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Sure enough, Sawyer saw one of his own teammates sidle up to the group and hold out a hand, inserting himself into their orbit with ease. Sawyer didn’t feel like he was part of anyone’s orbit here. He felt, once again, like an alien from an entirely different universe.
A hand clapped onto his shoulder, and Sawyer clamped his teeth together to stop from jumping out of his skin.
“Seemed lonely over here,” a guy said, his tan suit fitting him so perfectly he could have been sewn into the thing, his dark hair swept back off a face so alabaster pale that Sawyer wondered if the guy had ever stepped foot outside.
Sawyer rolled his shoulder and resisted the urge to brush off the area where the man’s hand had landed.
“Just taking a breather, I guess,” Sawyer said, being polite and searching the room for nothing in particular.
“I get it,” the guy said with a chuckle. “Trying to eye up the best prize, huh?”
The guy’s gaze landed on the red-haired girl’s bare back, and Sawyer was now regretting coming here more and more with every passing second.
“Antony White,” the guy said, holding out a hand which Sawyer didn’t deign to take.
“Sawyer,” he said, but before he could even say his last name, Antony was already interrupting, not fazed in the slightest by the handshake refusal.
“Oh, I know who you are,” Antony said. “I’ve seen the entire Falcons’ team here tonight. You sports guys really do move in packs, huh?”
Antony chuckled at what was, apparently, a joke and carried on with the conversation.
“I’m in tech, more of a solitary animal myself, hoping to finish up a new software design in the next few weeks that’s going to blow the whole market wide open…”
Sawyer felt the tips of his ears burn bright red with shame, thinking back to his bizarre mission in the middle of the night to call up some tech guy to get them to sabotage the sale of the farm. Well, mission accomplished. If he hadn’t been such an idiot all along, maybe he’d be back there right now, listening to the crickets rather than this guy’s nasally voice.
But then Antony’s voice stopped altogether and he stared at the glass in Sawyer’s hand.
“Are you seriously drinkingwaterat aparty?”
Sawyer blinked at him. “Yes.”
“Why?”
“You know, trying to stay healthy for training,” he said, taking a sip as if to make a point, the lemon residue sour on the tip of his tongue. His general distaste for the guy didn’t help either.
“Come on, have a beer on me.”
“It’s on a tab, no one is buying drinks.”
“Ah, if thisfootballthing doesn’t work out you’ve got a future in finance, my friend. You’ve got to be able to notice details like that. Come on, let’s get you a proper drink.”
“I’m fine,” Sawyer insisted, letting some bite come into his voice.
“You’re not seriously going to stand around a party and drink water. Come on, be aman.”
“And are you seriously going to try and peer pressure a thirty-year-old who can bench press three times your weight into drinking like it’s high school?”
Antony’s mouth closed with a snap, his eyes wide and shocked.
“Excuse me,” Sawyer said, not waiting for a response and not wanting one as he turned around and walked away. At this point he didn’t really care if he came across as rude. He just needed to get away.
Sawyer found another, more secluded corner for himself and sipped on his water, staring out the wall-length window, watching the city lights that looked like fallen stars. He must have looked brooding and unsociable enough that no one else approached him looking for conversation.
He had overheard snippets all night about how great the food was, how the chef was some Michelin star-winning genius and he and his staff had spent days preparing the menu for the party. So Sawyer was expecting a littlemorewhen he bit into the crispy dumpling than just… fine. He ate it despite not really being hungry. It was all right. But it didn’t make him lean back and sigh the way his meal at Back Creek Diner had. The way hisbrother’sfood had.
Sawyer had had enough. He dumped his glass of water out in the nearest pot plant, which was probably just plastic anyways, and weaved his way to the exit, not bothering to hide the fact that he was leaving. He yanked off his suit jacket as he waited for the elevator to take him down and pulled extra buttons on his shirt loose as he was closed up in the small cubicle, finally alone and still feeling claustrophobic from all the people that he’d been surrounded by.
What a waste of time. If he had stayed and bothered to try and find someone to talk to that was halfway interesting, there was a minimal chance of success. Even if he went back and talked to those ladies, it would just turn into flirting because it always did at events like this, and he didn’t want to flirt. Not with them.
