Page 51 of Fifty First Times (Sharing You 0.40)
it? You weren’t playing at it. You were a hero. Not like any of the other guys at the Cave.”
I turned in my seat to better face her, deciding to just be direct about this. I wasn’t going to get another shot. “Can I get your phone number?”
Her eyes widened. She made a sound that was half laugh, half snort. “Seriously?”
I frowned, bewildered. This was a first. A girl had never laughed at me when I asked for her number before.
She shook her head and grinned at me. The smile was placating. It made me feel like a child who had just demanded some unreasonable request. “You’re not going to call or text me,” she declared. Not a question. A statement plain and simple.
“Not without your number. So give me your number.”
She looked at me like she was peering into my very soul. Those eyes. They did things to me. It was crazy, but I couldn’t help feeling it. She wasn’t like any girl I’d ever met. She was real.
“You won’t use it.” And damn if she didn’t sound a little sad over that. Like she wished I would. “Let’s just leave it at good-bye.”
“So you’re not going to give me your number?”
“No.” She shook her head again. “Why do you even want it? To ask me out? Like on a date? C’mon.”
She didn’t mince words. There wasn’t the slightest pretense about her, and I totally wanted to kiss her right then. I wanted to kiss her everywhere. On her mouth. On every inch of her body. The urge hit me hard and swift. What I hadn’t seen of her up there on that stage, I wanted to see. I wanted to see all of her.
“Yeah.” I nodded. “Like a date.”
“No.”
The single word struck me like a slap. “No, you won’t go out with me . . .”
She looked amused. “No, you don’t want my number. No, you don’t want to go out with me.”
I inched closer, my arm stretching along the back of her seat. I caught her scent. It was faint. No overwhelming perfume. Strawberry shampoo. “Why are you so convinced of that fact? You don’t know me well enough to know what I want.”
Now she looked confused. “Guys like you don’t call girls like me. And you don’t date girls like me.”
“Guys like me?”
“Rich boys going to medical school do not date strippers.”
“Stereotyping, aren’t you?”
Her eyebrows winged high. “I live in a trailer park.”
I smiled and she frowned, clearly not liking my reaction. I guess she thought I would jump out of the car at that admission. “I’m still here.”
Those bright blue eyes narrowed. “My mom’s a stripper, too.”
“You’re just trying to spook me.”
“And my sister.”
“It’s not working,” I whispered, coming closer.
“It’s kind of the family business. I’m sure the Cave will rehire me. I talk a big game, but I’ll probably end up working back there.”
“You won’t go back there again.” I didn’t know why I was so certain. I just was.
“And you know me so well?”
“I know that much about you. Yeah. I do. You hated it. It’s not in you, Brooke.”
