AllFreeNovel
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I make a show of putting my phone in my pocket, and smile at Goran when he tells me the cab he’s ordered is almost here. We’re behaving like kids, Eli and I, but in a weird way I like it. He’s angry but I’ll make it up to him. And then he’ll take me home.
There’s a rush of heat in my blood that I haven’t felt for the longest time.
After college I didn’t go dancing any more. I certainly didn’t annoy hot hockey players who have a jealous streak.
And I didn’t promise to dance for them afterward.
I spent my twenties and thirties building up my career. Proving I was more than my name. Maybe I was trying to prove something to myself, too. That I wasn’t some nepo baby who was famous for baring all on a stupid ice rink.
The cab arrives and four of us pile in. I’m sandwiched between Goran and Ryan, with Carter opting to sit in the front. Eli gets into the next cab, looking way too delectable in a pair of dark gray pants and a white shirt, and he still doesn’t look at me.
Goran and Carter trash talk each other the whole way. Ryan is on his phone, tapping out messages like he’s using a manual typewriter, his fingers crashing against the screen.
“Boyfriend trouble,” Goran whispers in my ear during a break from bitching with Carter.
“Oh.” I give Ryan a sympathetic smile, but he’s too busy frowning at his screen for that.
When we get to the club Goran gets out first, offering me a hand to pull me to the sidewalk, which I appreciate because the skirt I’m wearing is tight and liable to shift up my thighs. Eli’s cab beat ours and they’re already at the door. He turns around and his eyes meet mine for a moment.
I stare back, unruffled. I’m going to dance so hard for this man he won’t know what hit him. I’m stupidly excited about it.
Security waves us in through the roped area. There’s thirty of us in all. Eli puts his card behind the bar and whispers in the server’s ear, I assume about a limit. Then the first round arrives, shots and beers. Goran insists that I take one of each.
“We down the shot then we down the beer,” he tells me.
“Is that a Swedish tradition?” I ask him.
He laughs. “No, we just need to get the party started.”
It works. Another round comes out and I turn it down. The music is pumping, the dancefloor is full, and the guys are getting a lot of attention from the customers who know exactly who they are.
Three girls surround Goran. He’s grinning like a loon. Some others approach Carter and he waves them off. That’s when I remember his girlfriend and her pregnancy scare. My estimation of him goes up. He knows where his boundaries are and I like that.
Eli is talking to Brian when a woman comes up with a piece of paper. She whispers in his ear and slides the paper into his shirt pocket.
And all my amusement disappears in that one tiny movement, replaced by a searing heat in my stomach. Yes, I’m pissed with him and I know he’s furious with me, but there’s no way I’m letting somebody put their number in his pocket. I’m about half a second away from stomping over there when Eli shakes his head and takes the piece of paper from his pocket and hands it back to her.
She leans forward and says something else but Eli isn’t looking at her anymore.
He’s looking at me.
The woman flounces back to the dance floor and joins her group of friends who all laugh and shake their heads. My gaze turns back to Eli.
He lifts his phone.
I take my own out and read it.
Want to go home yet? – Eli
How can he read my mind so easily? Yes, I do. I want to finish this day because somehow it’s ended wrongly. What should have been happy has turned sad. And I know that it happens – that’s what life is made of after all.
But I still want it to be over and to start afresh.
Yes I do. But I’m going to dance for you first. – Mackenzie
You can do it for me at home. – Eli
Nice try. – Mackenzie
