Page 59 of No More Heartbreakers

“I’m sure you hated that.”

“Well, I didn’t love it. It gets old. Really, Heidi. Is that what this is about? You’re jealous?”

His expression changed. He looked quite pleased, in fact. “I thought you acted strange the day we did the Dancing Dawg’s story.”

“No. I’m not jealous. What this isabout, is I’m not one of your groupies, and unlike every girl you meet everywhere you go, I’m not eager to become the next name on your list.”

“My list,” Aric repeated.

Then his voice rose in tone and volume. “Heidi, I can’t help it if girls come up and talk to me or give me their numbers. It’s not a big deal. It happens all the time. And it’s not like I call every number I get. Do you think I’m some kind of man-whore or something? Is that what you’re trying to say?”

Now that he put it into ugly words, it did sound rather insulting. “Well…”

“Do you want to know how many girls I’ve been with?” Aric’s face was flushed. “Do you? You could’ve asked instead of assuming you know my whole life story.”

He held up his fingers. “Two. Two people—is that number too high for you?”

I stood for a minute taking in the furious, wounded look on Aric’s face.

It was sort of impossible to believe he’d been with only two girls, but it wasn’t my business anyway, and I’d had no right to accuse him of sleeping around.

“I’m sorry.”

I collapsed back down on the chaise and stared into the fire. On the off chance hewastelling the truth… I’d grossly misread Aric and been extremely unfair to him.

After a minute, he sat beside me again. “Apology accepted. You don’t even have to send me flowers.”

I turned to study his face. “Is it true? Two? Really?”

He nodded. “My high school girlfriend, Sarah—we stayed together all through college, and a girl I dated in Mankato. That didn’t last too long.”

“What happened to Sarah?”

“She broke up with me right before we graduated from Emerson. We’re still friends. She was ready to settle down. I wasn’t at the time. My dad—he’s always warned me about making a commitment when you’re too young to know what you really want. He said that was what happened with him and my mom. The breakup sucked at the time. I felt… lost, I guess, right at first. I’d been with her so long. But it was probably for the best. She met somebody else immediately, and now they’re married. Looking back on it, it must not have been the real deal, or I wouldn’t have let her go.”

His profile glowed as he stared into the flames.

“And the girl in Mankato?”

“Yeah. She was nice. But I knew after just a few months it wasn’t going to go anywhere. She wanted to live in Minnesota and raise a bunch of snow-babies. She was from a big Swedish family, so I thought we’d have a lot in common, but we didn’t, really.”

He turned to me. “Okay, your turn.”

I blushed instantly, thankful to be concealed by the darkness. How much detail would he expect?

“My number, you mean?”

Aric nodded.

“Well, you’ve got me beat. There’s only the one.”

“Hale.”

“No, Hale and I never actually, uh…”

“Really? The way he acted with you, I would’ve thought…”

“Really. There was, you know, fooling around or whatever, but I wasn’t exactly…”God this was awkward.“…receptive to going further. And Hale didn’t push it.”

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