“Oh. What a small world. Astrid’s fiancé is Gray Adler.”
Drake nods his head, surprised, I think, but impressed, nonetheless. “Adler is a fucking beast.”
“I’ve heard he’s a fan of a certain sportscaster.”
“You should hook us up.”
I laugh. “Are you breaking up with me already? I’m not opposed to a threesome, you know. But I can’t do it with my best friend’s fiancé.”
“Not a problem. I don’t share.”
My smile is coquettish. “It’s hard to share something you’ve never had.”
His eyes darken, but Jackie arrives with our drinks before he can reply. I would love to hear what he came back at me with, but there’s something fun about leaving the conversation just like that.
It won’t hurt the man to let that marinate for a while.
“Here you go,” Jackie says, setting Drake’s drink in front of him. She pours a glass of sangria for me and leaves the pitcher on the edge of the table. “Have you thought about what you’d like to eat?”
“Everything looks amazing,” I say, wondering how to narrow it down. “How do people decide?”
“My advice is to order a few plates each and see what you like,” Jackie says. “We can kind of go from there.”
Drake looks at me over his menu. “I’m thinking the stuffed dates, potatoes bravas, chicken skewers, stuffed peppers, and definitely the chorizo clams.”
He rattles off his dishes, and then the pressure’s on me. There are so many I want to try, but my eye is drawn to the HessSampler—four of the owner’s favorite dishes named after their children: the Max, Mav, Cove, and Casio.
Once Jackie has taken our menus and departed, Drake and I settle in. He picks up his beer, leaning back in his chair with a cool confidence that puts me at ease.
“You were saying something earlier about something being fun,” he says. “We got interrupted before you could tell me what it was.”
I take a sip of my sangria and nearly die. It’s the best damn sangria I’ve ever had.
“I was thinking about how fun it would be if we, as a part of our dating experiment, ran a giveaway of some sort and sent a couple here on a date. Maybe a blind date where we match the couple or something. People could nominate themselves, and we could play matchmaker. Doesn’t that sound like a good time? And it would give your friend some bonus exposure.”
Drake snickers. “Look at you. One date with me and you’re wanting to bring people together instead of tearing them apart.”
“Ha. Ha. Ha.” I take another drink. “Speaking of the podcast, how much of this are we sharing with the public?”
“Have you checked your socials today?”
I shake my head.
He takes a deep breath and blows it out slowly. “It’s wild, Gianna. These people are more invested in our lives than we are. It’s hilarious.” He takes a swig of his beer. “I think we’re going to have to give them something, or they’ll riot.”
“Maybe we can record something—a two-to-four-minute thing—that we can post on Social every Monday or something. We can catch them up on whatever happens, so they feel included. And if we don’t have a date or nothing to report, we’ll just make something up.”
“I get six weeks to date you. You better believe I’m going to want all the time you’ll give me.”
I study him as I sip my sangria, feeling the alcohol and the sweetness of the fruit play on my tongue. This date has been so easy—surprisingly easier than most dates I go on. It’s been so easy, in fact, that I forgot it was a date for a while. It just felt like catching up with a super-hot friend.
“In the back of my mind, I was worried this would be awkward,” I admit.
“Why?”
“Because this just kind of happened. It’s not like you asked me out after we met in a bar. You dared me to date you in a spur-of-the-moment segment on my podcast with thousands of people listening. It’s not like you could back out.”
“I can do anything that I want to,” he says. “But I want to be here, with you. How often does a guy like me get to date a girl like you?”
