Bring Down the Stars (Beautiful Hearts Duet #1)(15)

The music barely masked the crack of pool tables from the gaming area, where Ruby was now pointing. Connor Drake stood in a circle of friends, head thrown back in laughter.

“There he is,” Ruby said. “Let’s go say hi.”

“I want a drink first,” I said, steering her to the long bar.

“Let him buy,” Ruby said. “God knows he’s good for it.”

I stopped. “What do you mean?”

“I mean his dad owns like a zillion companies and his mom’s a senator.”

My nose wrinkled. “How…? Do you keep dossiers on every guy here?”

“Doesn’t everyone?” She laughed and nudged my arm. “No dear, I pay attention to my surroundings, not just the insides of textbooks.” She studied my frown. “Don’t tell me Connor being rich is disappointing to your delicate farm girl sensibilities?”

“No, it’s not that…”

It’s just one less thing we have in common. On the heels of that thought was the memory of Weston saying he was at Amherst on scholarship too.

“Anyway.” I squared my shoulders. “All the more reason I should buy my own drinks. If he’s wealthy, people probably assume he’ll pay for everything.”

“Maybe,” Ruby said. “But he’s not like wealthy, in that he drives a nice car and wears nice clothes. I mean he’s wealthy, like a thousand dollars could fall out of his pocket and he wouldn’t notice.”

Ruby would know. She wasn’t Drake-wealthy, but her Jamaican mother was a professional singer and her Dutch father was a high-powered lawyer in Boston. Ruby liked to say she’d won the “Hammond Scholarship.” Her parents paid for school, so she didn’t have to work while completing a degree in Italian.

She held up her hands at my dry look. “Just saying. But let me get the first round. To celebrate the momentous occasion of your first post-Mark outing.”

I shook my head, a wave of affection for my friend making me smile.

At the bar, Ruby ordered a 7-and-7 for herself and a pear cider for me. She held up her glass. “To keeping it casual and having fun.”

“Amen,” I said, clinking my glass to hers.

“And to possibly getting laid.”

“For you, yes. For me…too soon.”

Ruby narrowed her eyes and set her drink down. “On that note, can I ask you something? How was Mark in the bedroom department?”

I spilled some pear cider over my lips as I sputtered. “Ruby.”

“Because you were with him for two years and we never talked about it. Ever. Any fireworks…?”

“I… What does that have to do with anything?”

“Everything,” Ruby said. “You’re a junior in college now. You’re supposed to be living it up and sleeping around and having a good time, and you were missing all that.” She put her hand on my arm. “I’m not happy that Mark cheated on you—it’s a super shitty thing to do—but I am happy you’re free.”

“Free?” I pulled my arm away. “He broke my heart, Ruby. I loved him.”

“Did you?” She held up her hands again. “I’m honestly not trying to start shit. I just never got the sense that he set your blood on fire. Your words, not mine.”

I hunched my shoulders and faced forward over the bar. “Nobody’s perfect,” I said. “I’m not. Mark wasn’t either. But we had good conversations and he understood what I was trying to do with my degree.”

Ruby pursed her lips and took a sip from her drink. “I don’t like to see you hurt. But I can’t help but feel like this is an opportunity for you. You work so hard. You deserve some fireworks.”

I started to protest but Ruby’s words sunk in. I did work hard at my double-major. But I’d also worked hard on Mark and me. I told myself the electrifying romance phase couldn’t last forever, especially after two years. But we had fallen into a rut of banal conversations and routine sex; a rut that he had broken—spectacularly—with another girl.

I glanced over to the pool tables. Connor Drake stood with some friends, chalking his pool cue. A huge smile broke over his face as he greeted a newcomer with a hearty handclasp and hug, welcoming the friend into his circle.

Seems like a nice place to be.

“Go,” Ruby said. “Just walk over, say hello, flirt a little and see what happens. Okay?”

“Okay,” I said. “There’s just one problem.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m a terrible flirt.”

“That, my friend”—Ruby handed me my glass—“is what the alcohol is for.”

I shot her a look and downed the rest of the pint—more than over halfway full.

Ruby laughed as I plonked the empty glass on the bar. “Hallelujah, girl.” She finished off hers and signaled to the bartender for another.

Pear cider isn’t the strongest drink in the world, but my slight weight and short height felt the effects immediately. The pleasant buzz gave me the confidence to walk over to the pool tables and step into an established clique of sporty guys and their girlfriends.

I knew, instinctively, that Connor wouldn’t act differently toward me in front of the girls or brush me off in front of his bros. And I was right. The second he saw me, he stopped mid-conversation, and his broad smile widened even further.