Player(25)

“Psh, please. It was his idea.”

That seemed to surprise him, but he didn’t comment. “So, how about you? What do you do?”

“I’m in a pit orchestra on Broadw—”

“Ricky Santolini, you useless son of a bitch!”

Her voice came from behind me, shrill and high, cutting through the music and murmur of the crowd like a siren. His eyes darted behind me and shot open like he’d been zapped with electricity.

“Oh, shit. Jeanette, baby, what are you doing here?”

“What am I doing here? What the fuck are you doing here?” Her blonde hair was in a mostly ruined ponytail, and mascara pooled under her eyes, running in long streams down to her chin. “You told me you had to work late, but I knew you were a liar, you fucking lying liar!” She pushed his shoulder. “Stupid, stupid liar. Well, I’m not as stupid as you.” With every stupid, she pushed him again. “If you wanted to dump me, you should have just said so. Stupid! You stupid, stupid, stupid, cheating liar!”

Once I picked my jaw up off the ground, I tried to slither out of there unnoticed. But the second I moved, Jeanette turned her bloodshot eyes on me. I froze dead to the spot.

“I…I’m sorry. I was just lea—”

She launched herself into me, throwing her arms around my neck. “Don’t be sorry. Just run away from this piece of shit as fast as your legs will take you, okay?” She leaned back, her face bright with concern as she waited for me to respond.

“Ah…um…okay. Thanks, Jeanette.”

She hugged me one more time and let me go, and I slunk away and back to Sam’s side as Jeanette and Ricky’s argument escalated to nuclear proportions.

I plopped into the seat next to Sam, still blinking. A sip of my drink helped me collect myself. Sam’s face was enigmatically closed.

“Well, mission accomplished. Newsboy’s name is Ricky, as the entire bar heard. He’s a logistics consultant, which is something so boring it didn’t even sound like English when he explained it, and I got a drink.” I held it up in display. “Victory tastes…unexpected.”

Sam chuckled and shook his head. “Teachable moment. Eighty-five percent of all guys you meet will be duds. But you’ll learn to spot the good ones on sight. Sorry I picked a loser. I’m much better at picking out women, if it makes you feel any better.”

I giggled. Then I put my drink down because if I was giggling, I should probably quit drinking. “Why are you apologizing? I just won! I checked all the boxes—I smiled, complimented him, got a drink, and I even got to use one of my pick-up lines.” I beamed like a spotlight.

Sam shook his head again, but he was laughing.

“I know I wasn’t supposed to, but you told me to be myself. And myself loves cheesy pick-up lines.”

“Well, cheers to that, Val.” He raised his drink and brought it to mine. “Now, finish that drink. I promised you a dance, and I intend to make good on it at least four or five times tonight.”

I took a gulp, then another, and paid for my enthusiasm with a deep cough against the whiskey.

“Question,” he said while he waited.

“Answer,” I responded automatically.

He smirked, amused. “What’d he say when you looked back at me?”

“Oh! He asked who you were and I told him not to worry because you were gay.” I laughed a little too loud at myself.

Something in his face changed, darkened, even though he was smiling. His eyes were molten gold.

“I could show you how not-gay I am, but I feel like that would be against the spirit of our lessons.” He was leaning toward me, and I found that I wasn’t breathing, my unblinking eyes on his lips. “So not-gay,” he whispered, his lips close enough to feel the words against my mouth and smell the sweet whiskey riding his breath.

And in a snap that left me reeling, he was a foot away, knocking back his drink and sliding off his stool.

“Finish that drink, Valentina, so I can take you on a turn around the dance floor.”

I pounded my drink, even though I shouldn’t have. It was just that I couldn’t say no to Sam, hangover be damned.

He held out his hand, and the second my fingers were in his palm, he towed me out to the dance floor. There was nothing in the world so freeing as being twirled around by Sam like I was weightless.

The night flew by, time speeding up and sliding past with nothing to mark the hours but his laughter and my smiles and our bodies bouncing around the parquet like we had nothing in the world to do but dance. I had no idea how late it was until “New York, New York” came on with the house lights.

Sam hooked me under his arm and guided me out into the chilly fall evening. Like an idiot, I’d come without a jacket, and I tried to play it off like I wasn’t cold. A shiver wracked down my spine, betraying me.

He shrugged off his leather jacket. “Here, wear this.”

“B-but then y-you’ll be cold,” I said, shifting away from him in an effort to stop him. “Look, it’s n-not even cold. It’s f-fake cold. It’s only what—like, sixty out? M-my body is j-just being drunk and d-dumb.”

“Val.” The word was a gentle warning. He held out his jacket like a matador. “Put it on.”

“N-no,” I said with a laugh.