Lover (Court University 4)

I got up.

It took me a second to regain equilibrium, but once I had, I pocketed my hands. “Nice meeting you, Brielle.”

It’d been an experience, that was for sure. I started to walk away, but she shifted, staring at me.

Her head angled up, way up since I was standing. Her lashes flashed. “You don’t know any pizza places, do you?”

“Pizza?” My eyes flashed. “You want pizza?”

“Good pizza. Yeah.” And then she was getting up, all the glorious angles and inches of her. She was a sea of taffeta and stark black, the back of her dress longer than the front. If I had to guess she stood just north of five-five, more than a foot of height I had on her. She smoothed the bell of her dress. “I’m not from here, but I heard the Midwest has good pizza. Deep dish.”

I found myself wanting to smile. Though, I fought it. I didn’t want to lose her, whatever this was. I popped a shoulder. “We do all right. This isn’t Chicago, but I do know a place. Twenty-four hours, too.”

If she was game, I’d take her there, and she seemed to be when she nodded. I’d never seen anyone like her, so poised and polished. Like a diamond-encrusted nut in need of a hard crack. We started to go until she angled a look over the edge of the high dive.

“What do you know about fishing out shoes?” she asked, her shrug subtle. “I seem to have dropped mine.”

Chapter Four

Bri

As it turned out, he knew surprisingly a lot about fishing out shoes.

The guy pushed up his shirt sleeves.

He exposed long arms corded in lean muscle, ready, but most importantly, willing to actually satisfy my request.

How curious.

I watched him behind an observant gaze, this man physically laboring over my error. They hadn’t even been my shoes, but I’d lost them, on loan from a friend. Said friend had also left me to fend for myself tonight, busy with a previous engagement surrounding our work. Evie hadn’t said what had come up, just that she had to leave town to head into the office but assured me we’d both been placed at the singles table for this wedding tonight so I wouldn’t be alone.

I’d been alone, exceedingly so, as I had to watch what was, quite possibly, the most ridiculously lovely wedding I’d ever attended. There’d been magic, love everywhere, like a soft slap in the face and a fuck you for ever trying to go out and actually forget your failed marriage.

At least, that was what I’d felt like.

The other singles, not so much. Most of them appeared to know each other, locals.

This Ramses seemed to know his way around as well, knowing exactly where to get the pool strainer, and I believed I did recognize him from today. Though, I wasn’t quite sure when. I’d made it to the wedding itself late today. I’d actually missed the ceremony, dragging my feet into the reception after Evie finally convinced me over the phone that coming to the wedding without her was okay.

“You’ll get to know some people. Everyone will be at this wedding tonight.”

She hadn’t been lying, the room so full I hadn’t even been able to see the bride and she’d been sitting up front with the groom. They’d both been at a sweetheart table, in their own little world. Every time I had seen her, she hadn’t been without him, a permanent staple at her side and the groom completely doting over her. It’d been sweet.

Goddamn them.

My manicured nails lodging into my scalp, I dragged my hair around to my front, stepping back on bare feet when Ramses placed sopping wet red-bottom heels in front of me. He’d used that pool strainer to get them out, rising like Mt. Vesuvius when he stood. He was easily over six-foot-five. Six-foot-five I knew, and he completely stomped on that number and claimed some inches above. He’d been ready to help me, again, curious.

“One and two,” he stated, dashing a grin down at me. He passed them out like penny candy, so ready to give them out. Like he didn’t care.

Like he enjoyed being happy.

My brain, as pessimistic as it tended to be as of late, thought good for him. If it was easy to be happy, people should be happy.

Yes, good.

But with wet shoes, I obviously couldn’t wear them, and Ramses made quick work of this as well. He had a towel at the ready, one he’d grabbed after he’d appropriated the strainer, which let me know he was either a very good sleuth or did simply know his way around this place, a local too. A local with a muscular ass who filled out his trousers like David Beckham.

A visual dick print included.