From Seduction to Secrets

by Andrea Laurence

  “I wonder if Brooklyn will be able to find us.” I looked around, but I couldn’t see much of anything beyond the candlelight.

  “Hey, guys.” Nat appeared and hopped up on the stool next to Sophie.

  “What happened to your man?” Sophie asked.

  “When the lights went out, he squealed like a little girl.”

  “That’s disappointing,” I said.

  Sometimes I wondered if there were any good men left in the world. I had a list of qualities. I mean, it wasn’t a long list, mostly to do with integrity and temperament. But squealing like a little girl was definitely not on it.

  “So not the type to rescue you from a bear,” Sophie said to Nat. She sounded disappointed.

  There was laughter in Nat’s voice. “Who needs rescuing from a bear?”

  “I might go camping,” Sophie said.

  “You?” Nat asked.

  Five-star restaurant manager, downtown high-rise-dwelling Sophie was definitely not the outdoor type.

  “Well, maybe you,” Sophie said.

  Nat had been known to spend time outside—at least in her rooftop garden.

  “Then that’s definitely not my guy.” Nat took a two-second gaze back over her shoulder.

  I realized then, that after a mere five minutes I’d wondered if Nat’s guy would be the guy. It could have been a really romantic story—Nat meeting the love of her life while spending a girls’ weekend in San Francisco celebrating Brooklyn’s wedding.

  We were all single. Well, Brooklyn wouldn’t be single for long. But Sophie, Nat and me hadn’t had a lot of luck meeting men.

  Good guys were hard to find. I could list the flaws in each of my dates from the past six months: too loud, too nerdy, too intellectual, too moody.

  I knew how it sounded. And I realized perfectly well what I was doing with that list. If I focused on the guys, I didn’t have to explore the possibility that it was me—which, of course, deep down, I knew it was.

  I’d love to live in denial. And I would if I could figure out a way that I didn’t know denial was denial.

  So far, I hadn’t been able to make that work.

  “Where’s Brooklyn?” Nat asked.

  “Ladies’ room,” I said.

  Sophie craned her neck to gaze across the dim room. “She should be back by now. I hope she’s not stuck in an elevator.”

  “I’m going to go look for her.” I slid off my bar stool.

  “You’ll get lost, too,” Nat said. “Or you’ll trip and break your ankle.”

  I remembered my black-and-gold sling-back stilettos. They were stylish, but not the most stable footwear in my closet. Nat made a good point.

  Instead, I retrieved my phone from my purse and shot Brooklyn a text.

  I climbed back up and took a sip of my drink.

  We all stared at my phone for a few minutes, but Brooklyn didn’t text back.

  “Stuck on an elevator,” Nat said in conclusion.

  “Or in an ambulance,” Sophie said. “I bet she was rushing to get back to us in the dark, and it all went bad.”

  “Don’t even joke about that,” I said. “There are five hundred people coming to her wedding.”

  “And it’s a long way up the aisle at St. Fidelis’s,” Nat said. “What if she broke her leg?”

  “She didn’t break her leg,” I said and then realized I was tempting fate. “I mean, I hope she didn’t break her leg.”

  Brooklyn with a broken leg would be an unmitigated disaster.

  * * *

  It was thirty minutes before the lights came on. When they did, conversation around us spiked for a moment, and there was a smattering of applause.

  The bartender went back to work, and the waitresses began circulating around the room. Brooklyn still hadn’t returned from the ladies’ room, and I looked at the lobby entrance, trying to spot her.

  “There she is,” Sophie said.

  “Where?” I asked, disappointed in my powers of observation.

  “Left side of the lobby. Talking to a guy.”

  I leaned in for a better angle, but I still couldn’t see her.

  “It looks like she got more support from random men than I did,” Nat said.

  “He’s hot,” Sophie said.

  I got down from the bar stool so I could see more of the lobby.

  “Whoa,” both Sophie and Nat said in unison.

  “What?”

  I saw a broad hand on Brooklyn’s shoulder, and I could almost feel the touch myself. The rest of the man was blocked from view by the lounge wall.

  She smiled, and then the hand disappeared.

  I surged forward, but whoever he was walked away too fast.

  “Seriously?” Sophie said. “The three of us are all single, and she ends up with him in the blackout?”

  “Fate is cruel,” Nat said.

  “What did he look like?” I asked.

  “Hot,” Sophie said.

  “Tall,” Nat said.

  “Tall and hot,” Sophie said.

  “Thanks for that specific detail,” I said.

  Brooklyn was coming toward us.

  “Who was that?” Nat called to her.

  “Can I meet him?” Sophie asked.

  “You don’t get to call dibs,” Nat said.

