Page 1 of In the Net
1
HARPER
There’s nothing more humiliating than being stood up on a date.
At least, that’s what I thought. Until right now.
No, I’ve unlocked an even greater level of humiliation: watching the guy who’s currently standing me up walk by with another girlwhileI’m waiting for him.
My jaw drops at the sheer audacity when I see Keith walking by with his arm slung over some girl’s shoulders. I’m staring at the sight through the window of the trendy cocktail bar where I’ve spent the last fifteen minutes waiting for him to show up.
I do a double take, blinking tightly a couple times to make sure my eyes don’t deceive me. But there’s no mistake.
To his credit, his face in person looks just like it did in his pictures; against his credit, there’sno wayhe’s six-one like his profile said.
My expression sinks. I rake my palm down my face, feeling perfectly pathetic. I manage to resist drawing attention to myself by groaning an obscenity, but just barely.
I pull out my phone to check and see if he at least had the decency to send me a last-minute message to cancel the date.
Of course, he didn’t.
I didn’t even want to go on this date tonight, and I wasn’t feeling much chemistry with Keith through our messages. But with my cousin’s wedding just a couple months away, and my entire extended family hounding me nonstop about whether or not I’m bringing a datethis time(with the far-from-subtle subtext being how much of a loser I must be if I don’t), I decided to put my best foot forward and try to find a plus-one instead of showing up conspicuously single.
Right now, sitting alone in this very date-y cocktail bar where it looks like literally every single customer other than me is part of a couple, conspicuously single is exactly how I feel.
I push the thought out of my head. No need to get all self-conscious on top of everything else. I doubt anyone in this place even notices me, and surely no one here is perceptive enough to suspect that I’ve been stood up.
“Harper?”
My stomach drops. Just as I was piecing back together enough of my self-confidence to do something with the rest of my Friday evening other than mope, I turn to see Mackenzie staring at me.
Most of my cousins are cut from the Mean Girl cloth, but Mackenzie in particular acts like her entire life has been one extended audition for a role in the remake of said movie. Or thenextremake, I guess.
As if growing up around her as part of an extended family that gets together often wasn’t bad enough, I have the misfortune of us both attending the same college.
“Oh, hi, Mackezie,” I grumble, making no effort to summon any enthusiasm.
Her eyes flit to the empty space on the other side of my table, going wide and bright when she finds it empty. She pulls a sharp intake of breath and leans toward me.
“Oh my gosh,” she says in that kind of voice where she’s pretending to whisper but actually making it impossible for anyone nearbynotto overhear, “did you just getstood up?”
My lips purse. Mackenzie’s always been eagle-eyed at spotting any source of embarrassment or insecurity someone has. She’s spent years honing those skills when it comes to me especially.
All because she just had to be the best at everything while we were growing up—most popular, trendiest, best-looking, leader in all her extracurriculars, straight-A student—and it ate her up that in just that last category she was number two, because I was always better than her academically.
Look, it’s not like getting stood up by some jerk I matched with on a dating app is a fatal hit to my confidence. It happens, it sucks, whatever. But looking pathetic in front of my shitty cousin is hard for me to swallow.
I open my mouth, hoping I’ll be able to snatch enough acting talent out of thin air to convincingly deny her very correct observation—but before a word can leave my mouth, I hear another voice that I can’t stand, saying something Idefinitelynever expecteditof all voices to say.
“Hey, babe,” the low sound rumbles, smooth as honey. “Sorry for being late.”
My stomach tilts again, but it’s a different sensation than the one Mackenzie’s voice stirred. It’s a sharp lurch, spreading an unsettling buzz up into my chest, and making my throat feel just a tiny bit tight.
Sebastian Lawrence is standing just behind Mackenzie. His tall, broad-shouldered frame towers above my cousin and her boyfriend Liam, who’s been hanging silently by Mackenzie’s side like a well-trained dog, as the guys she dates usually do.
Mackenzie turns to him, her eyes going even wider and gleaming with appreciation when she spots him. My brows knit,and a silent grumble vibrates in my throat. Sebastian’s ego is insanely overgrown, in large part thanks to every woman he comes across looking at him like that.
Every woman but me, that is.
