Page 46 of Anatomy of a Meet Cute
“Doctor.”
“I’m sorry?” Suspenders said, blinking as if they’d just remembered Grant was there.
“She’s a doctor.” Irritation tinged Grant’s voice, and Sam wondered what on earth could have prompted him to serve a death glare to poor Suspenders for the grand error of failing to anticipate her medical degree.
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
“No worries. Sam is fine. Thank you for this,” Sam said, holding up her glass.
“You’re welcome, Dr.Sam,” Suspenders said, maintaining the playful tone as they walked away.
Sam turned her attention back to Grant just in time to catch him rolling his eyes. “What?”
“‘Miss’? That seems a little fishy when you know someone is getting married,” Grant said, under his breath.
“Okay, Mr.Rules”—Sam held up her free hand and smirked—“excuse me, Dr.Rules. The thing is, we aren’t actually getting married.”
“They don’t know that.” Grant frowned into his glass of bubbles as he took a drink.
It took Sam everything in her not to laugh at his offended sense of propriety. “If this were anywhere else, you would have blown our cover. Lucky for you, rich people love getting angry over silly slights.”
“And threatening to fire people.” Grant chuckled, his scowl relaxing. “My apologies to Sherilynn.”
“Come on. Let’s catch up to Yesenia.” Sam laughed, taking a sip of her drink and walking through an archway into the next room, where their guide was already rattling off facts.
The room was equally beautiful, with the same hidden-garden feel, but softer than the first room. The lighting had an almost pink feel to it, and the wrought iron fixtures had been swapped out for dainty gold sconces and chandeliers.
“This is one of our more intimate spaces. As you can see, if you want additional room, we can connect the two rooms, or this one does have its own entrance if you wanted a smaller gathering.”
“A separate entrance is nice,” Sam said, absently circling around the room. She stopped to touch what looked like a bamboo palm—to figure out if it was fake or just the best-cared-for plant in the world—and noticed Grant a few paces behind her.
Catching her eye, he smiled briefly before turning away to look at Yesenia. Sam couldn’t put her finger on what she felt. It was like the room got a little colder without that smile, although she knew that was objectively not what was happening. If she was cold, she could put on her sweater. Medically speaking, that smile had nothing to do with regulating her body temperature. Or at least it shouldn’t.
“Is there storage on site? For example, if we wanted to have photos or goodies shipped to the venue ahead of time?” Grant asked.
“Typically, we are able to store things for a week prior to the event, depending on the size of the items. We couldn’t keep an elephant or anything, but framed images and gift bags should be fine.”
“I see,” Grant said, nodding at Yesenia. He turned back to Sam, an eyebrow raised as if to check in with her to see if the storage capacity met her approval, and her heart squeezed. For all the jokes and sneaking around, he was taking her mom’s party seriously. He didn’t even know her mom. There was no reason for him to be this thoughtful. He turnedback to Yesenia and asked, “And what about venue prep? Would we be able to get into the space early, say, to arrange the photos?”
“Sure. Or if you have a diagram, we would be happy to do our best to get everything lined up; that way you are only approving things on the day of. Save you both time.”
“It’s really more of her mother’s approval,” Grant said, wrinkling his nose and trying not to laugh at his own joke.
Yesenia laughed at the first layer of the joke, then started chatting about different event caterers they had used in this space. Sam wandered over to another practically perfect plant, still smiling at the second layer of Grant’s joke.
Reaching out to touch the shiny green leaf of a small banana plant, Sam determined that it was, in fact, a real plant. She was just about to ask Yesenia how they cared for all these beautiful palms when she noticed Grant slowly meandering in her direction again, as if the paint on the wall five feet from her were the most interesting paint he had ever run across. It dawned on her that maybe he wasn’t all that interested in looking around. After all, he had been here before. He might be in this corner of the room because she was in this corner of the room.
Something about having Grant as a shadow made her smile in spite of herself. Yes, he was hard to read and inaccessibly put together. But under all those layers he might like her company. It was sweet and unexpected.
She certainly hadn’t meant to, but somehow, Sam found herself smiling over at him. Waiting for him to stop pretending the paint was fascinating and look at her. Her heart thudded in her chest. One beat. Two beats. Then three. She was just about to come to her senses and move on when he finally looked over at her ... and smiled. It wasn’t the big brash smile he usually wore. This was a quiet smile. The kind of smile that meant everything but communicated nothing. That smile was intoxicating.
“Hey,” Sam said, doing her best to seem casual as she released the banana plant and wandered toward him.
“Hey. Do you want to see the private suites next?” Grant asked, looking over their shoulder at Yesenia, who was conspicuously giving them space to discuss who-knew-what.
“I mean, we can do that.” Sam shrugged, feeling tongue tied all of a sudden. Why hadn’t she come up with some kind of cool thing to say? Instead, she was going to tour the part of the building that she had entirely forgotten about somewhere between getting her glass of bubbles and Grant’s smile.
“Right.” His expression transitioned back into Business Grant, and Sam suddenly hated the look. She wasn’t in a rush to see anything. He turned to face Yesenia, and instinctively, Sam placed a hand on his upper arm to get his attention. Grant looked down at her hand, then back at her, questions written on his face.
