“You’re never going to guess where Bridget and I met,” Darrell said.
He wasn’t even going to try.
“Online. There’s this site for people who are too busy with their careers to date.”
Jonathan remembered that Darrell had a software company. He was clearly doing okay.
“It specializes in—” Here Darrell faltered.
Fortune Hunters? “Matching beautiful women with successful men?” Jonathan supplied.
“That’s it,” Darrell said, grinning.
Jonathan didn’t know a lot about women’s jewelry but he did know expensive when he saw it, and the necklace Bridget was wearing couldn’t be cheap. Kudos to Darrell, he decided. The guy had done well. He’d bribed a beautiful woman to be with him and he’d probably impress everyone at the reunion.
“Well, they did a terrific job,” Jonathan said, trying not to stare at Bridget’s boobs. “Hey, I need to, uh—” He pointed in the general direction of the crowd.
“Okay,” Darrell said. “We’ll catch up with you later.”
Jonathan nodded and started to move away.
Now here came Kyle and Mindy. “Man, what a crowd, huh?” Kyle said.
Don’t remind me, Jonathan thought. There were a few people he was looking forward to talking to—some of the chess gang, a couple of old buddies from band, but for the most part he was in hostile territory.
“Hi, Jonathan,” Mindy said. “It’s nice to see you again.”
“Thanks,” Jonathan said, trying to surreptitiously scan the crowd.
“Want us to save you a couple of seats at dinner?” Kyle offered.
A couple of seats, that was thinking positive. Yeah, think positive. “Sure,” Jonathan said, and returned to his hunt for Lissa.
She had to be here somewhere. He craned his neck, trying to see past the dressed-to-impress herd. The crowd shifted, and he caught sight of the bar set up in one corner of the dining hall. There, a little off to the right with a martini glass in her hand, talking to Laurie Poznick, stood Lissa.
He didn’t want to go over and talk to Lissa with another woman standing there, but she’d probably have someone standing next to her for the whole cocktail party. There would be no perfect time to make his first move. Now he saw—oh, no!—Rand in all his muscled glory approaching from another corner of the room, zeroing in on Lissa like a stealth bomber. No beer gut there, no hair loss. Rand looked as good as he had in high school. No, better—more filled out, more mature. He was a man in his prime.
Jonathan’s grip on his rose tightened. A thorn pricked him and he swore under his breath. Once Rand reached Lissa, he’d never leave her side. She’d end up going in to dinner with him, and Jonathan wouldn’t stand a chance.
He shouldered his way through the crowd, practicing his line as he went. Look at you. I could do it all night. Look at you. I could do it all night. Look at you.
Yes, look at her. She was so beautiful, wearing a blue sundress, her hair hanging in golden waves down past her neck.
Look at you. I could do it all night.
Now he was practically in front of her. She was even more beautiful close up. He took in those pretty lips, all pink and glossy, and his mouth went dry.
Laurie saw him first and smiled. Then Lissa turned her head. Now what was it he was going to say? Looking. Something about looking.
“Uh, Lissa,” he said, and held out the flower.
“Oh, Jonathan, how sweet! I was hoping you’d be here. Wow. You could be on the cover of a magazine.”
“I could look at you doing it all night,” he blurted. Wait a minute. That had come out all wrong.
Lissa’s eyebrows drew together and Laurie frowned at him as if he was a perv.
“I mean, I could look at you all night,” Jonathan amended. His face was a raging inferno. He turned to the bar and grabbed a water bottle. Stress (or all those workouts) had apparently given him superhuman strength and he about throttled the bottle taking the cap off. Water gushed out like a miniature Old Faithful, spilling down his shirt and onto his pants.
Laurie giggled and even Lissa was smiling.
Jonathan managed a nervous grin. “Uh, cheap plastic.”
“I guess,” Laurie said.
He had to get out of here before he did anything else dumb. “I’d better, uh...” Go shoot myself and be done with it.
He backed up, encountered a body and spun around, spilling the rest of the contents of his water bottle on Daphne, who’d been heading full steam for the bar.
“What the hell?”
