The Wingman (Alpha Men 1)

The music and chatter increased in volume as the doors swung open behind him, and he turned with an expectant smile on his face, which faded somewhat when he saw his brother’s large frame silhouetted in the doorway.

“Hey, where are you off to?” Spencer asked, stepping out on the sidewalk with Mason; the door didn’t swing all the way shut behind him, and the noise bled out into the peaceful night.

“Heading over to MJ’s with Daisy,” Mason replied.

“Seriously?” Spencer asked with a slightly incredulous laugh.

“I’m hungry.”

“Mase, I appreciate you coming out here tonight, but you don’t have to do that.”

“Do what?” Mason asked with a frown, confused.

“You know what.” Spencer grunted, closing the gap between them slightly as he stepped closer. “I know I asked you to keep the other one distracted . . .”

“Her name’s Daisy,” Mason corrected irritably.

“Yeah.” Spencer waved the correction aside impatiently. “Whatever. Look, I know I asked you to keep her distracted, but taking her out? That’s going above and beyond, Mase. I don’t think Daff’s that interested, so you don’t have to do this. Go home and catch that movie; I know that’s what you’d prefer doing anyway. You’re probably bored out of your skull by now. Sorry about this, man. But like I said, I had to try, you know? It’s just a shame you had to waste your time with the other one while I did so.”

It was a shitty thing to say, and Mason was about to tell Spencer exactly that when he noticed a pair of earnest eyes behind a pair of unflattering dark-framed glasses peeking up at him from behind his brother’s broad shoulder.

Fuck.

She was so damned short that she had actually managed to come up behind Spencer without Mason noticing. And—damn it—were those tears sparkling in her eyes? He felt like a total shit now and glared at his brother for a moment, before brushing by him and following the woman as she quickly turned away and walked up the road at a brisk pace. He heard Spencer swear behind him as his brother realized that Daisy had overheard him. Mason shot him a warning glare over his shoulder and held up a hand to prevent him from following.

He caught up with Daisy in a few short strides and took hold of her elbow to halt her movement. She went taut but stopped and glared up at him fiercely from behind those heavy frames. They were beneath a lamppost, and he could see every emotion in that expressive face. She looked equal parts angry and resigned.

“Look, you shouldn’t have heard that,” he began roughly as he agitatedly rubbed his hand back and forth over his scalp and wondered how the hell he had gotten into this situation.

“It’s nothing I haven’t heard before. I’m the ugly one, remember?” she asked, without a trace of bitterness or self-pity in her voice. In fact, she sounded remarkably calm. “But that’s okay because being pretty isn’t everything, since ‘a brain is just as important as good looks.’ And ‘at least I’m clever.’”

She used air quotes to make it obvious that she was parroting someone, and he shoved his hands into his jacket pockets and felt his brow lower as he considered the casual cruelty those supposedly well-meaning people had subjected her to. She wasn’t even that bad looking. She just needed to do something with her hair, maybe. Put on a little makeup . . . dress better . . . lose a few kilos.

He appraised her seriously. Her hair was crazy; he couldn’t tell if it was up in a bun or a ponytail, but whatever it was, most of the curly, mouse-brown strands seemed desperate to escape their confinement. She had a round face, a dab of a nose that her heavy-looking black-framed glasses kept sliding down, which meant that she was constantly peering at him from above the rims. Her deep-gray eyes were nice, big, and luminous and surrounded by thick, dark lashes and dark, arched eyebrows. She also had round cheeks, those adorable dimples he had noticed earlier, and a bit of a double chin when she laughed. He liked her lips; they looked soft and were naturally pink and lush. Surprisingly kissable lips set in a round, otherwise ordinary face.

The woman also appeared to have absolutely no dress sense; she was wearing a flannel shirt combined with a pair of snug faded jeans that clung to her shapely, if somewhat ample, butt rather sweetly. He couldn’t tell much else about her figure beneath the oversized shirt and boxy bomber jacket—who even owned bomber jackets anymore? He thought they’d all been left behind in the nineties, where they belonged.

She seemed to have bigger boobs than one would expect from a woman who was five foot three at most, but he couldn’t tell for certain.