Contestant number one held up her microphone. “Um, hello?”
Grant chuckled. “Hi, it’s nice to meet you.”
Contestant number two held up her microphone. In a deep, sexy voice, she said, “Hello.”
Grant cleared his throat. “Hello.”
It was Em’s turn. She held up her microphone. “Hi, Grant.”
Unlike the previous two introductions, hers was met with silence.
Grant
“Hi, Grant.”
His pulse went from zero to sixty with those two words. He knew that voice. Suddenly the game he’d never wanted to play in the first place just got a whole lot better.
When Miriam had first approached him to be the bachelor in the team’s version of The Dating Game, he was slightly annoyed. He knew the only reason she’d asked him was because he wouldn’t be able to play in the game. If he was able to dress out in his uniform, he never would have been considered.
Not only that, he knew Em would be watching the game. He hated the idea of her having front row seats to the halftime show that included him interviewing three women and then going on a fake date for the second half.
Miriam had assured him it was supposed to be something fun and silly. He’d agreed in the end since it was a way to show his commitment to the team even when he couldn’t be on the field.
So, he’d put on his best suit and hung out in the VIP section dreading the halftime show. If he’d known Emmeline was going to be one of the contestants, he would have volunteered the second Miriam had mentioned it.
“Well, contestant number three, it looks like you’ve rendered our bachelor speechless,” Miriam said into her microphone. The fans laughed in response.
Grant lifted his mic to his mouth and tried to keep the excitement out of his voice. “Nice to meet you contestant three.”
Miriam pressed her lips together, fighting a smile. “Now that we’ve gone through our introductions, I’ll let our lucky bachelor ask his questions.”
Grant looked down at the note cards in his lap. Miriam had given him a stack of ten cards, each with a question on it, and told him to pick his top three. Grant hadn’t even looked through them since he wasn’t actually looking to find love.
He read the top one. “If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?”
“I would love to go to Paris,” the first contestant said with a soft, dreamy voice. “It’s the city of love.”
Grant would have also loved to go to Paris someday, but it was the kind of generic answer that said nothing about the person giving it. “Contestant number two?”
“I would love to go to Hawaii,” she said, her voice as sultry as before. “Because I look amazing in a bikini and would spend a lot of time on the beach.”
There were a few whistles from the crowd. She was really laying it on thick. Only the first question, and he was already afraid that if he chose her, she’d be trying to rip his shirt off during their “date.”
He shuddered. “Contestant number three?”
“I think I’d go to Kansas City. I hear some pretty cool people live there.”
Grant could hear the smile in her voice. For a moment, he wondered how she knew where he was from, but remembered they’d spent a lot of time liking each other’s posts on Instagram. She knew he was from Kansas City, the same way he knew that she’d gone to University of Florida and was a Gator through and through.
He liked that they knew these things about each other. With a smile on his face, he looked down at the next question. “What’s your favorite food?”
“I like pizza.” Another standard answer.
“Yum, I do too,” he said. “Contestant number two?”
“Chocolate covered strawberries.”
Grant had to press his lips together to stop the laugh that threatened to come to the surface. “Contestant number three?”
“I could eat tacos every single day. There’s this truck that has the best tacos in town.”
She liked tacos from a truck? He wondered which ones were her favorite and made a mental note to ask her later which truck it was—and then offer to take her. He could barely wait to see her.
Excited to finish the game so he could spend time with her, he read the next question. “If you were a musical instrument, what sound would you make?” His face immediately scrunched up.
What kind of question is that?
There was a longer-than-usual pause between the question and the first contestant’s answer. Eventually, she started beatboxing—poorly.
“Contestant two?”
Clearly as thrown off by the question as the first woman, Miss SexyPants also started beatboxing.
“Contestant number three?”
Grant waited for yet another rendition of a drum set and was surprised when Em started making a terrible screeching sound into the microphone. He barely resisted the urge to cover his ears.
“I’m a violin,” she said once everyone in the arena had stopped laughing.
Yep, it was official. He was into her before but now he was a total goner.
“Well, that was enlightening,” Miriam said, taking control again. “Grant, you’ve got three lovely ladies to choose from. You’d be lucky to spend time with any of them in our VIP section. So, who is it going to be?”
Fans started calling out numbers. Some held up fingers to indicate which girl he should pick. He saw an awful lot of twos, mostly from the men. Not that it mattered, he knew who he would choose already. “I’d like to go on a date with contestant number three.”
The fans cheered.
“Well, before you meet your date for the rest of tonight’s game, let’s meet the women you didn’t choose. Contestant number one.”
A woman wearing a hot pink dress walked around the partition. She was pretty, but not Em. He stood up with the help of his crutches and gave her an awkward hug before she walked off the
