I Promise You: Stand-Alone College Sports Romance(67)

The girl smiles at me brightly. “Welcome! Please proceed upstairs to Room 100. They’ll make announcements there and explain the rules.”

“Rules?”

Bambi pats me. “When you frown, it makes lines on your forehead.”

I give her my fake smile.

“Creepy. And don’t squint. Try again.”

“We can’t all look like Mila Kunis—”

“Funny,” she says as we walk up the stairs and enter the spacious room, taking seats in the back.

“One of the Kappa guys is explaining how it works,” Chantal murmurs. “You made us late.”

“I didn’t intend to come!” I whisper ferociously. “Where’s Ashley?”

“Oh, she’s behind the scenes getting everything organized,” Bambi says.

The guy on stage is dressed in slacks and a lavender Ralph Lauren shirt. He says his name is Kevin and goes into a spiel about how their fraternity has partnered with the Thetas to benefit the Magnolia Women’s Shelter, giving details about the importance of the facility and the cost of maintenance. I listen while scanning the crowd. There are about twenty-five girls, none of them familiar. The guys must be in a separate room.

“…women will be assigned small rooms, one of the study carrels, on the third floor. If you’ve never been to the top floor, just take the stairs right outside the door here. The men will rotate rooms. You’ll have seven minutes to get to know each other—seven minutes in heaven, I like to say. Heh.” Kevin smirks. “After that, a buzzer will sound and the men will move to the next room.”

A hand in the front goes up. “What if we want to leave with our dates and go somewhere private?” It’s a girl in a Chi-O jersey.

He smiles. “Leave at your discretion, but we’d prefer that you stay and meet everyone. We’ve got a great group, and you might find more than one match.”

She stands up and looks around. “Are there any football players present, specifically Dillon McQueen?”

“Please, girl, sit your ass down,” Chantal grumbles under her breath. “Gah, I hate that I was as desperate as she was to hang with them. I’m still doing it.”

“You love the game,” I insist.

I focus on Kevin as he replies to the girl. “The guys are in another room, getting their instructions. It wouldn’t be any fun if we all knew who was here, would it?”

More murmuring comes from the crowd, the excitement rising. Another girl stands and asks a question, her blonde hair billowing in loose waves down her back, her halter dress tight and clingy. There’s a cute pink cloche on her head.

“Alexa, play ‘Raspberry Beret’ by Prince,” I murmur.

“Who are you talking to?” Chantal hisses.

“Myself. It happens.” I blow at a piece of hair in my face then sniff my armpits. Deodorant still works. No date clothes, but hey, I smell like cucumber.

Kevin continues with, “Each female has been assigned an ID number and a scorecard for her mystery man. Simply turn that in at the end of the event, and our computers will tally up your best matches along with photos of the men you liked. Will he be what you thought? Will he like you?” He grins, a hint of slyness on his face. “That’s up for you to decide—after you both receive your match’s phone number.”

Great. If there are the same number of guys and each one gets seven minutes, this event is going to last almost three hours. I twitch in my chair. Yeah…so? What else do I have to do? Romy is situated for the night.

After the introduction is done, we head up to the third floor, and I’m assigned a room at the end of the hall near the stairwell, tucked between nonfiction shelves. Seems appropriate that I skim them and grab How To Unf*ck Yourself. If the dates get boring, I can always do some self-improving.

Bambi and Chantal have wandered off to do their duties for the event, and it’s a pledge that leads me inside the room. It’s on the small side, about six by six, a desk with a partition in the middle.

“That’s so you can’t see faces,” the girl tells me as I settle into the seat. She instructs me to tuck my feet in since they would be visible if I didn’t, and I scoff.

“You think he’ll recognize me by shoes?”

She shrugs, unconcerned. “Use the tip sheet for questions, and there’s a buzzer if you need help—”

“Help?”

“If he comes on too strong—or if you do.”

“Don’t lunge for the mystery man, got it.”

“Have fun,” she calls as she slips out the door, and I exhale, glaring at the flimsy plywood in front of me. Will we even be able to hear each other through this thing?

I glance at the tip sheet. What’s your favorite color? What type of music do you enjoy? and so on. Meh. I mark them out and pencil in a few of my own. I read through the directions again.

A bell rings, people move out in the hall, and my door opens. Heavy breathing and a cough are the first things I notice, and I almost peek around to see if he needs me to resuscitate him.

“Are you okay?” I ask as he takes his seat. Looking down, I note the skinny jeans and leather flip-flops. His big toe is remarkably tiny.

He clears his throat, then another racking cough comes from his chest. “Just a cold. I think I have a fever.”