Page 10 of The Sweetheart Dance
Smiling at my pretty friend, I shake my head. She is one of the tallest women I have ever met with stick-straight blonde hair and big brown eyes. The woman would be someone I disliked if she wasn’t so sweet.
“It didn’t happen,” I mutter while placing my after-work clothes in my locker next to hers.
“What do you mean?” She all but squeals.
I take a deep breath before I tell her the craziest story ever. I’m sure she won’t believe me when I tell her Luke Willows spent the night last night or how we are going to be keeping each other company during the holiday.
Quietly, I look at my bag almost as if I have x-ray vision to see the note Luke wrote me.
Raina:
I’m happy I ran into you last night. Thank you for being my date during the holiday. I’m happy to be home. My number is 555-5555. I will call you later.
Even his handwriting is gorgeous. The perfect swirl of his letters along with the slight slant proves he put some thought into what he was writing.
Oh crap! I was going to text him before my shift started so he had my number.
ME: Good morning! Thank you for the delicious breakfast. This is Raina.
He doesn’t respond before it is time for me to go out on the floor.
“I got dumped,” I reply with a weird feeling shooting through me. I thought I would still be heartbroken to be dumped like that. However, I’m feeling something I haven’t ever felt. Am I happy about being dumped? Am I happy I wasn’t proposed to?
Am I happy I ran into Luke after running from the table where my hopes were crushed?
Jeepers! I think I am.
Sarah sucks her teeth. “I can’t believe it! I’m so sorry you got dumped! Wait!” She throws her hand out in front of me to stop me. “Why do you look weirdly happy about this?”
Sarah is one of those friends who is my mirror. The one person in this world who doesn’t let me get away with being stupid or lying about my feelings.
I take a deep breath before launching into how the rest of my night went. She is listening intently while grabbing the charts on the nurse’s station while I do the same. I’m trying to keep my voice down because there a lot of people here who like to gossip.
She giggles. “You mean to tell me one of the hottest football players spent the night with you and you didn’t do anything about that?”
I know what she’s asking. I’m not that type of girl who throws herself at people. I would have thought for sure she would have known that by now.
Saved by the pager going off! I then feel my phone vibrate alerting me to know where I need to go. I’m glad I don’t have to explain myself any further to her.
I don’t want thepoor youlook since I was dumped.
Chapter Eight
Luke
I press the button on my treadmill to go faster at the gym I’m at for the time being. Just because we have the time off doesn’t mean I can get lazy and not stay in shape.
Plus, this gives me time to consider what next week is going to be like. Being that close to Raina again is going to be hard. Hell, sleeping in the same home as Raina was hard. Once I was able to fall asleep, I slept very hard.
I’m running on full sprint when my phone vibrates notifying me of a text message. I see the local area code flash on my phone giving me hope it is Raina messaging me.
“Willows! Where did’ya go last night?” Karl Matthews asks as he jumps on the treadmill next to me.
Karl is one of my good friends on the team since we both were drafted at the same time. I like the guy since he’s pretty nice but he’s still enjoying theextraperks of being a professional football player.
“I ran into an old friend I had the last time I visited here. Hey, thanks for coming with me back here. I’m glad you aren’t spending time alone.”
Karl’s mother just passed away from breast cancer and it has hit Karl very hard. This would be the first holiday without his mother and I couldn’t let him be by himself.
