by Aven Ellis
I lose it. I laugh so hard that I have tears in my eyes, and Deke and Zach stop talking to stare at me. I take back what I said about Bree earlier. She’s the best wingman ever.
“Maybe she just likes soybeans,” I say, shrugging. “I’ll catch up with you later, okay?”
“Fine,” Sasha says, appearing dismayed at the idea of me choosing to play darts. Then she saunters off, no doubt ready to be the center of attention on the patio because it’s her birthday. I, on the other hand, return to my tennis match with Deke.
Deke wrinkles his brow as I approach. “Did she really think I’d shoot just because it’s her birthday?”
“Yes. Don’t you understand? With Sasha, it’s always about Sasha. Now are you going to play darts or what?”
He grins, and I find myself smiling back at him. Zach agrees to keep score, and Deke and I decide to play three rounds to see who is the champion.
And the whole time I’m so incredibly aware of being with him—of Deke’s eyes on me as I play, how I can smell his cologne when he bends down closer to talk to me, the ways his fingers brush mine when we pass each other the darts.
After three rounds, I have won two out of three and am the proud winner of an entire bag of White Castle sliders.
“See?” I say triumphantly, turning to Deke. “I can play.”
“I stand corrected,” he says, his eyes crinkling up as he smiles at me. “So tell me, Fashionista. Should we go now to get them?”
My heart does an excited flip-flop. I’m about to respond when I hear Sullivan’s voice from behind.
“Hey, gorgeous, are you finished?” Sullivan says, sliding his arms around my waist and pulling me to him. “We’re all waiting for you on the patio. James won’t do Sasha’s birthday toast until you’re there.”
I lock eyes with Deke, and I watch as the smile evaporates off his face. He picks up his beer and takes a swig, staring at me.
“Go ahead. You don’t want to hold up the party.”
Damn it! Deke totally shut down the second Sullivan touched me. I quickly wiggle out of Sullivan’s arms, wanting Deke to know that’s the last thing I want.
“I’ll be there in a minute,” I say firmly to Sullivan. “Thanks for letting me know.”
Sullivan’s eyes blink, as if he can’t understand what I’m doing. God, he’s so ego-inflated he can’t grasp the idea that I’m no longer interested in him.
I ignore him and turn to Deke. “You . . . you guys should join us,” I say quickly.
Deke glances at Sullivan and shakes his head. “Thanks, but no. Zach and I are going to hang out here for a while.”
Disappointment crushes me inside. Obviously Deke has no intention of spending more time with me tonight. And in the end, it was just a game—of darts.
“Well, I guess I’ll see you later,” I say quietly. “Thanks for the game.”
And then Sullivan puts his hand on my elbow and leads me through the crowd, to the patio, and away from Deke.
I’m furious.
I’m sitting on the patio of the pub, the white lights twinkling in the trees around me and Sullivan. Yes, just me and Sullivan, who is totally shitfaced and is trying to balance empty cocktail glasses on the table into a sculpture.
Bree left more than an hour ago, as Tate started hitting on her and it made her miss Alex the asshole, so she decided to take a cab and go home. Emma and Caitlin met some law students from Northwestern and went to a different bar with them.
And Sasha decided to go back with James to his place. She and James left a few minutes ago, as James couldn’t be distracted from Sasha long enough to make sure his good friend Sullivan got home okay.
Which leaves me in charge of Stupid Sullivan.
So why am I still here, anyway? Why wasn’t I smart enough to bail when all my girlfriends did?
I bite my lower lip. I would have left a long time ago, too, except for one simple fact.
Deke is still inside the bar with Zach.
I swallow hard and glance inside for what has to be the 89,576 time tonight. I can see him perfectly from where I’m sitting, and we’ve been exchanging glances all night. But a line has been drawn in the sand, and Deke is content to spend the evening inside without me.
And, as it turns out, I’m not the only one who finds him hot and mysterious. I watched a trail of beautiful girls make their way over to Deke and Zach all night long, making me green with jealousy. In fact, I’m quite sure if my jealousy could be seen from the bar, I would be a lovely shade of hunter green.
“Whooo hooo, I should be a fuckin’ artist,” Sullivan drunkenly yells, staring at his masterpiece of exactly two cocktail glasses stacked on top of each other.
I sigh loudly and stand up. I realize that despite the fact that I loathe Sullivan, I can’t leave him here like this. I’m going to have to take him home. Otherwise I’ll spend the rest of the night imagining all the horrible things that could happen to him if I leave him here. I mean, Sullivan could be hit by a car trying to walk home. Mugged. Passed out in the gutter . . .
No, my conscience won’t let me abandon Stupid Sullivan.
And since Deke has shown no interest in spending time with me tonight, there’s no longer a reason to stay here, is there?
“Let’s go,” I say, tugging on Sullivan’s arm.
“Are we going to have sex now?” Sullivan asks, his bloodshot eyes leering hopefully at me.
Oh for the love of God. I didn’t think this night could get any worse, but sadly, I was mistaken about that.
“No,” I say, dragging him out of the wrought iron patio chair.