“Oh, uh, sorry, Daphne,” he said, and put out a hand to wipe off the rivulets. Only...they were running down her breasts. Not a good idea. He yanked his hand away.
She scowled at him. “You ought to wear a sign that says Hazardous,” she snapped.
“Sorry,” he mumbled, and beat it, retreating to the farthest side of the dining room, willing his hands to stop sweating and his heart to calm down. How many people had seen that?
Now Rand was with Lissa and Laurie. He said something and Lissa smiled. Was it an I’m-majorly-glad-to-see-you smile or simply a polite one? Had she thought of Rand these past few years?
There he stood, well-groomed and well-dressed. Expensively dressed, with a fancy signet ring on his right hand so all the world could see he had money.
Money wasn’t everything.
And no ring on his left hand, so all the world could see he was on the prowl.
Now he leaned over and whispered in Lissa’s ear and her cheeks turned pink. What had he said? Probably that he could look at her all night. Rand would, naturally, get the line correct.
Jonathan became aware of a presence looming next to him. Feron Prince.
Oh, no. Fresh torture.
“Glad to see you here, Jon,” Feron said.
Jonathan couldn’t imagine why. “Uh, same here,” he managed, even though it was a total lie.
“I missed the ten-year.”
What a shame.
“There’s something I’ve been wanting to say to you.”
Jonathan looked at him suspiciously. “What?”
“I’m sorry I was such a damned bully in high school. I acted like a real shit stuffing you in that locker and I’ve felt bad about it for years.”
Jonathan blinked. Feron Prince was apologizing to him? “It’s okay.”
“It’s not. It never was. But thanks for saying that.” He held out a hand and Jonathan shook it. Obviously nerds weren’t the only ones who could change....
Jonathan’s thoughts were interrupted by the squeal of a microphone. Tina had one and was now tapping it. “Is this on?”
Well, duh.
She tapped it again. “Welcome, everyone, to our fifteen-year reunion. I’m glad so many of you could make it.”
It would have been nice if a certain one of them hadn’t. Darn it all, why couldn’t Rand have stayed married and stayed home?
“I think they’re about ready to start serving, so let’s all find our seats.”
Rand put a hand on Lissa’s back and began to steer her toward a table.
Never, never, never, never give up. Go sit on the other side of her, Jonathan commanded himself.
Keeping an eye on Rand and Lissa, he began to move toward their table. He’d almost reached them when he realized that Laurie was taking the other seat next to her. What would Winston Churchill do?
He had no idea, but he knew what he was going to do. He passed the table Kyle had chosen, motioning to his destination. Kyle nodded and gave him a thumbs-up as he weaved his way past chatting classmates toward her table to claim a seat opposite them.
The table was set for eight and already occupied by six. There sat Lissa, Rand and Laurie. And with them, Cam, Tina and Doug Immeressen, another superjock who’d enjoyed intimidating scrawny geeks. Jonathan would rather have swum in shark-infested waters.
Who was he kidding? These were shark-infested waters. With a gulp, he pulled out a seat and sat down, noddin
g at the others.
“Well, here he is,” Rand said genially, “the king of the chessboard.”
Not everyone had changed.
“That’s me,” Jonathan said, pretending it wasn’t an insult.
Rand studied him for a moment. “You lost the geek look.”
Jonathan shrugged. Maybe. He still had all his favorite button-down shirts in his closet and his nerdy T-shirts in a drawer at home. You could take the boy out of the geek clothes, but you couldn’t take the geek out of the boy. But for the weekend, that side of him was going to stay firmly hidden.
Unlike Rand, Doug and Cam didn’t comment on Jonathan’s appearance. They didn’t even bother to say hello, just kept talking with Tina. She was cute and single again, so that was hardly surprising. But they wouldn’t have said anything anyway.
“I think he looks fantastic,” Lissa said.
“Thanks.” Jonathan felt that was encouraging. So was the fact that she had her rose. She laid it carefully in front of her plate.
Okay, maybe he was going to survive this. Maybe he was going to do more than survive. Maybe he could find a way to be suave and entertaining. “Congrats on how well your career’s going. I’ve been watching you every day,” he told Lissa.
