoulders dropped, and he looked completely at home driving.
“We’re not racing to the restaurant, are we?”
He reached over and took her hand. “I’ll go the speed limit.”
Lise laughed. “I don’t believe you.”
“Watch me.”
He did drive the speed limit, all the way through the city. The sun had finished setting while she put Jake to bed, and now the lights spilled from store windows and streetlights, bathing everything in a glow that reminded her of being in college. Back then, nights had seemed endless and full of possibility. This night felt just like that. She let out a happy sigh. Life had gone differently than Lise thought it would. Who’d have predicted that she would be so taken with the idea of going out for one evening?
Raed took one turn, then another. Lise took one calming breath, then another. She needed to think of this as a way to pass the time together, not some momentous occasion. Like going to the movies. Or having coffee together. Raed took a left into an underground parking garage, and Lise couldn’t help but search for clues about the restaurant. There were too many of them in the area to know which one Raed had chosen, and she didn’t even see security’s black SUV parked on the street.
They climbed out of the car, and Raed offered her his elbow, which she held on to, pretending they were threading their way through a crowd at the opera. Maybe that was a little much, but this was her night out. For all she knew, it could be her only night out. They crossed the street and entered a building that looked like pure luxury. A gleaming white façade. Six stories. Lush flowers out front, and a uniformed doorman at the door. Raed nodded to them as they passed by.
“This is not a restaurant,” Lise murmured into his ear.
“This is unlike any restaurant you’ve ever seen.” They went into a lobby with high ceilings and a polished black floor, the center of which was covered by a long red carpet.
“Are they not serving food?” Lise joked, but Raed only patted her hand with an indulgent smile that made her want to kiss him or smack him. Maybe both. He led her to a bank of elevators and Raed drew a white card from his pocket and pressed it against a keypad outside the last set of silver doors. Oh—not just an elevator, then. A private elevator. The doors slid open, and they stepped inside. Raed’s fingertips on her shoulders turned her away from him. “What am I looking at?”
He leaned down and kissed her cheek. “Nothing.”
Then the blindfold came down over her eyes.
She gasped, her hands flying to her face, but Lise didn’t pull it down, her heart hammering. “What kind of game are you playing?”
He tied it firmly behind her head, tugging it to make sure it stayed in place, and pulled her back against him. For that moment, Raed was the only person in the world—there was nothing else except the tugging ascent of the elevator. A moment later, the doors opened again, and Raed’s hand on her back guided her out onto another stretch of soft carpeting.
“Good evening,” said a man’s voice, smooth and welcoming. “I’ll be your personal guide tonight. Do you need help with your blindfold, sir?”
“No, thank you.” Raed stepped away, and she felt his elbow brush against her upper arm. He really was tying on a blindfold, then. “We’re set.”
“If you’d reach your hand out to my shoulder, I’ll take you to your table.”
“What is this?” Lise kept her voice low. Who knew what kind of room they were entering? “Is it some kind of obstacle course?”
The other man chuckled. “This is dark dining. All of our guests are similarly blindfolded, so you’ll have complete privacy—except for your voices, of course. It’s a unique sensory experience. Here’s your table. It’s a booth for two, tucked into a corner.”
Lise reached forward and found the hardwood edge of the table, her knee bumping into the seat of the booth a second later. Raed followed her in. The lightest possible touch came after—the guide, showing her where her silverware was, where her water glass was, where everything was.
“Your server will be by with the first course in a few minutes,” he said, and then she could sense the empty space where he had been—a shift in the air.
“This is mind-blowing,” she whispered to Raed. “Just listening...”
Every sound around them seemed amplified, and Lise craved more of it. Behind the blindfold she had no sense of the lighting in the room. It was probably kept dimmed so that mishaps with the blindfolds didn’t leave people stumbling and blinking, she decided. The swell of conversation rose around them—so, not a big room—and all of it was punctuated with the click and ring of silverware against china.
“Incredible, isn’t it?” Raed’s hand caught hers so easily she wondered for a split second if he’d taken his blindfold off. Only one way to find out. Lise traced a path up his arm, over the crisp white shirt he wore, and found the smooth pane of his cheek. He felt...exquisite. Expensive. Like royalty. She’d never imagined that a person could feel royal, but there he was, all cut angles and defined cheekbones, a smile playing over his perfect mouth.
“Good evening,” said a new voice. “I’ll be your waiter for this evening. Simply raise a hand if you need my attention, but I’ll be keeping note of anything you need. I have your first course.” Another gentle touch on her hand showed Lise where the edge of the plate was. She grabbed for a fork. “Mini kebabs,” came that voice. “In a sauce of our chef’s invention.”
It felt so risky and delicate to spear the plate with her fork and lift it to her mouth. Flavor exploded on her tongue—the sauce was sweet and salty and the beef underneath so tender that she let out a little noise. Raed’s hand—still holding hers—tensed.
“That good?”
“Haven’t you taken a bite?”
“Not yet.” A laugh rumbled out of him. “And now that you’ve made that sound—”
She squeezed his hand back. “We’re not leaving yet.” A charge went through her. “Here. Taste this.”
Getting the bite to Raed’s mouth involved tracing the lines of his lips, and the blindfolds—if everyone was blindfolded, then Lise could risk...
Once his mouth closed around his bite, she leaned in and brushed a kiss to those lips. Raed took in a sharp breath and then his hand was on her arm, tugging her closer, to kiss her again.
It was like being hit by a wave—sudden and powerful, and she sat up, her whole body singing with the sensation. No one could see, but they were all so close—murkiness and laughing.
“My turn,” said Raed, and then it was time for Lise to lift her chin and open her mouth for him. Another bite. Another burst of flavor.
“This is—I think you planned this,” she breathed. “I think you chose the most distracting way to eat in the entire city.”
“Distracting?” A stroke down her arm, his fingertips moving lightly over her wrist. “I think we’re both completely focused on this meal. Don’t you?”