Page 106 of Betting on You

“What about your friend?” Charlie raised his eyebrows and said, “I mean yes, we’re both pretty and funny and smart, but do we haveothercommon interests?”

I rolled back over and said, “She’s totally sarcastic, like you, and she’s a volleyball player.”

“How would volleyball apply tomeexactly?”

“Obviously you both like doing sporty things.”

He raised an eyebrow and looked amused. “Obviously?”

I rolled my eyes as my cheeks burned. “You have the chest of someone who enjoys sweating, and you know it.”

“Baybay,” he teased, leaning his face closer to the camera, “were you checking me out?”

God, had he always been that sexy? It was FaceTime, for God’s sake, and my breath hitched like he was going to lean in and kiss me. I cleared my throat and said, “I’m telling Dana you’re a conceited asshole. Goodbye.”

He laughed and said, “I’ll text you after I talk to Eli.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHTCharlie

“Sorry about my parents,” Dana said as she buckled her seat belt.

“No worries,” I replied, starting the car and putting it in reverse. Her perfume smelled good, and I wondered what it was. “They seem great.”

Theydidseem great, even though they’d interviewed me for ten minutes, but I didn’t give a rat’s ass about Dana’s parents. Honestly, I was dreading this entire double-date evening, even though Dana seemed pretty cool.

Why? Oh, yeah—because I was a fucking idiot.

I’dknownthat men and women couldn’t be friends. It was something I considered to be a universal truth. But somehow, with Bailey, lines got crossed. One minute we were just coworkers who irritated each other, and the next she was putting her hand in a fucking urinal for me.

We fell into the trap and became “friends” for a hot minute,but somewhere along the way—of course, you dumbass—I became obsessed with the way she blinked fast when she was surprised, the breathy sound of her laugh when she was sleepy, and the way she somehow knew when something was going to upset me, even before I did.

Somewhere between Omaha and Colorado I’d fallen truly, madly, fucking ridiculously hard for Bailey Mitchell. She was all I could think about, all the time, and sometimes it felt like I’d do anything—anything—just to make sure she was happy.

So yeah—it was kind of like a fucking slap when she mentioned setting me up with Dana, but that slap had been necessary. It was like the splash of cold water that reminded me I had no interest in anything more with her becausemorenever lasted.

Everyone I’d ever known—every-fucking-one—had told me I was wrong. Every single person tried to convince me that true love and happily ever afters were a possibility.

But it was simply not true.

Yes, there was the obvious baggage in my life to which a therapist could attribute my beliefs: my parents fell out of love, every person I’d ever dated had fallen out of love, my grandparents had all split up—even my aunts and uncles had RIP’d their marriages.

Anyone related to me wasn’t a part of the HEA crowd.

You could argue with me all day about the merits of true love, but in my opinion, it wasn’t worth the risk.

It always came to an end.

And then there was nothing.

When Bec and Iusedto sit next to each other in bio, welaughed and screwed around and texted secret jokes about what the acronym of Mr. Post’s first name (Uwe) stood for. I looked forward to that class because she made it fun.

It felt good to have someone to have fun with.

But after we dated—and subsequently broke up—we didn’tspeakin that class anymore. She looked at her phone or talked to Hannah (who sat on the other side of her) every day, and I… felt alone.

Every fucking day.

Fuck.

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