“What, through binoculars?” Rand chortled at his own humor.
“On TV. You’re great.”
“Lissa’s always been great,” Rand said. He lowered his voice and Jonathan strained to hear. “I was a fool to let you go.”
Rand was a fool. Period.
Lissa blushed and took a sip of her martini.
The chair next to Jonathan was pulled out and down plunked—oh, no, Daphne. “Don’t spill anything on me,” she cautioned.
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Jonathan assured her.
But he did. In his haste to pass the poppyseed dressing to Lissa when the salad had been served, he managed to let the little pitcher slide off its tray. It tumbled right onto Daphne’s plate and rained salad dressing into her lap.
She scooted back with a yelp.
Jonathan could feel his cheeks burning. “Sorry, Daphne,” he said. This couldn’t be happening. Now truly panicked, he grabbed for his napkin and in the process, tipped over his water glass. Water slid across the table toward Tina, who was on his other side, amid ruthless chuckles from Rand.
Jonathan was vaguely aware of someone asking, “Who invited this clown to our table?” He thought it was Cam but it could as easily have been Rand or Doug. He didn’t know. Everything was one ugly blur. He was living his nightmare.
Daphne was standing up now, holding out the skirt of her black dress. “I have to go change. This dress is ruined.”
“I’ll pay for a new one,” Jonathan offered.
“You bet,” she snapped, and made her exit.
“You always were a klutz,” Rand reminisced.
Grown men don’t cry. Jonathan wished he could run away, to another city, another state, another country. India, maybe.
“It was an ugly dress, anyway,” Lissa said in an obvious effort to make him feel better.
That was Lissa, kind to everyone and everything—lost puppies, little kids, clowns. Jonathan managed a nod.
The evening crawled tortuously on. Daphne came back to the dining hall but found a seat at another table. “Well, you got rid of her,” Rand cracked.
It was about the only other thing he said to Jonathan. Hard to believe they’d been childhood friends. Rand had turned into a selfish braggart. Everyone at the table heard about his film agency in Hollywood and his house in “the hills.” Lissa heard about how his wife had never understood him, how next time he was going to pick a woman with heart. “A woman with blond hair and pretty blue eyes,” he added, and gave a lock of her hair a playful tug.
Jonathan gave his breaded chicken a vicious slice with his knife, sending it skittering off his plate. He didn’t check to see who saw that one. Instead, he kept his head down as he stabbed it with his fork and returned it to his plate. He didn’t touch it again. His appetite was gone, as were his chances of impressing Lissa.
He sneaked a look at the table where Kyle was sitting with Mindy and Darrell and Bridget and two of his old friends from the band. They were all chatting, smiling, enjoying themselves. He should have sat there, with people who liked him.
Dessert was served, a chocolate mousse topped with fresh raspberries that the women all raved over. As far as Jonathan was concerned, the best part of dessert was that it signaled the end of dinner.
“Time for fun,” Tina said, and left her seat.
Fun? Oh, no. What did that mean?
She picked up her microphone and asked, “Is everyone having a good time?”
No.
Hoots and claps asserted that everyone else present was, indeed, enjoying the party.
“Well, now we’re going to see how good your memories are. Melody is passing out some pop quizzes. Don’t anyone turn your papers over until I say.”
“Oh, man, just like in Ms. Crow’s history class,” complained Cam.
Cam had never been good at history. Actually, Cam had never been good at anything scholastic. His specialty had been football and getting laid.
Jonathan wished he hadn’t been so good with the books himself. Look where that had gotten him. Melody gave him a sheet of paper and he dutifully turned it facedown.
Not Rand and Doug. They were already comparing answers. Bunch of cheaters.
“Okay, now, turn over your papers,” Tina said merrily.
