“Oh, it’s you,” was all she said when she stopped.
It was very irritating that Maddie was the only person he could talk to about this Alexa thing, but she was just going to have to deal with it.
“Yeah, it’s me. Want to bet how long it’ll be before they make some excuse and take off? I give it less than an hour.”
She tossed her head and laughed. Why did it feel like every man in the bar turned to look at her when she did that? Yes, she looked incredible in that hot pink dress; even he could admit that. But he got the feeling she was laughing at, not with, him.
“I’d never take that bet.” Yep, she was laughing at him. “I’d be surprised if they were still here in thirty minutes, though Alexa’s tendency toward unnecessary politeness might force her to stay longer than she wants to.”
He pulled out his phone and turned on the stopwatch.
“For science.” He grinned at her. Amazingly, she grinned back before she walked away.
He shook off thoughts of Maddie and turned back to his friends.
In exactly forty-one minutes, Alexa came over to him.
“So, um . . .” She was definitely blushing. “I think we’re going to take off.”
He did everything possible to hold back a laugh.
“You and Maddie are leaving early? Okay, well, thanks for coming, and . . .”
She smacked his arm, and he finally let himself laugh.
“You’re such a fucking asshole. No, not me and Maddie.”
He leaned in for a hug.
“He’d better be nice to you. See you Monday.”
When Alexa and Drew walked out the door, Theo looked around the bar for Maddie. She was in a group with Julian and Lindsey, but she was looking right at him, and they grinned at each other. After a second or so, Maddie looked away from him and back at Lindsey. Okay, well, he guessed that was the one day in five years Maddie would be nice to him. Now that Alexa was gone, he figured she’d leave any minute.
But every time Theo glanced around the bar for a glimpse of hot pink, she was still there. After an hour or so, Theo saw Ben walk over to her group. He wandered over, too, just to make sure his brother wasn’t causing any trouble.
“Hey, man!” Ben said. “I was just saying to these guys that we should go dancing. I know this great place in SoMa. Let’s go!”
Yep, Ben was trying to cause trouble, all right.
“Have a fantastic time, and give me a call tomorrow to tell me all about it,” he said.
Ben turned to Maddie.
“Maddie!” Ben said. “We’re all talking about going dancing. Want to come?”
She shook her head.
“Thanks for the invite, but I have work to do tomorrow. I have to go. Theo, happy birthday.”
She didn’t lean in for a hug, so he didn’t, either.
“Thanks, and thanks for coming. I saw you talking to Lindsey and Julian. Did you get another possible client?”
She nodded.
“I think so. And also maybe your friend Fiona.”
“Oh good, Lindsey and Fiona are both great. Glad this may have been profitable for you.” What a weird and businesslike thing to say at the end of a party. What was wrong with him? “See you around.” No wonder she thought he was uptight; even with a little too much bourbon tonight, he sounded so stilted around her.
She smirked at him and turned to walk out, when he thought of something.
“Wait. Did you drive here?”
She turned back to him.
“Yeah, I’m just a few blocks away.”
He checked his pockets for his phone and keys.
“Let me walk you to your car.”
She shook her head.
“No, you don’t have to do that. I’m fine to walk by myself. I don’t want to drag you away from your party,” she said.
He hesitated. He wanted to insist, but he couldn’t tell if she said that because she didn’t want him to feel like he had to walk her to her car, or if she said it because she was sick of him and really didn’t want him to walk with her. But the Mission could get weird on weekend nights, with too many marauding bands of bros. Well, he’d ask one more time and then let it go.
“Honestly, it’s no trouble. You’re not dragging me anywhere. Plus, it gives me an excuse to disappear when Ben is hatching his plan to move to a second location, which is always a bad idea.”
She shrugged and turned to the door.
“Suit yourself.”
He waved to Ben and followed Maddie out the door. He was glad the party was over. He’d had fun, and he was even sort of glad Ben had harassed him into having one. But his ideal birthday would be spent at home on his couch with a good movie on TV and a large pizza on his coffee table.
The cool San Francisco night air was refreshing after the stuffy, beer-scented heat of the bar, and he breathed it in as he walked with her down Valencia. They walked in silence for a block or two, until they turned onto one of the quieter streets.
Okay, now the cool San Francisco night air was just flat-out cold. He hunched his shoulders against the wind.
“Did you have a good birthday party?” she asked, just when he thought she wasn’t going to speak to him the entire walk.
“I did. I got coerced into having the party in the first place; I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m not a huge party guy.” She laughed and he joined in. “But it was fun to see so many people who came out. Maybe I’ll do it again in another ten or so years.”
She laughed again.
“And I’m glad Alexa ran into that guy, though I’m still not quite sure what I think about him.”
Maddie nodded.
“I’m not sure what I think about him, either, but I did appreciate the way he was looking at Alexa all night like he’d won an amazing prize.”
That was a really good way to put it.
“You’re right. Okay, that makes me feel a little better about him.”
She turned to him and raised her eyebrows.
“Wait, did you really tell me that I was right? I’m stunned.” They walked by a streetlight that showed him the smile on her face. He smiled back.
“I have a lot of faults, but I’m good at acknowledging when other people are right.”
She stopped next to a black hatchback and gestured to it.
“This is me. Thanks for walking me to my car. Um, have a good night.”
He nodded at her and stepped back onto the sidewalk.
“You, too.”
While she got into the car and started it, he leaned against the street-cleaning sign and pulled out his phone. He had no intention of going back to the bar—Ben would just harass him into going dancing, and Theo had reached his party limit about an hour ago. Ben had known him all his life; he was used to Theo disappearing from parties when he’d had enough. Even his own parties.
