Page 8 of Penthouse Prince
Sarah Jo rolls her eyes, but lucky for me, our waiter appears with our drinks before she can give me any grief on my extra-mild summer plan that definitely do not include dating apps.
I don’t know what she was expecting. It’s me, after all. Sure, I had a few flings here and there in college. I even had one semi-serious boyfriend a few years back, until we decided that my teaching schedule and his bartending gig made it too difficult to see each other. Other than that, though, it’s common knowledge that I steer clear of the dating pool. I haven’t had much steaminess in my life since . . .
Well, since Lexington, to be honest.
I take a hefty sip of my frozen margarita through the pink plastic straw. Maybe if I’m lucky, I can brain freeze that sad reality away. And if not, some tequila might make it a little less painful and I’ll forget everything.
“Okay, that’s it.” Sarah Jo slams her margarita down hard enough that it splashes a bit across the table.
I flinch at her intensity, wiping a cold drop of splashed marg from my cheek. If she’s willing to waste booze like that, she must mean business. “What’s up?”
“I should be asking you that question.” She huffs, folding her arms over her chest. “You’ve been acting weird since we left your classroom. What’s going on? And don’t try telling me that nothing’s wrong. You’re clearly stewing about something.”
Defeated, I sigh. I can’t lie to my best friend. And I’m already feeling loose-lipped after a few sips of my margarita, so I might as well break the news now.
“It’s Lexington,” I say on a sigh. “He’s back.”
Sarah Jo’s palm hits her lips with the slightest smacking sound. “No freaking way. The Lexington Dane? I thought he was a city guy now, some penthouse prince living in the big apple.”
I nod, cringing slightly at hearing her call him by the nickname I’d heard him called in the local media. The day Lexington graduated from college, he booked a one-way flight to LaGuardia Airport and never looked back. Not at North Carolina, and certainly not at me, the high school girlfriend he left in the dust with a hundred questions and not one answer.
“Well, what is he doing here?” Sarah Jo asks, scooping up a heaping helping of salsa with a tortilla chip and popping it into her mouth.
“No clue. All I know is what Dak told me, that he’s back in town and he needs some kind of favor .”
I should have chosen my words more carefully, because my dirty-minded best friend hears the word favor and immediately starts wiggling her eyebrows suggestively, seemingly forgetting all about my hellish history with Lexington.
“Not that kind of favor,” I say on a groan. I’m not in the mood for her antics right now.
“Then what the hell would he want from you?”
“I wish I knew so I could practice the best way to shoot him down. If anyone should be asking for something, it should be me, asking him for an apology.”
Sarah Jo lifts her glass in agreement. “You’ve got that right. So, what are you going to do?”
“Cross my fingers that he stays as far away from me as possible?” I say. “That’s the only plan I’ve come up with so far.”
She purses her lips, holding back a snicker. “Maybe we can get you a disguise. Like those glasses with the fake nose and mustache, oh maybe even a mullet wig.”
Cue me nearly snorting frozen margarita out my nose. Leave it to Sarah Jo to make me laugh, even in the crappiest of situations.
“But, seriously,” she says, refocusing. “I have to ask this and you’ve got to give me an honest answer because that’s in the best friend code handbook. Do you still have feelings for him?”
I chew thoughtfully on my straw as I drain the last of my drink. It would have been easier if she’d asked me to explain physics to her, or come up with the meaning of life.
Do I still have feelings for Lexington Dane? I certainly feel something toward him. Anger? Regret? And a whole lot of confusion. My emotions are more blended than this frozen margarita, and I can’t tease them apart. There’s only one I can identify for certain, and that’s anger. So that’s the one I’m going with.
“The only feelings I have toward him are strong ones of wanting to jam a screwdriver into his balls.”
Sarah Jo smirks, then finishes her drink. “Well, that’s that, then.”
With our glasses empty and our stomachs full of chips and salsa, we pay the check and say our good-byes. I’m an early-night kind of gal with a one drink in public limit. That way, I can always drive home, and I’m never at risk of a parent spotting me in a less-than-flattering state. It’s one of the many important teacher rules that they don’t teach you in undergrad.
