Page 19 of Wicked Bite
Then it all hit me at once. I’d been stood up, by Grayson. That Sexy Brit never showed up, and I waiting for his ass. We had a connection. We had something I couldn’t ever even describe. Something that felt older than the two of us. Like it’d been there the whole time, and when I found him, I found it. But obviously not, because he didn’t show.
Eternally broken picker.
“Hey, I have a concussion. Who knows what I might have forgotten or what I’m thinking?”
“Right.” She folded her hands and rested them on her stomach. “I totally believe you.”
I groaned. “Grayson never showed.”
“The Sexy Brit?” She sat forward. “I thought you two had something.”
“So did I.” For all the physical pain I had, getting ghosted stung worse. “My picker has failed me once more.”
“I don’t know. Even I thought there was something about that one. He seemed different. The way he looked at you, he was really into you. And leaving him with a challenge the way you did. That guy seemed like a hunter. The kind of hunter that doesn’t let up . . . ever.”
Maybe if Dice saw it, there really was something there. But even so, I was totally ghosted. “Yeah, but he didn’t show up.”
“Well, maybe something happened to him.” Friends always do this. We make excuses for the guys we like thinking, Oh, maybe they didn’t mean it, or Maybe they just forgot, or Maybe something horrible happened. When the truth of the matter is, if they liked us, wanted us, they’d show up.
I shook my head. “Nah, I’m not buying into that line of crap. When a guy wants you, he goes for you. End of story. No show means they really don’t care.”
“Oh, come on. Have some faith.”
I rolled my eyes. “Faith in what exactly? My horrible track record or the realistic notion that facts are facts.”
“What if he was at work and they made him stay late?” Her eyes went wide with excitement. “Or, he had to skydive from an airplane to save his hot friend from certain death.”
A reluctant chuckle rumbled in my chest. “Tame a lion at the circus before it ate the ringmaster.”
She hopped up on the foot of my bed. “Had to fly back to Sexy Brit land to make tea for his ill-mannered grandmother, who would despise the likes of us.”
I leaned forward. “Got lost on a speeding train through the Rocky Mountains, never to be seen again.”
“Got in a huge fight and was thrown through a wall and is on the fifth floor of this very hospital with his own concussion, except he’s unconscious, stuck in a black hole of nothingness with only the memory of the girl he left behind.” She folded her hands and pressed them to her chest. Then she batted her eyelashes and rubbed away a fake tear. “So sad.”
“A truly tragic end to a beautiful beginning.” I groaned and tried to run my hands through my hair, forgetting it was a caked, bloody mess.
Dice reached over and put her hand on my leg, giving it a little squeeze. “I’m sorry, Sis. Some guys just aren’t what we expect them to be.”
I nodded and forced a smile. “Maybe next time.”
“There’s always hope for a next time and your broken picker.” She gave a light smile. “We never lost hope in the home, and we won’t now.”
“It was one date, one night. No big deal.” If it was no big deal, why did it sting so much? “Right?”
“Right. Chuck it in the fuck it bucket.” She hopped up. “Now, let’s see if we can get you out of here soon. I don’t like the smell, you look like hell, and my dinner got ruined.”
“Yeah, I just wanna go home.” And lie in bed for a week or so.
“I’m on it.” She winked and headed out of the curtained area toward the nurses’ station.
I closed my eyes, remembering his devastating smile, his wild chocolate hair, and the deep mahogany of his eyes. His voice ran through my head, “Sassy Creature,” and it warmed me down to my toes. I threw my arm over my face and huddled back into the pillows.
My damn picker is good and broken.
CHAPTER SEVEN
PIPER