The questions were properly goofy. Which teacher was nicknamed the Smurf? Who was famous for her bad hair days? (Hint: her initials are L.P.) Lissa saw that one and gave Laurie a playful elbow. Who got caught smoking pot in the boys’ bathroom? Jonathan had no idea. He’d never smoked the stuff. Who did we lose the football championship to? Who cared? Where was the best place to go when you wanted to be alone after a hot date? Ha! He knew that one. Even he had done a little smooching parked at the entrance to the Lost Bride Trail. Who starred in our 1998 production of The Music Man? Daphne, of course.
Jonathan’s hand suddenly went clammy and what little of the chicken he’d consumed started doing the chicken dance in his stomach. What superbrain got “trapped” in his locker when he was a freshman?
Seriously? He’d been Tina’s reunion tech slave and this was the thanks he got? He crumpled his napkin into a tight ball. Okay, enough. He’d had enough, enough of this so-called game and enough of these people. Almost all of them were stuck in high school with their stupid snobbish pecking order. He didn’t need to stay for this.
He shoved out his chair and stood.
“What’s the matter, Templar?” Cam called after him.
Jonathan didn’t bother to answer, merely said goodbye with his middle finger.
He was halfway across the lobby by the time Kyle caught up with him. “Hey, where are you going?”
“Home. I don’t need to sit around and take this shit.”
Kyle frowned. “Don’t leave, man. If you do, they win.”
“Easy for you to say,” Jonathan growled. “You didn’t make it into the pop quiz.”
“Come on. Come back in and sit with us. You can’t let them win.”
Yes, he could. He shook off his friend’s hand and started walking.
“You leave, and you’ll really look like a loser,” Kyle called after him.
That stopped him in his tracks.
“Anyway, you’re not that guy anymore. Are you?”
Hell, no. Jonathan turned around and marched back to the dining room.
Chapter Twenty
He arrived just in time to hear his fellow classmates’ chuckles. Of course. They were laughing at him. He clenched his sweaty palms and made his way back to his table.
“We were just talking about you,” Rand greeted him.
Maybe so, but as it turned out the giggling at the moment was over another question, one he hadn’t read on to see. Who fell into the garbage can while trying to fi
sh out her retainer? Someone had done that? Why didn’t he remember?
“I can laugh about it now,” Tina was saying, “but at the time it wasn’t all that funny.”
“We got a great view of your ass, though,” Cam called, and she shook her head at him.
“All those embarrassing things that happened to us in high school,” she said. “Didn’t they seem like the end of the world back then?”
Yeah, they did.
“But they didn’t really matter half as much as we thought.”
Well, he didn’t know about that.
“’Cause look at what a super bunch of people we’ve turned into,” Tina was saying, sweeping the room with her cheerleader smile. “I hope you’re all having as much fun as I am catching up with everyone. We’re going to need to get out of here pretty soon, but I know you’ll all keep the party going at Zelda’s or the Man Cave.”
Jonathan shot a look across the table. Sure enough, Rand was whispering something in Lissa’s ear. She gave him a considering smile, then nodded. It would probably be Zelda’s for them and that meant there’d be no chance for him to get any one-on-one time with her tonight.
“But before we go, I want to thank my reunion committee for all their hard work. Laura and Heidi, stand up.”
Laura and Heidi stood, and everyone gave them a hearty round of applause.
“And a big thank-you to Jonathan Templar, my favorite nerd, for doing our webpage for us and getting everything up on Facebook.”
Applause was a little less hearty now, except for Kyle’s table where there was much cheering. Jonathan felt the flush from his neck clear to the roots of his hair.
“Okay, everyone, now just a quick reminder about our schedule of events for tomorrow. All you Grizzly Girls don’t forget our breakfast at Breakfast Haus and our shopping spree. Let’s support our hometown economy!”
Go, Grizzly Girls, Jonathan thought sourly. Lissa would be part of that, so there was no point in asking her out for breakfast.
“For you golfers, we have the golf tournament, and then, in the afternoon the picnic, where we can get a chance to see how everyone’s families have grown.”
He already knew how that would go. Lissa would be surrounded by girlfriends; she’d be busy holding their babies, playing with their children. For a moment he could picture them together as a couple, her holding a baby girl with blond curls, him chasing a dark-haired little boy around.
What She Wants Page 25
