Page 14 of The Longest Wait

She took a deep breath, needing to gain control of this conversation so Alex didn’t have something else to hang over her head.“Get over yourself. I’m not the one who dragged you into a bathroom. Take a look in the mirror and blame yourself, not me.”

Alex dropped her hand to move his to the wall above her,but she was quick. She ducked underneath him and exited thebathroom as quick as possible. His latest antic was only anotherreminder to keep herself far away from him.

He was bad for her.

THE PARTY ENDED and the only people left were the peopleclosest to him. Lucy, Jack, Connor, Dominic, Tess, and Sofia.Actually, Sofia was debatable to consider her a close friend,but semantics.

Dominic took a swig of his beer. “Sofia, I was expecting youto leave with Gordon.”

Alex grimaced.

After their impromptu kiss in the bathroom, she made it hermission to flirt with this Gordon jackass the rest of the night. Alexknew her tricks, she was making a point. A point he didn’t like. Hewas expendable to her. And worse, she didn’t care how it affectedAlex, regardless it was a party for him.

Sofia gave Dominic a demure smile. “I debated it, but changedmy mind last minute.”

“Why was that?” Lucy asked while she rested her head onJack’s shoulder.

“We were talking about music, and he said it wasn’t his thing.There is no way I can hook up with someone who doesn’t likemusic. I’m still not sure what that even means ‘not my thing’.”Sofia’s hair shook as she shuddered. “Like does he turn off musicwhenever he hears it? Does music upset his stomach? Are theremusic allergies?”

This made most of them laugh.

“At least you have standards. If a girl told me she didn’t likemusic, fuck it. It isn’t like I want to take her to a concert,” Dominicadded, which caused Tess to cringe.

Jack kissed the top of Lucy’s head. “This is exactly why I don’tmiss being single.”

“Here I thought we got married because of love, not becauseof the game of ‘Who will I bring home tonight’?” Lucy saidwith playfulness.

“And I didn’t feel like playing the game.” Sofia added quickly,“Tonight.”

Hearing her snarky response pissed Alex off. He saw throughthe bullshit game they have been playing for years. Sofia was nevergoing to leave with the man who might have had music anhedonia.Her plan was only to prove a point to Alex, which she managedbased off how annoyed he was.

Point for her.

Dominic laughed while he stood up. “I’d love to talk about myphilosophy of playing the field, but I need to get home. I feel likehaven’t been there a lot this week.”

Tess stood up too. “I’ll go with you so we can take an Ubertogether. Connor, you coming with us since we’re all close by?”

Connor nodded. “I ordered an Uber while Dominic was clarifying how he would just not put on his record player if he wantedto have sex with someone who hated music.”

“Damn right,” he said with a smile.

The group chatted for a few more minutes about plans for theremainder of the weekend. Soccer was in off-season , so Jack wasn’tas busy as he normally was, and he planned to take advantage of hisfree time as much as he could. He told Alex earlier in the night hewanted to whisk Lucy away to places she hasn’t visited yet so theycould add to their wall of maps. Alex was proud of Lucy that shechose Jack because their love was obvious. The way they supportedeach other was evident.

Connor spoke up, “Uber is here.”

Dominic waved as he walked out the door, while Tess promisedLucy the cleaning crew would arrive the next day to make sure thehouse was spotless. Once they left, it was momentarily quiet.

Jack ran his hand through his hair. “Dominic is all over theplace. I need to remind him of company policy. We have a waveof interns coming in, and the last thing we need is for him to sleepwith someone, only to find out they work with us.”

“This seems oddly familiar,” Sofia teased, making fun of howLucy and Jack met. It started as a one-night stand where theyended up working together, and now they couldn’t get enough ofeach other.

“I don’t want to hear anything about sex and my sister.” Alexsquashed the conversation before it started. If there was somethinghe didn’t want detail on, it was how Lucy met Jack.

Sofia’s blue eyes gleamed, daring him to fight back. “Then Iprobably shouldn’t mention what I walked in on in the kitchen.”

Alex matched her look. “Was this before or after the bathroom.”

That got her. She went from challenging to pissed off in amatter of seconds. It was like Alex lived to make her uncomfortable. Luckily, no one picked up on his comment.