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Books are safer than men. “Of course you can.”
He winks at me, possibly knowing it will cause an all-out body tingle for me. “Tell me what your degree in poetry has done for you. What real-world skill have you acquired?”
I don’t want to be a loser. I don’t want to be the butt of a joke or the mark of someone’s con. It’s true, my degree has been useless in many real-world situations, but there is one thing that a degree in poetry has given me.
I know how to rhyme.
I take off my reading glasses and stand up. He pulls back, wondering what I’m up to, and I walk to a table and pull out a chair. As I start to climb on it, Nash rushes over to hold my arm and stabilize my climb.
“What the hell are you doing, Gertrude?”
I rise to my feet, and all seven patrons look at me when I yell out, “Excuse me, I have something to say.”
The volume on the jukebox magically goes down, something I still haven’t figured out how to do even though I’ve fiddled with every button on it, and I take a deep breath. “There once was a princess from the city. One day, her life got very shitty. She moved to the Bay, the beast said she couldn’t stay, and now everyone has his pity.”
Everyone claps and I mock bow, pleased with myself for doing something so unTru. When they ask for another, I blush but do my best.
“The once was a fellow named Nash. Who claimed he had the best ass. It’s not what you thought, not supple or taut, but brays too much and eats grass.”
Nash folds his arms over his chest. His very broad chest that is stretching the limits of his Hanes t-shirt. He’s pretending to be chagrined with me, but I see the smile behind the smirk and I think I just impressed him a little.
He offers me a hand down, but when I get to the floor, he doesn’t move back right away, and the chair is pressed up against my legs. My stomach quivers and my nipples perk up like they think they can reach him if they try hard enough. I move my eyes up, way up, and he looks so big and bad and ...sexy. The breath catches in my throat. I can’t touch the bottom here. I don’t know what to do with sexy. No one has ever been sexy in my vicinity before. His gaze is amused and heated, like he knows exactly what he’s doing to me and isn’t the least bit sorry about it.
“Ahem,” a woman clears her throat from behind Nash, and he turns and steps away.
“Stella,” he intones. The way he might to a little sister who is asking to play with his toys or hang out in his “boys only” treehouse.
“I want to borrow Tru for a bit. She hasn’t met Dixie, and I think she needs a break.”
He puts his hands on his hips, drawing my attention to the V of his waist. “She hasn’t been working hard enough to need a break.” His gaze meets mine, relaxed despite his pretend gruffness.
“Good, then you don’t need her.”
“No dogs, Stella. I’m serious.”
I don’t know why he bothers with the pretend gruffness. I haven’t seen it work on anyone yet.
Stella pulls me away to the corner and introduces me to Dixie, her soon to be sister-in-law.
“So you’re getting married,” I say and bite my tongue so I don’t warn her to do a title search on the groom first. “How did you meet Stella’s brother?”
“Oh, you’re gonna love this,” Stella interrupts. “Dixie was a wrong number text to Leo and they fell in love.”
“In a text?”
Dixie laughs. “Not just one text, no. Leo flirted with me in the text.”
“Gross,” Stella interjects, taking a sip of her wine.
“And then we just kept talking.”
“Talking.” Stella huffs indignantly and good-naturedly. “They had dirty, dirty phone sex and then found out they lived three blocks away from each other.”
“Wow, that’s quite a coincidence.”
“That’s destiny,” Dixie answers on a sigh. A sigh that says she might actually prefer Leo’s company to ours right now.
I roll my eyes and catch Stella doing the same and discover a woman I might actually be able to be friends with in a way I never could with my sorority sisters.
