I feel hot. I see why Georgia loves wearing heels.
When we get to the private dining room, though, no one is here.
The table is way too small for a team of twenty-three guys with their partners, too. My eyes narrow. With staff and partners, we were expecting over seventy people.
Something isn’t right, but when I turn to ask the hostess, she’s already disappearing down the hall.
ETA?I text the girls in our group chat, but there’s no answer. A warning moves through me. This feels like the plane, when everyone’s seats were taken. And the PowerPoint, when everyone was looking at me.
I check the meeting invite, and yes, I have the time and place correct.
Once again, the team is conspiring to throw Tate and me together, and this time, my friends are in on it.
You’re all permanently banned from the Filthy Flamingo,I text the group chat.
I’m sorry!!!Darcy texts.They swore me to secrecy!
I’m annoyed, but I’m laughing. I picture them at the bar, peering over her shoulder at her phone.I’m going to break your calculator, nerd.I include knife and calculator emojis and hit Send.
I turn to go back to my hotel room so I don’t have to see the uncomfortable look on Tate’s face—and bump right into him.
His hands come to my arms to stabilize me.
“Sorry,” I say quickly.
Wow. That suit. I’m immediately furious with the team because now there’s no excuse to take a picture of Tate in his suit, and an image of Tate in this suit should be in a museum. His hair, shorter at the sides like he got a last-minute haircut this afternoon. The deep, rich green of his eyes and perfect slant to his soft-looking mouth.
Thousands of years from now, when people look back at our civilization, they will point to the image of Tate wearing this suit and say, look. Look at how hot some of these people were.
“No. It’s my fault.” He clears his throat, eyes moving over me in my dress. “You look lovely.” His mouth says lovely but his eyes are concerned and alarmed. “Sophisticated,” he adds mildly, eyes lingering on my neck.
There’s that word again, the one he said at the first charity event when he looked at me like I was wearing something offensive.
“Nice choker,” he says hoarsely. He stares at it. “Are you wearing perfume?”
“A bit,” I admit. “Is it awful?”
“Nope,” he says, looking away, focused on something across the room, his jaw flexing. His chest rises and falls like he’s taking a deep breath. “It’s nice. Sweet. Like those drinks you bring me.”
Hunger flashes in his eyes, the same look I saw when I set a drink on his desk yesterday morning and forced him to take a sip. One sip. Only one. That’s all he ever allows himself.
He notices we’re the only ones here and frowns. “Where is everyone?”
“There’s been a mistake.” How do I word this? “No one else is coming.”
He arches an eyebrow. “Is this like the plane? And the PowerPoint?”
I nearly choke. “You know about that?” I thought he didn’t notice on the plane. And someone told him about the PowerPoint?
I’m going to die. I’m going to burst into flames and disappear, right here.
He chuckles. “Word gets around.” He glances around the empty dining room. “Shall we go?”
My insides sink but I keep the neutral, cool expression. It’s been awkward since we cuddled. Of course he doesn’t want to have dinner with me, alone, like we’re on a date.
“Yep. Let’s go.”
This is humiliating, that the team keeps trying to set us up and Tate keeps turning me down.
