Page 38 of Biggest Player
True. And can I point out again that itWasher idea ...
Margot:
I’ll allow it.
Dex:
So, drinks? You can tell me all the things that are wrong with me, and then we can go our separate ways.
Margot:
Gee. What girl can resist an offer like that?
Chapter 8
Dex
“Take her for a drink, they said. It will be fun, they said,” I mumble, disgruntled.
“First of all, I can hear you.” Margot laughs, perched on the barstool next to me. “Second, this wasyouridea. I tried to weasel my way out of it, but you insisted.”
She lifts her cocktail glass to her lips and sips.
Obviously, I watch.
I’ve been watching her a lot since we sat down at the bar of an old tavern on the outskirts of the city, closer to where she lives than I do—for the first time I tried to be a gentleman, seeing as she’s doing me a favor and all.
“When did you try to weasel your way out of coming tonight?”
Margot rolls her eyes at me over the brim of her glass. “Remember when I asked if you had friends who could help you instead of me?” She swirls the crystal glass, studying the amber liquid and the big square ice cube before taking another sip. “I reckon if you sit here long enough by yourself, some lonely woman will find you.”
I feel my entire forehead wrinkle. “Some lonely woman would find me? What am I, a charity case?”
My anti-date snorts. “Hardly. That wasn’t my point. What I meant was, all you have to do is sit here and look pretty.”
“Aww, you think I’m pretty?” I flutter my eyelashes as I lift my glass of beer. It’s cold and in a frosted mug, just the way I like it.
Margot sighs long and loud. “You’re lucky Wyatt had a slumber party tonight, or I would have canceled on you.”
I’m not sure how to translate what she means by that. “What are you saying? That you can’t get babysitters?”
She shrugs. “Sure, I can get babysitters. I just don’t like wasting them on pointless”—she pauses, searching for the words—“efforts.”
“You think this is pointless?” And what does she mean by efforts?
Margot is confusing the fuck out of me.
She turns on the wooden stool, leveling me with a stare. “Yes. This isn’t a date. You felt guilty about being an assbag, so you’re buying me a drink, and I haven’t had the chance to wear my new jeans out of the house, so I said yes.”
New jeans?
Assbag?
I’m trying to follow her logic. “You agreed to drinks so you could wear your new jeans?”
She nods, letting out a satisfiedahhhafter her drink. “Yup. I don’t like wasting them on the grocery store.”
Margot slides off the stool, sets her glass on the bar top, and skims her palms over the front of her dark denim jeans. She postures and poses, jutting out her hip. For someone who hasn’t spent more than a few minutes in my company, she certainly isn’t shy.
