The Dating Dare (Gambling Men Book 2)

by Barbara Dunlop

  “You want to take a rest?” James asked.

  A wooden bench was positioned on a concrete pier that jutted out into the lake.

  “Sure.”

  We pulled our bikes onto a grassy patch and took the empty bench.

  “I think we’re coming at this all wrong,” James said.

  “Coming at what?” My first thought was the bike ride. Did he not like the lakeshore path?

  “It really is a numbers game.”

  “Riding?”

  “No, meeting the opposite sex. You need to meet a lot of eligible people to up your odds.”

  “Sure.”

  Who would argue with that? Not me. I might not be a science nerd, but I understood the law of large numbers.

  “And we need to bring them to us.”

  “The eligible people?” I wasn’t exactly seeing what he meant. Were we going back to the crowded beach?

  “Think about Callie.”

  My face pinched up. “What about her? And are you sure it’s not Kaylee?”

  “We can call her whatever you want.”

  “I always thought she looked like a Candi.”

  “Candi.” He paused in thought. “She does sort of look like a Candi.”

  “Don’t drool,” I said.

  “I didn’t mean it like that.”

  “Yes, you did.”

  James grinned unrepentantly. “Okay, we both agree most men would point at her from across the room.”

  “We do.”

  He was right. Candi was gorgeous and glamorous and eminently desirable.

  “And we agree that most women would point at the Kendrick twins from across the room.”

  I was surprised he brought them up. “Yes.”

  Separate or together Colton and Max Kendrick were definitely pointworthy.

  “Let’s do that,” James said.

  I was really puzzled now. “Point at people from across the room?”

  “No.” James shook his head. “Get people to point at us.”

  Three

  “Explain to me again how this works?” I said to James.

  We’d finished our ride, locked up our bikes, and found ourselves a table on a deck overlooking the Orchid Club courtyard at the edge of the park.

  “The view is perfect,” James said. “Are you ready to take notes?”

  “I can take notes.” I had my phone. It had apps.

  He glanced at his watch. “There’ll be an event at the club tonight.”

  “What’s the event?”

  A waiter came by with a platter of nachos and two beers with quarters of lime stuck in the necks of the bottles. I’d also been eyeing the mini éclairs pictured on the menu. But I’d decide on that later. I was holding out hope the nachos would fill me up enough to take the éclairs off my mind.

  “I don’t know the event,” James said. “It doesn’t matter. Whatever it is, it’ll be posh. People will be dressed up, looking fine. We’re going to pick out our favorites.”

  “Please tell me we’re not going to talk to them.”

  I was still wearing my yoga pants and an oversize T-shirt. And I was still slightly damp with sweat. The sun was going down, and I was grateful for the propane heater stationed next to our table.

  “Were you not paying attention?” James asked, looking stern.

  I looked to the club entrance. “Did I miss something?”

  “We’re not approaching them. They’re going to approach us.”

  “Dressed like this?” I gestured to my chest.

  “Not these people. Other people. Future people. Tonight, we pick out the pointworthy people and take notes on what makes them pointworthy. Then, we replicate it.”

  “What if it’s genetics? I’m not getting plastic surgery.”

  A new hairstyle and a fancy dress were only going to get me so far. It’s not like I’d never dressed up before. I’d dressed up plenty of times. Dressing up didn’t turn me into Brooklyn or Sophie or anyone else.

  James was giving me a horrified look. “Who said anything about plastic surgery?”

  “What if we decide I need a new nose? Or...” I glanced down at my chest. “Upgraded breasts?”

  “You don’t need upgraded breasts!”

  He gave a glance around at the other tables and moved his chair closer in, lowering his voice. “I told you, you already have the raw material.”

  “I’m not so sure about that. Wait. Look. There’s a limo.”

  I pulled out my phone and hit the notes app. “Who is it?”

  A man got out of the back seat.

  He looked about fifty.

  “Nice tux,” I said.

  “Formal wear gets your attention?” James asked.

  “Formal wear is good, depending on the occasion. I wonder if this is a wedding.”

  “Could be the father of the bride,” James said.

  The man extended his hand and helped a middle-aged woman out of the limo.

  She was followed by two younger men in business suits.

  “Which one attracts your attention?” James asked. “Don’t think, just blurt it out.”

  “The guy with dark hair.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s tall.”

  “I could put lifts in my shoes,” James said.

  “You’re tall,” I said to him.

  “Other men are taller.”

  “You’re tall enough.”

  James was well over six feet. I’d say six-two. A whole lot taller than that and the height started to be a detractor. There was a perfect sweet spot. He was in it.

  “What else?” he asked me.

  “His shoulders,” I said. “They’re broad, but it’s more than that. There’s something to the set of his shoulders. It makes him look confident. Confident is good.”

  “Confident shoulders.” James flexed his.

  I chuckled. “Yes. Confident shoulders.”

  Another vehicle pulled up. This was a big white SUV.

  Four girls piled out wearing identical aquamarine dresses.