  “Dibs,” Sophie said.

  Brooklyn was smiling and shaking her head as she drew closer. Her cheeks were flushed, and there was an odd brightness to her eyes.

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “The power went off,” she said.

  “Did you get his name?” Sophie asked.

  Brooklyn shook her head. “Can’t help you with that.”

  “He squeezed your shoulder,” I said.

  From my vantage point, the touch seemed intimate. That tanned, strong hand squeezing down on Brooklyn’s shoulder had sent a shiver up my own spine.

  I tried to imagine how James would feel about someone touching Brooklyn that way. He wouldn’t like it. Of that, I was sure.

  “He was saying goodbye,” Brooklyn said.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Sophie asked me.

  “Who squeezes a strange woman’s shoulder?” I asked.

  “Who doesn’t?” Sophie returned.

  “It’s not like he kissed me,” Brooklyn said.

  For some reason, her words didn’t make me feel any better.

  “He can kiss me,” Sophie said.

  It suddenly occurred to me that Brooklyn might already know the man. That would explain the touch.

  But if that was true, why wasn’t she saying so? Was the guy an old boyfriend? Not that she could have an old boyfriend without me knowing. It was impossible.

  “We’re going to be late for our dinner reservation,” Nat said.

  “Was my drink ever served?” Brooklyn asked.

  “I think it got lost in the excitement,” Sophie said.

  As if on cue, the bartender arrived. “I think you’ll like this one. I call it an icy wave.”

  The drink was in a tall glass, blue green in color, with lots of crushed ice and a strawberry garnish.

  “Thank you,” Brooklyn said to him.

  He waited while she took a sip.

  I waited impatiently to ask her another question.

  “It’s good,” she said.

  The bartender beamed.

  Before I could speak up, shaggy-neat-hair guy walked back into the lounge. The sight of him sent a jolt of electricity across my chest. I sucked in a breath.

  He seemed to hear me, or maybe he just felt me staring, because he turned, and we locked gazes. This time there was no mistaking it.

  His mouth crooked into a half smile. I couldn’t tell if he was greeting me or mocking me. It could be that my lust was
obvious to him even at this distance.

  No, not lust, I told myself. Lust made my reaction sound salacious.

  This was interest, no more, no less. And there was nothing wrong with being interested in a good-looking guy across the bar.

  “We have a reservation in the Moonside Room,” Nat said, interrupting my musings.

  I forced myself to break the gaze.

  And I was absurdly proud of breaking off the look first this time. I found myself smiling in satisfaction. I had to resist the urge to check shaggy-neat-hair guy’s reaction to my shift in attention.

  “I can have your drink brought up to the restaurant for you,” the bartender said to Brooklyn.

  No mention of my drink, or Sophie’s. But then that was the way of the world.

  “Thank you so much.” Brooklyn flashed her friendly blue eyes.

  “Not a problem.”

  I could tell the bartender thought he had a shot—despite the big diamond ring on Brooklyn’s left hand. She had a knack for that—for doing nothing in a way that ever so subtly led men on.

  Sophie was very pretty. Nat was girl-next-door cute. But none of us could hold a candle to Brooklyn’s allure. Men tripped over their own feet when she was in the room. She invariably got us great tables and great service from earnest waiters and maître d’s.

  Mostly I just took the perks without bothering to be jealous of Brooklyn.

  “Through the lobby?” she asked the bartender.

  “Straight across to the gold elevator. It will take you to the fifty-eighth floor. Mandy can show you.” He beckoned one of the waitresses.

  “Just in case we can’t read the sign,” Nat whispered to me.

  “Just in case he misunderstood the diamond ring,” I whispered back.

  “Men have no consciences.”

  “Luckily for James, Brooklyn does.”

  My best friend, and an only child with two distant, busy parents, Brooklyn had spent countless weekends and holidays with my big extended family. She’d had a crush on James since we were old enough to know what a crush was. He’d finally invited her to the junior prom, and there’d been no going back.

  Their relationship made such perfect sense for everyone, including me. I’d been testing the term sister-in-law inside my head for months now. I couldn’t wait to use it in real life.

  As we walked to the elevator, I looked around for shaggy-neat-hair guy.

  He wasn’t in the bar, and he wasn’t in the lobby.

  Ah, well. There was always tomorrow.

  The sauna and spa lounge were coed. He could be a spa guy.

  Or maybe I’d check out the exercise room. He definitely looked like the weight-training type. And I could see him on an elliptical machine...or rowing.

  I could definitely picture him rowing.

  Copyright © 2020 by Barbara Dunlop

  ISBN-13: 9781488062643

  From Seduction to Secrets

  Copyright © 2020 by Andrea Laurence

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