Page 27 of Houston, We Have a Problem
I haven’t quite figured him out, though I’ll admit I’ve been distracted tonight. If I wasn’t watching Jordan and Brook poorly act aloof around each other, I was thinking about Darcy and how much I wish she had come with me tonight. Everyone else is paired off, leaving me as a seventh wheel.
I grab my glass of Coke and take a long sip, trying not to let that get to me. Brook would smack me with a pillow if she knew, but I’m not sure I believe Darcy when she said she had work to do. What did I do wrong? I’m not as friendly as Jordan, but I like to think I’m pretty likable. And yet, despite my inexplicably growing interest in Darcy, she keeps pulling back and keeping her distance. Why?
I’ve been asking that question a lot.Why?Why can’t I find a relationship that sticks? Why did my arm have to give out on me? Why is Tamlin Park sitting at the bar?
I choke as my eyes lock on none other than the diva journalist herself sitting at the bar and nursing a cocktail. Soda sprays everywhere, most of it from my nose, but I can’t even focus on the pain of that because that is undeniably Tamlin sitting there chatting up a guy who’s basically drooling on her. I’d recognize her anywhere.
“You okay, Texas?” Jordan asks as Brook and Skyler scramble to soak up my mess with napkins. Fischer is dripping with soda and worse, which isn’t going to help him like me.
But I’m already on my feet, barely aware of the mess as I march across the bar and slide onto the seat on Tamlin’s other side. She has her back to me right now, which gives me a second to wipe my watering eyes dry on my sleeve, but as soon as I find an opening in her conversation, I jump right in.
“You wanna tell me why you’re following me, Park?”
Her body tenses, enough of her skin on display from her navy blue dress for me to realize she’s stronger than I would have thought. Her outfits usually draw the eyes…elsewhere…but with her back to me, I can see definition in her shoulders that I wouldn’t have expected.
Her manicured nails play with the straw of her drink, which she’s barely touched, before she apologizes to her salivating friend and turns to meet my gaze. “Houston Briggs.”
The guy behind her widens his eyes. “Wait, you’re—”
I hold up a hand, which shuts him up. I’m not over here for a chat with fans; I’m here to get this woman out of my life. “Answer the question, Tamlin.”
Everything about her is catlike, from the way she moves to the predatory look in her eyes to the winged eyeliner she wears. She probably came out tonight on the hunt, though I’m prettysure she can do better than the guy who can’t seem to decide if he’s more interested in her or me.
Her red lips twist in a smirk. “Oh, Briggs, you must think you’re so special if you really think I would waste my time following you around when you have nothing good to give me. I like my stories to be exciting. Interesting. And you…”
I don’t know why her assessment bugs me so much. It’s not like I want her to find some exposé to ruin me—or even have something for her to find—but it doesn’t sit well that she so easily tosses me aside.
“Because I’m old, I’m sure,” I say, tempted to ask for a drink stronger than Coke. That’s a terrible idea. The last time I had alcohol, I was still in high school, and I nearly cost myself a scholarship when I got benched after showing up to a game hungover. My stepdad would have paid my way if the UCSB scout hadn’t come to the next game to give me a second chance, but I like knowing I got where I am on my own merits.
Tamlin laughs, the sound low and sultry. Why does everything she do feel deliberate? From the way she moves and speaks to the expressions she makes. Even that laugh was perfectly controlled, and it’s unnerving. “I never said you were old,” she says.
“Pretty sure you did,” I growl back. Iknowshe did because it’s been bugging me for the last week and a half.
But she shakes her head. “I was only asking what you thought about other people’s comments. You were pretty confident in your answer, unless you want to change it now.”
It’s only now that I notice her phone sitting on the bar between us, and I tense. “You’re not recording this, are you?”
“Why? Is there something you want the world to know?”
“I want you to leave me alone.”
She doesn’t leave her stool, but she does lift her glass and set the straw on her tongue before closing her lips around it. Shetakes the tiniest sip, but I still watch every moment of it until she swallows. She may be completely superficial, but she knows how to hold a man’s attention, I’ll give her that. Tamlin Park is undeniably beautiful, and she knows it.
“I’m going to point out that you’re the one who came to me this time,” she says, returning her glass to the napkin in front of her. “I might have never known you were here if you hadn’t come to say hi.”
“I definitely haven’t said hi.”
She pouts. “I know. It’s very rude.”
A growl rumbles out of me, as if her felinity is summoning the dog in me. I want to chase her out of this bar—out of this city—but she keeps herself just out of reach. My place in the public eye is a chain holding me back while she walks the fence above my head, taunting me.
“You know what you are?” I say, stuffing my hands into my pockets so I don’t clench them into fists.
She flashes a white-toothed Cheshire grin. “What am I, Houston Briggs?”
“You’re a real pain in my—” I cut myself off when she cocks her head, like she somehow knows how hard it is not to finish that sentence. Those big blue eyes of hers watch me, waiting, and I’m realizing she will never do what I want her to. No matter how many times I ask her to stay out of my business, she’s going to be right there pretending she’s here for anyone but me.
She wouldn’t have that growing smile if she wasn’t trying to get under my skin.