  “Wedding,” James said.

  “Definitely.”

  We were both silent for a moment while they settled themselves into a group.

  James munched on a nacho.

  “So, which one?” I asked.

  “Auburn hair,” he said.

  “You like auburn hair?”

  He shook his head. “It’s not the hair color. It’s... I would say the shape of her figure and the brightness of her smile.”

  I jotted down “bright smile.”

  I found myself running my tongue over my teeth. I’d whitened them a few months ago. But maybe it was time to have it professionally done. I needed a dental checkup soon. I could easily get some whitening at the same time.

  It couldn’t hurt.

  “She has a graceful walk,” James said.

  “I could practice that,” I said.

  He looked at me. “I never paid any attention to your walk. Walk somewhere and let me look.”

  The request made me super self-conscious. “No.”

  He pointed. “Over to the exit and back.”

  “I’m not going to walk for you.”

  “How can I help you if you won’t let me assess you?”

  Assess me? “I’d feel ridiculous.”

  “Well, get the heck over that. I’m going to do whatever you want.”

  I couldn’t let that opportunity stay hanging. “Whatever I want?”

  “You know what I mean. I’ll walk. I’ll talk. I’ll make confident shoulders. Come on, Nat. If this is going to work, we have to trust each other.”

  I realized he was right. Everything he’d said and done so far made me believe he was sincere. I should get over
myself and take his help.

  It was either that or cats, cats and tea, tea and cats until I was old and gray and alone.

  I stood. “Don’t you dare tell anyone about this, especially not Layla.”

  I’d be mortified if he told his sister that I was on a self-improvement binge.

  “You think I want Layla to know what we’re doing? You think I want anyone to know?”

  “So, our secret?”

  “Yes.”

  “To the grave?”

  “You want me to pinky swear?”

  “That would be good.”

  He solemnly held up his pinky.

  I hooked mine around it, and we both broke into twin grins.

  “I pinky swear,” he said.

  “So do I.”

  His hand was warm and strong, his skin rougher than mine. It felt odd to touch him, and I realized how rarely it happened.

  I’d seen James hug Brooklyn countless times. He hugged Layla, of course. And I’d even seen him hug Sophie—who pulled pretty much everybody into hugs at one point or another.

  James and I, on the other hand, had always kept a respectful distance.

  I hadn’t thought about it until now.

  But now I was thinking about it.

  He dropped his hand from mine.

  “Walk,” he said.

  I turned, took a breath and walked straight to the exit. There I turned and walked back, trying really hard not to feel utterly stupid.

  “More glide,” he said when I got back to the table.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Smoother, don’t clunk when you walk, and keep your feet closer together, more like you’re walking on a line than on the two sides of a railroad track.”

  “A railroad track?” Just how unattractive was my walk?

  “Do it again,” he said.

  It was on the tip of my tongue to refuse.

  But I told myself to buck up. Maybe my ugly walk had been the problem all these years. I wondered why nobody had said anything before now.

  I glanced around to make sure the people at the other tables weren’t paying attention. They weren’t.

  I breathed again, really deep this time.

  I turned and walked—glided, I hoped. I pretended I was on a balance beam, moving my feet together with each step.

  I turned.

  I couldn’t look at James.

  I picked a spot in the trees above his head and I did my best to glide back.

  “Hmm,” he said.

  Embarrassed, I sat down before he could tell me to do it again.

  “Hmm?” I mimicked. “I get a hmm?”

  “It was better. I think.”

  “You think?”

  “You seemed a bit stiff.”

  “Well, of course I was stiff. I could feel you watching me.”

  “We’ll practice.”

  “We?”

  “I’ll do the shoulder thing.”

  I looked back down at the courtyard to see that three more vehicles had arrived. “Oh, I’m going to find something way better than the shoulder thing for you to practice.”

  I was definitely not going to be in this alone.

  “Bring it on,” he said.

  I watched two more couples get out of their cars.

  Valets had arrived and were moving the cars away as more people turned up.

  “That guy,” I said to James. “The one in the blue blazer.”

  “You like him?” James squinted. “Next time we should bring binoculars.”

  “We’re going to be stalkers?”

  “Private eyes. Investigators. We’re investigators investigating beautiful people.”

  “It seems a bit invasive to me.”

  “What do you like about blue blazer guy?”

  “He looks relaxed.” I gazed at James to contrast the two men. “You look uptight.”

  “I do?”

  I nodded. “You do. You look critical, like the world isn’t quite measuring up to your standards and you’re about to tell it why. That guy down there, he looks like he loves the world and can’t wait to meet it and have fun with it.”

  James gazed at the courtyard. “Interesting. I’m not sure how I practice that.”

  “Tequila.” The suggestion jumped out of my brain.

  “I’m game.” He munched on another nacho. “But I’m not sure how much tequila will help with your walking problem.”

  I smiled and reached for a nacho myself. “Are we really going to do this?”

  He met my gaze. “I think we are.”

