Page 36 of The Billionaire Offer
Together, we crossed the street, and when we walked into the bar, I grinned when I saw Jeremiah and Stephanie, Tanner and Larisa, Shawn, and a girl I didn’t recognize sitting in our usual booth. I was assuming the girl was Leah and not Shawn’s date.
She had that same, somewhat edgy look that Serenity so often did, with a lobe full of earrings and black hair pulled up into a messy ponytail. Laughing at something Shawn said, she turned suddenly with the others and waved at us.
Serenity pulled me forward, grinning, and enveloped the girl in a hug while I greeted the others. As we parted, Jeremiah and Tanner both gave me knowing looks but didn’t say anything about it as they stood up to say hi.
“How was the game?” Jeremiah asked. “Steph and I watched it here. It looked like a great one to be at the stadium for. It’s too bad we weren’t invited.”
I put up my hands. “Hey, I didn’t know about it, but that doesn’t mean I’m putting the blame on Serenity. I wouldn’t have invited you even if I had known.”
Tanner clutched his chest dramatically. “You wouldn’t have invited me to my own stadium? Oh, the pain.”
Larisa came up behind him, giving him a teasing smile before reaching out to give me a quick hug. “Ignore him. I actually asked if he wanted to go, but he said no. Both of them were scared of running into you and potentially ruining your date.”
Since she said it while hugging me, I doubted that Serenity had heard her, but I looked around quickly before responding anyway. “I’m not sure it was a date, but I’m glad they didn’t show up.”
If they had, that kiss wouldn’t have happened and I was all about that fucking kiss right now. I hadn’t planned it, but when I had felt the urge to do it, I hadn’t resisted either. Part of me hadn’t expected that she would kiss me back. When she did, however, it was like my world imploded and started putting itself back together in a whole different way, a way in which it was possible that we’d be together again someday.
Larisa released me. One of her brows twitched up as she glanced at Serenity before looking back at me. “I didn’t know you two when you were together, but I’m pretty sure it was meant to be a date. If not a date, then at least a show of love, whether it’s new love or old love, I don’t know, but no one does something like that for someone they don’t care about.”
“What if they feel indebted to that person?” I asked. “Wrongly so, but indebted nonetheless.”
She shrugged, and it was Jeremiah who answered. “People who feel indebted to others typically go one of two ways in my experience. They either avoid the other person entirely, or they send a fruit basket or something. I’m with Larisa on this one. Doing something that meaningful for someone else means you care about them.”
“Like the laptop.” Tanner slung his arm around Larisa’s shoulders and grinned down at her. “I thought that getting her a meaningful gift would make her realize that I cared, but instead, all she thought was that I didn’t trust her old laptop to get the job done.”
She elbowed him playfully in the ribs. “What was I supposed to think, Mr. Player Extraordinaire?”
He sighed heavily. “That I cared, my love. That’s what you were supposed to think, and that’s what Bart is supposed to think.”
I chuckled, but I wasn’t getting my hopes up based on their opinions. Firstly, because they were all wearing the rose-tinted glasses of love. While I understood why, my situation with Serenity was a little different than any of theirs had been. Looking at it from their perspectives, I could see why they thought what they did, but that didn’t mean it was true for us.
She appeared at my side, dragging Leah along with her. Our conversation ceased abruptly and everyone turned to look at them. Serenity frowned but then shrugged it off and pulled her friend forward.
“Bart, this is Leah,” she said, waving between us. “Leah, Bart.”
Leah stuck her hand out, her gaze assessing as she looked me over while we shook. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Bart. I’ve heard a lot about you. You’re the one showing my girl the world.”
“Guilty as charged,” I said, liking her immediately despite the fact that the caveman who lived inside me didn’t like hearing her refer to Serenity asher girl. I knew it was a friendship thing, obviously, but in my head, Serenity had always beenmygirl. “It’s nice to meet you, too. I’m dying to hear some of these songs she’s been writing, but she refuses to let me until they’re ‘ready’.”
I put the words in air quotes. “You don’t happen to have any recordings of them lying around that you can accidentally send me, right?”
Leah glanced at Serenity questioningly but then laughed and shook her head. “Nope, sorry. If she’s not ready to let you hear them, you’re just going to have to wait until she is. They’re great, though. Her muse has been screaming instead of just whispering recently.”
My heart did a weird flip in my chest. I wasn’t going to presume that I was her muse, considering that I was pretty sure the muse was being so loud more because of the experiences we’d been having together than my participation in said experiences, but it was nice to hear from an outside source that meeting up with me again had positively influenced her craft.
Maybe that’ll make her realize that we can be together while she’s still trying to make it and that not all distractions are bad.“Fine, I’ll wait, but I’m expecting a private show one of these days.”
Shawn heard the last statement and he bounded over to us, questions and disapproval in his dark eyes when they met mine. He blinked it away, though, but not before shooting me a warning look. I knew where he stood on this particular subject and I also knew that if something happened, we’d have to talk to him about it together before he found out another way, but since there was nothing untoward going on, I grinned at him and gave my head a small shake.
“I didn’t mean it that way,” I murmured to him when he came to stand beside me. “A private show doesn’t mean she’d have to be naked for it.”
He laughed and clapped me on the shoulder. “I wasn’t even thinking about that, but thanks for putting the visual in my head of my sister singing to you while naked. Obviously, I’m not imagining either of you naked, but the idea of you two together in the buff again is terrible.”
“Well, you’ve got nothing to worry about,” I assured him. “No one has been in the buff in the presence of anyone else recently. Not that I know of, anyway.”
Although the thought she might still be seeing other people made me feel sick. I had no idea if she was and there was no real reason why she shouldn’t be, but I really didn’t like that it was a possibility.
That caveman inside started pounding on his chest, roaring about how she wasmygirl. Thankfully, Shawn shut it down when he squeezed my shoulder. “I hate to break it to you, buddy, but you were the last to arrive. Let’s go get those drinks, shall we? On you, of course.”
