Page 46 of Heartsmashed
“Is that a dare?”
“Could be.”
“You gonna rub me down when I pull a muscle?”
I felt it, the subtle way his fingers tightened, his voice a little strained when he said, “I think I could, uh, help you with that.”
Yeah, I could just fucking imagine his “help,” which was the last thing I needed to think about when we were about to be surrounded by his family and friends.
A couple ahead of us opened the ballroom doors, and as they headed inside, we got our first glimpse of the madness we were about to walk into.
This wasn’t just a party, it was a full-blown time warp, and for a second, both Sawyer and I paused in the doorway, taking it all in. Whoever had put this together hadn’t gone half-assed—they had killed the assignment.
Itwas1991, according to the huge balloons that greeted us, and there was neon everywhere. Streamers in electric pink and lime green were draped from the ceiling, along with hundreds of silver CDs that reflected the lights bouncing around the room. A massive photo booth was set up in the corner, with oversized props: the MTV logo, boom boxes, Rubik’s Cubes you could sit on. And on the many tables were cassette tapes and old CD cases that varied from Nirvana’sNevermindto Michael Jackson’sDangerousto Boyz II Men’sCooleyHighharmony, a respectable mix.
And speaking of the music…
The end of “Good Vibrations” by Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch pulsed through the speakers, slowly transitioning into“Groove Is in the Heart,” and the dance floor was already packed with people swinging glow sticks.
“Oh…my…God.” Sawyer’s wide eyes met mine. “I knew my moms loved a theme, but this is overboard even for them.”
“A time capsule,” I murmured, leading us inside and letting the doors swing shut behind us.
“No kidding.” Sawyer’s head was on swivel, taking everything in. “I’m thinking we definitely need drinks first to handle this level of nineties nostalgia.”
The bar was our first stop, the specials written in neon on a whiteboard with something called a?—
“Wine Cooler Revival?” Sawyer wrinkled his nose. “What the hell even is that?”
“It’s fruity,” the bartender shouted over the noise, and though that wasn’t my thing at all, I arched a brow at Sawyer.
“When in Rome?” When he nodded, I leaned across the bar and said, “We’ll take two of those, and a couple of glow sticks if you’ve got ’em.”
She nodded and disappeared, and when I turned back, Sawyer was watching me. It wasn’t just amusement on his face, but something altogether different. Appreciation? Interest?
I held his gaze, neither of us looking away from each other until the bartender returned with our drinks—and the glow sticks.
“You know,” he said as he tucked his glow stick in the front pouch of his overalls and grabbed his drink, “it’s really not fair how you pull that tracksuit off.”
“Oh yeah? Not too embarrassed to be seen with me?”
“Embarrassedis definitely not the word.” He wrapped his lips around the swizzle straw, and my eyes tracked the move.
He noticed.
But there wasn’t a chance for that sexual tension to grow, not when Rome slung his arm over Sawyer’s shoulder, Hudson right behind.
“Shoulda known we’d find you with a fruity drink,” he said. “But Beckett, man, I expected more out of you.”
“And we expected more from your outf— Wait, are those harem pants?” Sawyer shrugged off Rome’s arm and gawked at his outfit. At first it didn’t catch my attention the way Hudson’s stone-washed denim-on-denim ensemble did, but then I realized I’d seen MC Hammer in those balloon-looking pants. Not to mention the gold chains around his neck looked heavy as hell.
And real.
“We’re doing shots!” Drew announced, a tray of shot glasses that looked suspiciously like tequila in his hands. He thrust the tray in each of our directions. “You take two, and you take two, and—Beckett, that’s only one, I need you double-fisting.”
I sniffed at the drink and immediately regretted it. That wasn’t tequila—that was another fruity concoction.
“What is this?” I asked.
