Page 9 of The Love Wager

She takes almost the full fifteen minutes we have left before the bar closes to add up her notes. Drunk math should be a new game show. The group helps me clean up the decorations, getting everything shoved—not so neatly—back into the bag I brought in.

“Any guesses?” Taylor excitedly asks the tired crowd.

“Time to go, ladies; I called you cabs. They’re waiting outside to take you somewhere that isn’t here!” That booming voice sounds from steps away.

“Come on, Tay. Just tell us before we get booted,” I urge.

“Fine.” She pouts. “Looks like somebody got bit by Brooks’ no-fun bug. Now, I really wish you weren’t the winner.”

“Wait, I won? Really?” I shoot up from the booth, knocking straight into a hard chest, the back of my head smacking hard into bone. “Ouch, fuck!” I yell, reaching for my throbbing injury.

“Should have known you’d be hardheaded. I think you cracked a tooth,” he growls, too close to my ear.

The shiver it sends down my spine and straight to my toes has nothing to do with the sexy deepness and everything to do with the fact that I’m drunk.

Drunk and hornyalwaysgo together.

I spin on my heels, noticing the table has cleared and Taylor’s in the middle of slinking off to join them. I reach for my bag and step up to our ungracious host. “Don’t worry, we’re leaving.Good luck with the tooth,” I snap, patting his hard chest in a moment of intoxicated weakness and storm off.

Taylor leans heavily against the dark brick building when I push open the door and enter the frigid night. “There you are. Did everyone else get off okay?” I ask my very inebriated best friend. Ushering her toward the curb to wait for the next cab to arrive.

“You know, I think you're wrong,” she says instead of answering my question.

“Yeah, about what?”

“I think you need to fall in love. It’ll change your life, Indie. I promise.”

I laugh at the sincerity in her voice. This girl is sloshed; even so, she’s still madly in love with Spencer. That’s how I know they will be among the few to make it. “I know you think so, Tay, and I love this journey for you. But I’m not there yet.”

She lets out a frustrated huff at my disagreement. I forgot how quickly her emotions flip on nights like these.

“How about this? Double or nothing. I’ll double the money from tonight’s pot if you at least try to give someone a chance this week. Not just a hot fuck, but spend time with him, get to know him. You never know; maybe we’ll end up with babies at the same time. How cute would that be?”

“Woah, there. I’m ignoring the baby comment altogether. You want to pay me twenty thousand dollars to give some random guy in your small town a chance this week?”

“Yep!”

“Do I get to pick who it is?”

“Nope! I’ll point him out to you tomorrow. But for tonight, that’s my cab, and I’m going home to the man of my dreams. Night, night, Indie. I love you.” She ends the conversation on that note and pours herself into the cab's back seat.

I stand in the middle of the sidewalk, stunned and completely still. Twenty thousand dollars. I could do almost anything for that kind of money.

FOUR

Brooks

Banging on the door has me whipping my head up from where I’m counting the till. I put a finger up to tell Nick I’ll be there in a minute, but the face of the thorn in my side stares back at me from the other side of the door.

“We’re closed! Your hazing session is over!” I shout, flicking my eyes back to the money in my hands before transferring it to the bank bag, moving it into my office, and locking it in the safe.

As I do all of this, the banging on the door continues.

Grumbling, I march toward the door, my hand itching for my bat as I unlock it and open it. “The night is over. You’ve had your fun. Go back to your hotel…” I look around, realizing the cabs I called are nowhere in sight.

“I think I left my phone inside if you’ll just move…” her words trail off as she pushes past me, her lithe body brushing against my front as I turn, my astonishment written all over my face as she meanders to the table Tay’s party had been harassing customers from all night long.

“Didn’t I call you a cab? Why are you not in it?” I ask her, letting the door shut as she gets on all fours and crawls across afloor I wouldn’t dare my worst enemy to touch. I can’t actually recall the last time I cleaned it.

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