Page 64 of Third Chances (Men of Manhattan 2)

"I'll go first," James said. "Let me think. No! Actually someone else go first. I can't think of anything right now." He wiped a bead of sweat off his forehead.

Something was definitely off with him. It was almost like he had taken something to make him all hyper. I frowned. Was he on cocaine? The thought made my stomach twist into knots.

"James, are you feeling okay?" I asked.

"I'm swell. You go first!"

"Oh, um..." I tried to think of some funny facts about myself. All I wanted to do was tell him that I felt it too. That I loved the feeling of rain on my skin and his hand in mine. But I couldn't do that in front of all these people. Everything else that popped into my head was just super lame.

"I'll go first," Alina said, saving me. She gave me a small smile. Alina was never very outgoing either, so I appreciated the gesture more than she even knew. "I'm about to get married to the love of my life. I can play guitar. And I only have one major regret."

"You're definitely lying about getting married to the love of your life," Matt said.

Alina laughed awkwardly. "No, that's true. It's really, really true."

"It is," Kristen said. "Just mentioning Bryce's name makes her giddy like a school girl. See, look at her face right now."

Alina was smiling. She grabbed her drink and took a sip, clearly embarrassed.

I glanced at Rob out of the corner of my eye, but immediately looked away. He was staring right at me. We had both just talked about what love meant to us and how neither of us had experienced it yet. Was that why he was looking at me? Was that why I had looked at him?

"Cheers to that," James said and lifted up his glass. "And this guy right here is about to be in the same boat as us. He's proposing to his girlfriend soon." He slapped Mason on the back.

"What the fuck, man?" Mason said. "You promised you wouldn't tell anyone."

"I haven't told anyone. I haven't even told Penny. Which has been really hard, because we don't keep secrets from each other. Besides, we don't know these people."

I was pretty sure he meant to whisper the last line. He had said it a little quieter, but his normal speaking voice seemed strangely loud tonight.

"Layla knows her." Matt gestured to Layla who was sitting beside him.

Layla put her hands up. "I swear I won't tell Bee. Your secret is safe with me."

"Still," Mason said. "Stop trying to ruin the surprise." He laughed and lightly pushed James' shoulder.

James shrugged. "Anyway, Alina, you're lying about only having one regret. We all saw that it was more than that."

Alina's eyes got wide. If the restaurant wasn't busy around us, we would have been able to hear crickets chirping. "No," she said quietly. "I, um, lump that all together as one bad decision."

"Oh, sorry. You're lying about the guitar thing then?"

Alina nodded her head. "Yeah. I'm terrible with musical instruments."

"Really?" Matt asked. "I would have guessed you'd know your way around, say, a flute or a clarinet pretty well."

Alina choked on the sip she had just taken.

Rob laughed. "Did you seriously just compare your dick to a flute? Is it like super thin or something?"

"No," Matt said. "Shut up, you've seen my dick. It's normal. It's not thin."

"Wait." I laughed and looked up at Rob. "Why have you seen his penis?"

Rob shrugged. "I don't know. We all grew up together."

"Now I just have to know," Kristen said, staring directly at James. "Who is the biggest?"

James looked away from her and downed the rest of his beer. He picked his straw up from the table and put it in his other drink. He swirled it around, seemingly transfixed.

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