Page 44 of Over Time Advantage

“So,” he prods again, “have you thought of me at all?” he asks hopefully.

I take a sip of the most delicious drink in creation, which will now forever be on my drink order list. “We’re doing the honesty thing from now on, right?”

He nods. “We are.”

After a large gulp for some liquid courage, I admit, “Yes. A lot. You weren’t alone in feeling a spark that night.” I reach for his hand. “I felt it too. And I’ve thought of you often. More often than I’d like to admit.”

We stare at each other as something passes between us. It’s electric.

He picks up my hand and kisses it. “Have I told you how beautiful you look tonight?”

I wordlessly shake my head.

“You’re stunning. Complete and total perfection.” He winks at me with a knowing smirk. “I might need to take a picture of you and use it as my wallpaper.”

“Wait,” I say as a memory from our night together hits me. “Don’t you have a flip phone? How did you manage to get yourself on the app?”

His smile grows. “After you rejected me, I went out and bought my first iPhone. My kids had to help me learn how to use it. It took a lot of time and patience, but I think I get it now.”

“You bought an iPhone just to join the dating app so you could talk to me?”

He nods before looking toward the dance floor and then back at me. “Would you like to dance?”

I scrunch my face. “I don’t actually know how to line dance.”

He smiles. “I know. I was there when you adorably giggled while you put it on your profile, and you told Lloyd. But lucky for you, I do. My mother didn’t have a husband, so she’d make me go with her all the time when I was growing up. I hated it when I was a little boy, but I grew to enjoy it.”

I remember him telling me during one of our late-night chats that his parents divorced when he was a baby.

“Were you ever that little?” I ask, taking in his enormous body. “It’s hard for me to imagine you as a little boy.”

He lets out a laugh. “I was born at twenty-three inches and eleven and a half pounds.”

I audibly gasp. “Oh my god. Your poor mother.”

He chuckles as he stands and grabs my hand. “Come on, angel face. Dance with me.”

That’s the first time he’s called me angel face in person. I’m confident I’ll now be putty in his hands whenever he does so because hearing those soft words uttered by this hard man has got my head spinning and libido on overdrive.

When we approach the dance floor, the band leader looks at Jett, and they seem to exchange some sort of silent acknowledgment. The man cuts the music and brings his mouth into the microphone. “I understand we have a new friend tonight who wants to learn a dance.” He stares right at me.

My eyes widen at a hundred pairs of eyes looking at me as I turn to Jett in time to see him bite back a smile. He leans down and whispers, “It’s your first lesson. Just have fun. It’s all about letting loose and having a good time.”

I squeeze his hand, though I’d rather crawl into his arms and disappear from this entire scene.

The band leader continues, “Tonight we’re going to learn an oldie but a goodie. A bit of a staple in line dancing. It’s called the Footloose. Let’s get lined up properly and show our new friend how it’s done.”

Everyone cheers before they get into rows as if professionally trained. I feel like I’m in one of those cheesy movies where all the kids at the prom have a fully choreographed dance, except I’m the one person at the prom who doesn’t know the routine.

“Alright,” he happily announces, “we’re going to run through the steps and then add the music and have a blast. It’s a simple thirty-two-count routine you repeat over and over with a quarter turn in between each set. Are we ready?”

The crowd excitedly screams that they are. I’m still absorbing the fact that a thirty-two-count routine is considered simple.

“The first eight count is a grapevine to the right and then a grapevine to the left. Ready? Five, six, seven, eight, step right, left behind, step right, left foot stomp. Good. Now step left, right behind, step left, right foot stomp. Make sure when those boots come together, you stomp it out. Don’t forget to clap on each beat of the grapevine.”

Wholly crap. Everyone is doing it so easily while I stumble through, trying to copy them. I look around and do my best to follow their lead. Okay, this isn’t bad. I can do it. Some side steps. I can handle this.

He repeats it a few times before moving on to the next steps. “Next, we’re doing a traditional K-step. Take your right foot and step forward diagonally and then meet it with your left foot. Take your left foot and step back diagonally and then meet it with your right foot. Now right foot back diagonally and meet it with your left. Then forward left, meeting it with your right. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.”