He opened an app to get a ride back to Berkeley. Ugh, there was a five-minute wait for a ride. Hopefully no one thought he looked threatening hanging out in this residential neighborhood for the next five minutes, waiting.
“What are you doing? Why are you still standing there?” Maddie had started to pull away and was now shouting at him out the window of her car.
“Waiting for a ride home,” he shouted back. “Someone’s coming in”—he checked his phone—“now it’s six minutes? Why do these apps have such problems with time?”
“You’re not going back to your party?” She was looking at him like he was some sort of alien, which made sense. Maddie was probably used to all those life-of-the-party kinds of guys who he’d always seen as foreign to him.
He shook his head.
“The party is mostly over. I told you, Ben’s trying to get people to go dancing, and I’m not in the mood.”
She closed her eyes for a minute, prob
ably trying to conceive of how someone like him existed. Another car pulled up alongside her car, and the driver made that Are you coming out? motion. Maddie nodded at her and turned back to him.
“Get in.”
Wait, what? Was she going to take him back to the bar, or . . .
“Come on, someone wants this spot. Get in! I’ll take you home.”
Well hell, if she wanted to save him a thirty-five-dollar ride home from San Francisco to Berkeley, he wasn’t going to say no. He quickly canceled his ride request and opened her passenger door.
“Thanks, Maddie, I appre—”
“No need to thank me. It’s fine. I’m going the same direction as you are, and it’s cold outside. I saw you shivering while we were walking to the car. Why don’t men wear jackets?”
She glared at him as she leaned forward and turned the heat on in her car.
“I do wear jackets! Sometimes. It was so warm when I was getting dressed today, and it felt ridiculous to put something warmer on when I was walking to BART to come out here this evening.” The warm air coming out of her car heaters felt really good right now. “Though, that’s definitely one of my faults—I’ve lived in the Bay Area for a long time; I should know it’s always at least ten degrees cooler in San Francisco than it is in the East Bay, and it gets really cold at night, but I never prepare for it.”
Why was he still talking about the weather? He shut his mouth and settled into the passenger seat.
He glanced in her direction. She certainly didn’t look happy to have him in her car. She was right that they were going in the same direction, but this was the first time he and Maddie had ever been alone together, and she really didn’t seem to be enjoying the situation.
He didn’t know what to talk about with her, or if he should talk at all. They’d been getting along well tonight, strangely, but he didn’t want to push his luck.
“I’m surprised you watch House Hunters,” he said. “I would have thought you’d watch Project Runway or all of those fashion-y shows.”
Here he was, pushing his luck.
She shrugged.
“Oh, I watch it mostly because everyone expects me to have seen all of the episodes. But it feels like work, not relaxation.” She sighed. “You know what the most relaxing show of all time is?”
He sat up straight and turned to face her.
“No, tell me.”
The peaceful smile spread across her face.
“The Great British Baking Show. It’s the best.”
Unfortunately, this time he couldn’t chime in about his love of the show.
“I’ve never watched it, but people have told me that. What do you love about it?”
They merged onto the Bay Bridge, along with many other cars. Thank God he’d come up with something to talk about; they’d be here for a while. He relaxed into her passenger seat.
“Well, it’s a competition show—in Britain it’s called The Great British Bake Off. I don’t know why it has a different name here.”
He turned to her.
“I know this! It’s because of Pillsbury. It has a trademark for the term ‘Bake-Off’ in America, so they had to change the name.”
She nodded.
“That sounds like the kind of thing you would know.” Yep, he’d pushed his luck just a little too hard. Was it his fault he loved trivia like that?
“Anyway, I like it because even though it is a competition show, the contestants are so kind and gentle with one another. It’s such a soothing show.”
He nodded.
“Sounds good. I’ll have to watch it.”
Silence descended on the car again, but this time he didn’t try to fill it. They burst out from the tunnel on the lower deck of the bridge, and he saw the white tower of the Bay Bridge glowing in the darkness. He loved this part about coming home from San Francisco at night.
“Why didn’t you want to go dancing with your brother?” she asked him.
He laughed. If she only knew either him or Ben better, she’d never ask that.
“I wasn’t in the mood.”
She turned to him with one of those annoying grins she always sent his way.
“Oh, I get it. You can’t dance. It’s okay, not everyone is blessed with dancing ability. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”
Oh hell no. He would not let this stand.
“I can too dance,” he said. Maybe a little too loudly.
She chuckled.
“Sure you can. It’s okay, you don’t have to prove anything to me.”
He shook his head.
“I know I don’t—I don’t need to prove anything to anyone—but I’m a fucking great dancer.”
She nodded.
“Mmmhmm.” She gestured to the freeway signs up ahead. “What exit?”
For some reason, her attitude was really getting to him.
“University. I’m near the North Berkeley BART station. And you can mmmhmm however much you want, but I speak the truth.”
She changed lanes to follow his directions. He tried not to watch her expression too much. He didn’t want to look like he was staring at her. But when a smile hovered around her lips, he found himself smiling back. Why? He had no idea.
He pointed at his building. Finally.
“This is me. Thanks for the ride. Remember: I can outdance you any day.”
She pulled up in front, and he opened his car door and jumped out. Thank God he was home. He needed to go inside and sober up.
As he walked up the pathway to his building, he heard another car door slam, and he looked behind him to see Maddie standing on the sidewalk.
“You really didn’t think I was going to let you end this conversation without me making you prove your alleged dancing prowess, did you?”
Andrea Scher
Jasmine Guillory is the New York Times bestselling author of six romance novels, including The Wedding Date and The Proposal. Her work has appeared in O, The Oprah Magazine, Cosmopolitan, Bon Appétit, and Time. She lives in Oakland, California.
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While We Were Dating Page 33