He sways for a moment, and I reach out and catch the cocktail glass sculpture before it crashes and shatters. I quickly set them upright and then take Sullivan by the arm, trying to keep him from falling over.
“We’re going now,” I say, guiding him back inside.
Sullivan is weaving all over the place, and his weight is practically crushing me. We move through the crowd, and now I find myself passing Deke.
Then I get angry all over again. He’s just watching me drag Sullivan along. God, would it kill him to help me now? Even if Deke isn’t interested in me, he could at least help me get Sullivan out of the bar.
Suddenly Deke approaches me. My breath catches in my throat, and my heart jumps anxiously inside my chest.
“Do you need some help?” he asks, furrowing his brow like he’s actually concerned.
“Hey! You . . . you’re the camera dude!” Sullivan yells.
“Right,” Deke says, grinning at me.
Ooooh! Now I decide I’ll be dammed if I accept his help. Not if he thinks this is amusing, I won’t.
“No, I’m fine,” I snap. “Have a great evening.”
Then I drag Sullivan past Deke and Zach and out the front door.
We get outside, and I park Sullivan on the curb.
“Sit here,” I say, needing a break from inhaling the beer and over-cologned scent that is permeating his skin.
“Sure,” Sullivan says, sitting in a drunken stupor.
Okay. All I have to do is hail a cab and pay for it with my emergency credit card. I open my purse and take it out. Then with horror I realize I hadn’t put my MasterCard in my tiny purse before heading out tonight like I thought.
I’d grabbed my reloadable Starbucks card by mistake.
Oh my God. I can’t believe this. I’ve spent all my cash in an effort to prove I could buy my own drinks, and now I have no way to get home other than to walk.
And there’s no way I can drag Sullivan home by myself.
“Damn it,” I snap, throwing my stupid Starbucks card back into my purse. This evening has been a total disaster. I could try picking the wallet out of Sullivan’s back pocket, but he probably has no c
ash anyway. Or he’d think it was a sexual advance . . .
Okay, that’s not an option. Now I’m going to have to call Bree and have her pick us up and keep my fingers crossed Sullivan doesn’t throw up in the backseat of her Jetta.
I see a taxi coming down the street and suddenly I hear a familiar voice behind me call out for it.
I spin around and see Deke standing behind me, holding his hand out to flag it down.
Now I’m really pissed. How can he leave me here? Can’t he see I’m in a jam? So I told him I don’t need help, but he should be a gentleman and help me anyway.
The cab stops next to us. Then, much to my surprise, Deke and Zach come over to the curb and lift Sullivan up.
“Okay, buddy, here we go,” Zach says.
“What are you doing?” I ask, following them.
Deke shoves Sullivan in the backseat of the cab and turns around to me. “What apartment is he in?”
Stunned, I rattle off his unit number. Deke leans back into the cab and gives the driver the address to my building. Then he backs out and Zach climbs into the backseat with Sullivan.
“Later,” Zach says, nodding at Deke.. “Goodnight, Avery.”
“Goodnight,” I manage, staring at him in shock.
The cab drives off into the night, leaving Deke and me on the sidewalk. I look up at him, only to find him already staring at me with those beautiful Caribbean Sea-colored eyes of his.
“It’s a nice night out,” Deke says slowly. “I was thinking I could walk you home.”
I can’t breathe. The games are over now. It’s just me and Deke, with no camera, no Sullivan, no one else in the world to bother us.
“You want to walk me home?” I ask quietly, hardly able to speak over the pounding of my heart.
“If you want me to,” he says softly. “So what do you say, Avery? May I take you home tonight?”
Chapter 14
I stare back at Deke, seeing nothing but sincerity in his not-so-mysterious eyes. And I want nothing more in the world than for him to escort me home tonight.
“I would like that,” I say softly.
“Me, too,” he says.
We start heading down the street, with Deke moving around me so he’s next to the curb. For a moment, all I hear is the music blaring from other bars and pubs as we begin to walk. Then I glance up at him and clear my throat.
“Sullivan is not the guy for me,” I say honestly, putting my tennis racquet down.
Deke is silent for a moment. “I didn’t think he could be. You could never be with a guy who has two last names.”
I begin to laugh, and so does Deke. I gather up my courage and ask him a question.
“Why didn’t you come out and join me on the patio?” I ask quietly, wanting to know.
Deke turns and looks at me, sincerity once again shining in his beautiful eyes. “It was Sasha’s party, Avery. She wouldn’t want me there. Besides, I don’t think I could take watching Sullivan—”
He abruptly stops talking.
My heart leaps inside my chest, desperate for him to finish that sentence.
“Watching Sullivan do what?” I ask, biting my lip.
“Nothing,” he says, clearing his throat. “So I was thinking, Avery, since I owe you a bag of sliders—”
“You do,” I say, but I’m still trying to finish the previous sentence in my head. What didn’t he want to see? Me interacting with Sullivan?
“. . . that maybe I should pick you up and take you to work tomorrow,” Deke says, snapping me from my thoughts. “We could go to White Castle for lunch, and then I could shoot you shopping for the spa basket materials after work. If you want to, that is. You don’t have to if you don’t want to. It’s . . . it’s just an idea.”
