“Who, me?”
The man’s eyes narrow, as if to point out that we’re both willingly standing in a damp New York City alleyway in February and that in itself is a questionable offense. My own frown deepens. I don’t need masculine pity-worry from someone who’d attend this wedding. “I’m okay. Are you?”
This is a kindness unnecessarily wasted on a man in a tuxedo. But he nods, appeased by my answer, and finally goes back to his phone. I pretend to do the same, though I can’t stop peeking. It isn’t that I’m hoping he keeps paying attention to me, or anything like that. Genuinely flirting with a man would require me to temporarily stop being Cat Cromwell, Fun Fashion Girl, a mask I wear like it’sglued to my frame. I’d have to stop running, and you’ve got to keep moving if you want to keep having fun. The second I let my guard down, get domestic with a stranger who’d never be able to handle my true self… that’s slowing down. That’s doom.
It’s just that he really does look familiar. Too familiar. And that isn’t a good thing in my line of work. I know I haven’t broken his heart; I charge triple for men who look like they have opinions about the Socratic method, even before you factor in the elegantly disheveled, tortured-celebrity-crush aesthetic.
My blood goes cold.
Oh my God.
I twist away, turning to face the streetlight at the front of the alleyway. Okay. No, this is—totally fine. So, yes. I do know who’s standing behind me. It doesn’t matter. I’m not eighteen anymore. I haven’t watched Formula 1 in years. I’m not going totalk to him.
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
He’s talking to me. Again. And there’s something new in his voice—irritation, maybe—like I’ve annoyed him by possibly being not okay. My face goes red beneath my weapons-grade foundation, but I take a deep breath, smooth my hair into place, and turn back around. “Totally fine. Just had to get some fresh air.” I smile again, like his whole patronizing, I-know-better-than-you gambit is so endearing. And fine, it was. Once upon a time. From afar. But as is, I’m very unendeared by it.
With an equally unimpressedhmm, his gaze dips to my feet. We’re almost the same height, spot-on, and his eyes really are alarmingly brown, so it’s a bit obvious. “You a friend of Bernard’s?”
“Oh, no.” I not-so-subtly lean farther away. “Just here with someone.”
“Someone you’re leaving?” he asks skeptically.
I bite my lip. “Well.”
“Well?” he repeats, waiting for more.
More that he won’t get. “Well! You caught me.”
His head tilts, and his wavy hair tilts with him. Unlike his younger days, he’s mostly clean-shaven, though his hair’s longer—tiltable. Then he hums, unsmiling, unblinking, and a tiny wave of unease rolls down my spine. “Just a phrase,” I find myself adding. “It’s not—I really am fine, if that’s what you’re worried about. I’m not, like, hiding. The date just wasn’t that great.”
“Why?”
I blink. Many times, actually. “He’s… I guess I didn’t expect all this.”
“All what?”
“You know, ice sculptures, multiple cocktail hours.”
He exhales out an almost silent, almost emotionless laugh. “Not for you?”
I hesitate. There are all different ways to look at someone: pupils blown with desire, excitement clouding your better judgment, seeing without seeing. Those are the kind of looks I’m used to. But his eyes are stuck on my face, calmly and acutely curious about me and my answers and my sneaking around, and I don’t like it at all. I know who he is. I once spent fifty dollars on a bootleg shirt with his face on it. But why is he looking at me like he knows whyI’mhere?
Or maybe… well.
Maybe he’s looking because hewantsto look at me.
I entertain this thought for one nanosecond. His curious eyes. How his shoulders fill out that suit. This is younger me’s ultimate fantasy: a Wattpad of an evening with Fausto Ferreira Sanchez. Also known as Faust, the Pride of Portugal, Stark-Benzin Racing’s favorite, and one of the best Formula 1 drivers of all time.
Then the nanosecond is over, and I push the thought away so easily that I give myself chills. “You know what, I’m being so rude.” I suck in a breath through my fake smile. “I should go make sure I’ve said bye to him.”
I wait a moment. Here’s when my former hero hits me with the classic man-getting-left-at-a-party response:Oh no, don’t go, you’re so (insert adjective here).Only, he doesn’t. Faust just looks at me, quiet and unreadable. And I guess I read him… slightly wrong. Or I’ve been dismissed? Noted as unattainable? I peek over my shoulder one more time as I head back inside—where I fully intend to hide until my car’s here, away from him and his twenty questions.
Faust has returned to his phone. Thumbs tapping, brow furrowed.
I don’t wait for him to notice me again.
I breeze back inside, heading to the nearest ladies’ room, through the little powder room with its vanity seating area and fire-hazard scented candles, toward the actual sinks. God, I’m good. Who else could shut down a man they used to watch on TV? And yeah, I don’t love how he looked at me, fascinated and foreboding and scary-hot, but I highly doubt that Faust’s heard of me, and really, my problem is having such an oddly specific type of—
