Page 22 of Sizzle

So to speak.

Joelle nods slowly.

“If you don’t mind,” she says. “Meg and her husband offered, but they live on the opposite side of town and she’s exhausted already.”

“Not a problem,” I tell her, checking my watch. “Give me another twenty minutes, maybe. I think everybody’ll be done by then.” Her smile is thin as she nods again and checks the display on her phone.

“Somewhere you need to be? I can get you a cab if you need to leave now.” It’d probably be safer that way anyway. Safer for me, I mean. I’m not prone to jumping on women who need my help.

Just that I can’t stop thinking about what it would be like to jump her. Or for Joelle to jump me. Or any possible variation of those things. Every variation.

“No, I don’t mind waiting.”

“Tell you what,” I say, an idea forming. “My friend Alex is sitting in the bar. He can keep you company while I finish up so you don’t have to sit alone in the dark.”

“A-Alex is here?” She stutters his name and my eyebrows hit the ceiling.

“That’s right. You guys have met before.”

“Yeah. Last week, waiting on to-go orders,” she says. To my surprise, even in the dark I spy a blush creeping over her face.

Well, I guess it’s not that surprising. Alex is a good-looking guy.

What’s really surprising is that I’m not jealous of that blush. Considering the amount of time I’ve spent deliberately not-fantasizing about my newest employee, you’d think her obvious interest in Alex might bother me.

It doesn’t— which is just the weird-ass cherry on this weird-ass night. Fuck it all. I need a drink.

And that gives me a better idea.

“You know, Alex and I had talked about sticking around to play pool once I lock up for the night. Would you care to join us? If you don’t have plans already, of course.”

Alex and I had no such plans, but he’ll do me a solid once he sees Joelle, surely. Then again, he’s already seen Joelle. They met last week, she said… and he’s been avoiding me ever since. I shoot a glare at the lone figure nursing a beer at the bar across the room.

Hmm.

8

Alex

“So there sits Alex,” Elliot says, wiping imaginary tears from his eyes. “Drunk as a damn skunk from those disgusting wine coolers, and the sorority girls, they just keep bringing them, you know? ‘Cause he can’t say no to save his life.”

Joelle is giggling so hard behind her hand I think she might not be breathing. I roll my eyes, letting Elliot finish his story as I line up my shot. The streetlights outside, plus Elliot’s flashlights pointed at the enormous mirror behind the bar, give us just enough light to see the pool table.

Of course, the booze is doing its part to make seeing straight a challenge.

Snick. Only the eight-ball left to go.

“After, like, the forty-seventh pink wine cooler, he finally gets up and says, ‘Scuse me, ladies,’ and bolts out the door. I think he puked for a solid twenty minutes.”

As embarrassing stories went, Elliot could have done worse, I guess.

“I can’t even so much as smell them anymore or I get nauseous,” I chuckle, chalking my cue.

“That was your freshman year?” Joelle asks, wiping a genuine tear from her eye as she catches her breath.

“Not long after the day I met him,” says Elliot. “Ah, memories.”

“You’re an asshole,” I say then take my shot, sinking the eight. “But now you’re an asshole who owes me twenty bucks.”