I stop breathing as I hear the hesitation in his raspy voice. I forget about the Sullivan sentence and smile at him as we head toward Armitage Avenue.
“I think that sounds like an excellent idea,” I say. “But only if I can read you the ‘Dear Emily’ column from the Vibe while you drive. Because I seriously don’t think you can top her advice two times in a row.”
Deke bursts out laughing, the wonderful sound once again wrapping around me. And I grin happily, knowing I’m the one who can make him laugh like that.
“Fair enough,” he says, smiling back at me. “And for the record, I know I’ll kick Emily’s ass tomorrow.”
And then we just start talking. I stroll along the city streets with Deke, passing by the closed boutiques and shops and watching the elevated trains rumble overhead on the track, the conversation flowing easily between us. We talk about what we like to eat, our favorite restaurants, how Deke thinks the best bars in Chicago are in his Wrigleyville neighborhood and not in Lincoln Park.
I steal a glance at him as we pass by Victorian greystones, fascinated with the stories he’s telling me tonight. Now Deke is talking about a time he and Zach were invited to a chic Gold Coast nightclub and the plastic women they encountered there.
“So this girl comes up to Zach—because he’s a magnet for hot girls—and he offers to buy her and her friends drinks,” Deke explains. “So we buy her and her identical friends Grey Goose martinis, and she raises her glass and proposes a toast—to being ‘fabulously wealthy.’”
“Ugh,” I say, disgusted.
“I know,” Deke says. “So later we get on the subject of animals, and we’re talking about dogs, and this same plastic girl says, ‘I don’t like dogs.’ Then we were talking about going to Lake Geneva in the summer, and she said she didn’t like that, either. And almost everything we talked about she turned her nose up at. So finally I turned to her and asked, ‘Well, what do you like, besides money?’”
“You did not,” I say, delighted with this story.
“I sure as hell did,” he declares, his eyes shining wickedly. “Needless to say, the plastics blew us off shortly after that.”
“Plastics,” I repeat, grinning. “I like that.”
We pass by a greystone that has the windows open on the first floor. Deke suddenly stops walking.
“Do you hear that?” he asks. “It’s Frank Sinatra.”
I pause for a moment, hearing Frank sing something about “witchcraft” through the open window.
“Yes, I do,” I say, nodding.
“Now that’s the kind of music you dance to,” Deke says firmly. “Not club music, not Top 40. When you want to dance with a woman, you gotta dance to Sinatra.”
I stare at him in complete shock. Who would have thought the guy who always wears T-shirts would be adamant about dancing to Frank Sinatra?
“I’ve never danced to Sinatra,” I say honestly. Then a giggle escapes my throat. “To be honest, I’ve only danced at high school dances or fraternity formals with guys. And it’s always some Top 40 song that you slow dance to.”
His eyes shine at me. “That’s wrong, Fashionista.”
“Yeah, I think so, too.”
“I think that memory needs to be replaced with a new one,” Deke says slowly. Then he extends his hand to me. “May I have this dance?”
“Here? On the sidewalk?”
“Why not?” Deke asks, his hand still waiting for mine.
It’s crazy, dancing on the sidewalk on Armitage Avenue. It’s like something out of a 1950’s movie.
And I think it’s the most incredibly romantic thing I’ll ever do.
I smile and put my hand in his, feeling his rough skin against mine. Goose bumps instantly prickle my skin the second we touch.
“All right, first we have to spin,” Deke says, holding my hand in his. He spins me out and pulls me back to him, and I burst out laughing in joy.
“No, do that again. I want to twirl my dress with flair,” I beg.
Now he’s the one laughing. “What?”
“I want my dress to really twirl,” I say.
Deke complies and spins me out, and I float my hand out perfectly, putting an extra move on so my tangerine dress swirls around me.
And I feel just like Ginger Rogers dancing with Fred Astaire.
“There you go,” he says, bringing me back to him. “Very nice flair.”
My hand instinctively reaches for his strong shoulder as he draws me closer. Oh, God, I can feel it’s solid and sculpted underneath the fabric of his T-shirt. And the gentle summer breeze carries the scent of his citrus cologne toward me, making my pulse leap in response.
“Thank you, Deacon,” I say without thinking.
A blush instantly flies up my cheeks and neck, raging furiously as I feel his fingertips rest against the small of my back. “I . . . I mean Deke,” I sputter, mortified by my slip. “I’m sorry.”
“You know,” he says slowly, twirling me around as Frank continues to sing, “only my mother calls me Deacon.”
I swirl back into his arms, and Deke gazes down at me as he holds me close.
“But I suppose if I can call you Fashionista, it’s only fair that you can call me Deacon,” he says softly.
I can’t breathe. I really can’t. We dance closer now, with the city of Chicago serving as our own personal dance floor. Here we are, in the shadows of old greystones, slow dancing on the sidewalk. My heart is pounding, my eyes are nowhere but on his. And as Frank sings about witchcraft, I know that’s what is happening to me, too.
Because I’m totally spellbound by Deke Ryan.
After Frank finishes singing, we continue our stroll back to my apartment. Except I’m not walking.
