Restoring Hope Read Online Free PDF Page A

back to the kitchen as Nic stared after her, the sway of her hips locking his eyes in place.
    “When you need more crawfish, you let T-Hope know, 'kay Nic,” Rose jumped in as she watched Hope scurry away and then turned without waiting for his answer to chase after her.
    Turning his head back to his son, they both dug into the big bowl of crawfish. Nic watched as Nicky devoured what he thought was the best crawfish this side of the Mississippi. Pulling the shell apart, until the white, tender meat showed itself, he grabbed it and popped it into his mouth.
    “That T-Hope is pretty,” Nicky replied around a mouth full of food.
    “Saw that did you,” Nic smiled, and then leaned forward and ruffled Nicky’s hair.
    “Kinda hard to miss, she’s got curves in all the right places.” Nic stopped chewing, and wondered when he’d missed his son turning from a boy to man.
    “What do you know about curves?”
    “Not that much, but like I said, hers were hard to miss.”
    Looks like it’s time for “the talk” Nic thought, but he had to admit, Nicky wasn’t wrong, Hope did have curves you couldn’t miss.
    A few tables over, several men who apparently had been drinking too much and consuming their weight in crawfish, seemed to be growing louder by the minute. Nicky turned his head and watched them for a moment and then turned back grinning.
    “I love coming here, all the crawfish you can eat, and I get to see ass—I mean drunks make fools of themselves.” Nic shook his head chuckling. Yeah, he’d definitely missed the moment when his son had taken that step into manhood.
    Grabbing a piece of corn, Nic’s eyes caught on Hope as she came out of the kitchen with another large bowl filled with bright red crawfish and his eyes stayed on her as she placed them on a table near the belligerent diners. One of the men caught a look at her in that tight Tee and said something to her. She ducked her head ignoring them, and Nic watched as her face paled. Considering how ivory her skin was, he figured whatever the man said must have been bad to cause a reaction like that. Hope shook her head when he said something else, and when she tried to leave the man grabbed her arm and pulled her into his lap. She went stock-still, and the look on her face turned his stomach sour. Without a thought, he stood up and walked over to the table.
    “You’ve had your fun now let her up,” Nic rumbled low in his throat. Hope kept her eyes to the floor, and Nic watched as she started to tremble. Reaching out to help her up, she jerked when his hand came into view of her face and bucked back; looking up, fear in her eyes.
    “We’re just having fun man, chill,” the drunk slurred.
    “Give me your hand, sugar,” Nic told Hope, his voice gentle, not wanting to spook her again. Hope finally looked at him and without hesitation put her hand in his outstretched one, grabbing on tight.
    “The lady wants up, now let her up,” Nic repeated. He was pissed Hope could tell, but he wasn’t the only one. She was angry with herself for reacting the way she did to some asshole. This “good old boy” might have been a nice person when sober, no, scratch that, Hope knew better. Alcohol brought out the bastard quicker than flies on manure, as Big Daddy would say. Taking a deep breath, determined not to let another man make her feel small, she leaned forward suddenly breaking the drunken fools hold on her and stood as Nic pulled her up and then pushed her behind him. Nic leaned into the drunk and with an icy voice told him, “You keep your hands to yourself, and we got no problems, you hear me?” One of his friends put a hand on his shoulder saying, “Be cool, Jason.” Jason, being drunk, shrugged off the hand and stood, but only reached the top of Nic’s chin. Apparently being drunk also made Jason think he was bigger than he was, ‘cause he didn’t notice Nic outweighed him by a good thirty pounds, and most of that was muscle, Hope figured.
    Nic