  “Embark on a secret mission to make ourselves irresistible to the opposite sex?” I bit down on the nacho. It was delicious, and I was hungry.

  “Law of large numbers until we fall in love.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  This was by far the oddest thing I’d ever done. But however it turned out, it was going to be way better than cats.

  * * *

  “You have to come with us.” Sophie shut the heavy door of my apartment behind her.

  I lived in what was once an elementary school and had been converted to thirty apartments. I was on the third of three floors in a high-ceilinged loft under what were now murky skylights, with an aging wood floor partially covered in scattered worn rugs. The walls were gray-painted cinder blocks, enclosing a single big room, plus a bathroom.

  I’d added a freestanding wooden divider to cordon off the bed. I didn’t like making beds, and I didn’t want the world to see my failing.

  “Nat,” Sophie said with an urgency to her tone.

  “Did Ethan specifically ask you to invite me?” I was having a hard time believing Ethan wanted another date with me.

  Sophie paced to the cluster of sofas and armchairs on one side of the room. “Of course he wants you to come. That’s the whole point, that the four of us would have fun together again.”

  “I didn’t think he had fun last time.” I went to the kitchen area to get a pitcher of iced tea from the fridge.

  “Sure he did. Didn’t you?”

  “I felt a little out of place.” I dropped ice cubes into two glasses.

  “Why?”

  I turned to look at her. “Because all you talked about was the dessert project.”

  “We talked about other stuff.”

  I had to grin at that. “A little bit. But it was mostly about Sweet Tech.”

  “I’m sorry.” She dropped down on the arm of one chair. “Are you mad at me?”

  I poured the iced tea. “I’m not mad. I didn’t say I was mad.”

  “We didn’t mean to be boring. I’m sure Ethan didn’t mean to be boring.”

  “You weren’t boring.” I crossed the room and handed her a glass. “You were excited. And I’m excited for you. I just don’t think Ethan and I are going to work.”

  “You didn’t really give him a chance.”

  “I didn’t feel a spark.” I sat down in my favorite burgundy armchair.

  I’d moved it and the matching burgundy sofa from my parents’ basement on the other side of the city. I bought my brown sofa and the two leather contour chairs from an online reseller. They all surrounded a square glass-topped coffee table.

  Sophie took an end of the sofa cornerwise from mine.

  “You barely had a chance to get to know him.”

  That might be true. But I was pretty confident in my impression.

  “Did it take a long time with you and Bryce? Could you tell right away that you liked him?”

  “We were always friendly,” she said. Then she seemed to give it some thought. “I never disliked him. Do you dislike Ethan?”

  “I don’t know him well enough to dislike him.”

  She made a mock toast with her iced tea.
“Thank you for making my point.”

  I sighed. I didn’t feel like having this argument.

  I’d only been home from work for about twenty minutes. But I’d already slipped into a loose cotton T-shirt and a pair of worn blue jeans. I was planning to make a bowl of soup, then putter around in my sundeck garden for a while.The heather was still nice, and the pansies and chrysanthemums would last a few more weeks. I wanted to enjoy my little patch of outdoors as long as the weather held.

  Afterward, I was thinking I might search for a video on graceful walking. Surely, I wasn’t the only woman in the world with that particular challenge. I didn’t want James to frown at me and say hmm the next time I tried walking for him.

  “My car’s out front,” Sophie said. “I’ll tell Bryce we’re going to meet them there. That way you don’t have to rush to get ready, and we can come home whenever you want.”

  “I wasn’t planning to celebrate Technology Week,” I said.

  “This is a fun event. It’s not nerdy at all. It’s the Things Festival—phones and tablets and home alarm systems. It’s stuff you should be learning about anyway. Don’t you want to see the hologram exhibit?”

  “I was planning to garden after dinner.” I knew there was a whine in my voice, but I was feeling a little whiny at the thought of going back out again tonight.

  “Come on, Nat. You can garden any old time. And it’s way more fun when you’re there.”

  Now I felt selfish. Sophie obviously liked Bryce a lot. She wanted my support, and I should buck up and give it to her.

  I glanced at my torn jeans. “Do I have to change?”

  “It’s definitely come-as-you-are. Flats are better for walking around.”

  “I haven’t eaten yet.”

  “There’ll be vendors.”

  “With 3-D printed food?” I joked.

  She looked worried. “I sure hope not. We’re trying to be ahead of the curve.”

  “That was a joke,” I said.

  “Oh. Good. It’ll be more like burgers and nachos.”

  “I can live with that,” I said, forcing myself to stand up and show some enthusiasm. “Give me a minute.”

  Leaving Sophie to finish her iced tea, I cut past my bed to the bathroom, freshened my face and tossed my hair into a ponytail.

  Then I hoisted my shoulder bag from the bed. I hesitated, testing its weight in my hand for a moment. Deciding to play the odds and be more comfortable, I stuffed the essentials into my jeans pockets—my phone, a credit card, a little bit of money, a mini comb and a couple sticks of gum.