Artie had collected every unwanted couch and coffee table he could find on the island to furnish the place. Gave a nice home theater vibe. Sid hoped it would lead Lucas to forget they were in a public place.
“There’s a fridge back that way, near the bathrooms.” Sid pointed toward a hallway to their right. “Just leave a dollar in the honor box next to it. I’ll take a bottle of water.” Her stomach tended to make strange noises when she drank soda late at night. Would not be good trying to get cozy with Lucas in the dark only to have him think an alien might burst through her belly button.
With a nod, her date—which was more fun to say than she’d admit—headed for the hallway. Just as he disappeared around the corner, a shrill voice echoed from the back of the room.
“Sidney Navarro? Is that you?”
Shit damn fuck. Not Crystal Casternack. Not tonight.
“Aw, are you here by yourself?” The slender blonde gave a knowing smile to her minions, Heather Ledbetter, who had the misfortune of looking just like her dad, and Lissa Whitmore, the most clueless twit to ever graduate from Anchor High.
Why couldn’t Lucas’s prom date have put on a hundred pounds and grown a mole? On her chin? That sprouted long black hairs?
“Now that we’re here, you can pretend you came with friends.”
Sid would rather drop a couch on Crystal’s head. No jury would convict her. “I’m not alone, Casterhack, but thanks.”
Prom queen’s jaw tensed. “That’s Caster
“Right. My bad.” Sid hunkered down deeper into the couch, thinking of all the ways she could turn Crystal and her chicklets into fish bait. No one would ever find the bodies.
A second later, the dimmed sconces on the walls went out and the sixty-inch flat screen at the front of the room came to life. Halfway through the first trailer, Lucas returned to the couch, nearly tripping over the coffee table and landing on the cushion beside her with an oomph.
“Holy shit. Why didn’t you warn me how dark this place would get?”
Shushing noises came from the couch beside them. Thanks to Artie’s penchant for a totally black theater, Lucas’s identity remained a mystery to the three bimbettes.
“Who is that?” Leaning forward, Lucas tried to see who was beside them. Of course the screen went bright white in that moment, increasing visibility.
“Lucas Dempsey, is that you?”
Sid gritted her teeth until her jaw ached. She longed to make Crystal’s jaw ache.
“This is Lucas. Who are you?”
“It’s Crystal, silly?” Blondie said, as if they’d been chatting on the phone just last week. Sid snagged her water from Lucas and resisted the urge to accidentally douse the next couch with it.
“Crystal?” Lucas’s seeming confusion won bonus points from Sid. With fewer than ten people in his graduating class, how hard could it be to remember the chick he took to prom? He had to be playing stupid.
“Casternack!” Without an invitation, the blonde pranced over, inserting herself between Sid and Lucas. “I haven’t seen you in forever. You look great.”
Sid leaned around the interloper to see one perfectly manicured nail on Lucas’s knee. Oh, hell no.
“Excuse me,” Sid said, tapping Crystal on the shoulder with much less force than she could have. The blonde turned around, rubbing the spot where Sid had poked. “Lucas and I are here to watch the movie. Get your skinny ass back on your own couch.”
Crystal’s head spun toward Lucas, back to Sid, then back to Lucas. Maybe the thing would spin right off and improve everyone’s night.
“You two are together?” Without waiting for an answer, she went on. “Is someone paying you to take her out?” she asked Lucas.
Sid reached out to grab a handful of hair, but Lucas caught her wrist before contact. “I stopped taking payment for dates after the prom,” he said, sounding more put out than Sid expected. And what did that last crack mean? Had someone
This night was looking up.
Crystal leapt to her feet. “I see you’re still the pompous ass you always were. Thinking you’re better than the rest of us.”
“And you’re still as hateful and self-centered as I remember. Now if you could honor Sid’s more than polite request and return your …” He looked to Sid. “How did you put it?”
“Skinny ass,” she said, smiling as the warm spot in her chest spread to her knees.
“Right.” Back to Crystal he said, “Your skinny ass back to your own couch.”
By this point he’d gone from holding Sid’s wrist in midair to holding her hand on the couch between them. Sid felt like giggling. Something she never, ever did.
Crystal huffed. Stomped. Squealed. And finally returned to her couch. The minions were whispering reassurances, but Sid couldn’t have cared less. She looked over to find Lucas smiling at her, still holding her hand, slumped down in the overstuffed red leather sofa.
Best. Date. Ever.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Lucas knew he should feel bad, but Crystal Casternack had made his life miserable in high school, stalking him in the halls, telling everyone they were getting married and she’d be the pampered wife of a powerful lawyer. They’d never even gone out on a date. He’d only taken her to prom because Crystal’s mom kept calling his mom about it. Desperate to end the torture, Tom gave him a hundred bucks to bite the bullet and take one for the team, as he’d put it.
As a result, Lucas’s prom had sucked. Not that guys cared much about that stuff, and with only four girls total in his graduating class, there wasn’t a large number of other dates to choose from. All the others were spoken for by the time he asked Crystal.
But none of that was cause for him to be so rude to her all these years later. The way she’d talked about Sid was what sent him over the edge. As if any man would have to be paid to go out with Sid Navarro. Grant it, she could be brash at times. Okay, all the time. But she had her moments. Like when she smiled the way she had after he sent Crystal stomping back to her friends.
She’d looked happy, surprised, and grateful with that one adoring look. The adoring part made him nervous. The way she’d sprinkled the sex comments into their dinner conversation, he’d begun to believe maybe a casual fling could work. Then he saw that look. But she hadn’t clung to him through the movie. Didn’t protest when he let her hand go to open his drink, then didn’t take it back again.
No pressure. No sign she was going all gooey on him. Then again, Sid was likely incapable of going gooey over anything. Maybe he’d just imagined the look.
They’d enjoyed the movie in silence, then waited until Crystal and her friends had gone before moving toward the exit. Other than telling Artie good night, neither had spoken since before the movie started.
“Thank you,” Sid said, staring out the passenger window into the falling rain, her expression unreadable.
“You’re welcome,” he said, out of reflex. After a moment of silence he asked, “For what?”
Sid turned his way, brown eyes serious. “You didn’t tell Casterhack in there that this isn’t a real date.”
Lucas shrugged one shoulder. “We went to dinner and a movie, right?”
“Yeah. But not because you wanted to go.”
“Says who?”
“Said you.” She went back to staring out the window. This was a side of Sid he wasn’t sure how to handle.
“This may not have been my idea, but I had fun. Great food. The most comfortable theater seat I’ve ever experienced.” He elbowed her softly. “And the company wasn’t bad either. I mean, you have your moments.”
Like this one. The spitting, cursing, challenging Sid he knew what to do with. Softer Sid was an enigma
