AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Well, I got some pictures of the place I was at. It had an open bar, but I was too afraid to make a drink," I said.
“What about Graham?” Dale asked.
“Well, he is absolutely every bit as gorgeous as he seems like he is. He was all hot and sweaty and grimy from the game.”
Dale and Steven had opposite reactions to this piece of news, which nearly made me spit my drink. Dale’s screwed-up face of distaste and Steven’s borderline-creepy smile were so polar opposite that I had trouble concentrating on the rest of it.
“What did he say?” Tamara asked, being a taskmaster for the story. I figured she was falling back on her journalism degree, but it was entirely possible she had just been deprived of gossip with Dale and Steven only ever bickering and then being wildly in love with one another.
“He said it was nice to see me and that I looked better than I had last time,” I said, eliciting sniggering and swoons from my three friends. “We shared a beer, and he saw that the team conference was going on and said he had to go. But he said he wanted to see me later, and I gave him my number. Then he said not to go too far.”
“Lord, woman,” Steven said. “How you maintained your composure in a time like that I will never know. It is so impressive.”
“Honestly, I don’t know how I did it either. The man is incredibly attractive. I’m not going to lie; I was tempted,” I said.
“Well, if you end up jumping his very large bones later tonight, I will need an update. Preferably before midnight. So get to it quickly, please,” Steven said.
“It’s not a date, guys,” I said. “We’re just going to go catch up. Two old friends. He’s not interested in me like that, I am sure of it. We’re just going to go get a drink together, swap some stories and reminisce for a while, and then I will be back at my apartment. Probably before midnight.”
Steven rolled his eyes dramatically.
“Seriously?” Tamara asked.
“Seriously,” I said. “I’ve had a crush on him for over ten years. I’m not going to ruin that for myself by doing something desperate. He wants to catch up. I want to catch up. The fact that he is incredibly, insanely attractive is completely beside the point.”
Dale had been quiet for longer than usual, and I looked over at him, his forefinger on his chin and his eyes searching the ceiling as if he was deep in thought.
“Dale?” Tamara asked, catching on to what I was seeing. “Dale?”
“Hmm?” he asked.
“What are you doing?”
“Oh, nothing,” he said. “There’s just a ‘rounding the bases’ joke in here somewhere, and I was trying to find it.”
Steven and I both groaned aloud, and Tamara hung her head. Shaking it off and rolling my eyes, I took a sip of the drink they had brought me.
We had been hanging out at the bar for about twenty minutes when my phone vibrated in my pocket. It had a rather intense effect on me since the pants I was wearing were so tight that slipping my phone into my pocket was an act of war with my own body. I jumped a little and then tried to pry it out of my pocket, much to the amusement of my friends.
When I finally got it out, I hadn’t even had time to unlock it before Dale and Tamara were hovering over it.
“What did he say?” Tamara asked.
“I don’t know yet,” I said.
I stared at them until they sat back down, Dale brushing his hand through his hair and downing a tequila shot.
Would you meet me at my hotel bar? Have a drink somewhere other than the stadium?
“He asked me if I would like to meet at the hotel bar for a drink, just like I said,” I said. “Nothing more interesting than two old friends catching up. So there.”
“You mean the hotel where he will be staying? So you will be a few floors below the place where his bed is? His big, lonely bed?” Dale teased.
“Yes,” I said. “At the bar. Where we will have a drink. That’s it.”
“I have my doubts,” Steven said.
“He might ask me to say hello to people back home,” I said. “I’ll give you that as a possibility.”
