Page 78 of Wrong For Me

“You’re not shy.” I stare at her. She doesn’t actually see herself that way, does she?

“Rose, you’ve literally never once acted shy in my presence.” Her confidence was one of the things I’d found most sexy about her when we met. The way she made the first move to talk to me at the festival, and again later that night at the club. The way she’s never hesitated to call me on my shit when I’m being an ass. Shy? Rose Ransome is fierce as hell.

But she’s biting her lip and playing with her bracelets in an agitated sort of way, so I’m guessing she’s actually serious.

“With strangers,” she says softly. “I’m pretty shy with strangers.”

“You weren’t shy with me when I was a stranger.”

Her eyes flash with something I can’t quite read, something almost wicked. “Because I thought you were hot.”

Fuck. She can’t say shit like that to me if she wants to be able to leave this room.

“You seemed fine with the whole small talk thing at the mixer the first night here,” I point out, deciding ignoring the hot comment is the only way I’ll be able to control myself.

She laughs. “I felt awkward as hell.”

I raise an eyebrow. “And what about your little clique?”

“My clique?”

“Your fan club. The group that follows you around like a bunch of enamored puppies. The girl with the purple hair and the sweater vest guy.” I manage to not snarl when I say his name, but just barely.

Rose looks confused. “Kevin and Gina? Those are just some people around our age. We started hanging out together when we realized the median age of the conference attendees is about sixty.”

That’s a slight exaggeration, but I see her point. We’re amongst the youngest people here. “Well whatever the reason you started hanging out, you’re always the center of the group whenever I’ve looked at you.”

Her eyebrows go up. “You’ve been looking at me?”

Well, I just walked right into that one, didn’t I?

“I may have noticed you. A few times.” I shift in my dress shoes, uncomfortable with the entire direction of this conversation. “We should probably head down there, don’t you think?”

She’s watching me with a wicked twinkle in her eye—a twinkle that has me thinking I’d be insane to walk out of this room. But Rose grabs a sparkly, beaded clutch from the desk and slips by me towards the door, giving me a great view of the fucking dress swirling around her ass. When she gets there, she looks over her shoulder. “Leo?”

My voice is pure gravel. “Yeah?”

The grin she shoots me could bring a man to his knees. “I look at you sometimes, too.”

I’m too surprised to do anything but stare at her as she slips through the door into the hallway. When she’s gone, I let out a groan. This is going to be a long damn night.

* * *

The speeches are justas boring as I anticipated. But I’d take boredom over the hot stab of anger I feel every time my eyes drift to Rose and the sweater vest douchebag. He’s not wearing a sweater vest tonight, but that’s beside the point. They’re sitting a few tables ahead of me, along with the rest of the Rose fan club, and I’m finding it nearly impossible not to glare at them.

I’m so out of it, I actually jump when the people at my table begin to stand, a loud rumble of voices filling the ballroom as the lights come up. Apparently, it’s over. Which means it’s time to go schmooze with more assholes at the reception. Fantastic.

When I reach the reception room, I’m relieved to see no trace of that flowered dress. That makes it a hell of a lot easier to focus on the guy I’m supposed to be talking to, Jim something or other, one of the honorees tonight. He’s going on about his research on lemur social structure, but he seems so enthusiastic about it, so genuinely happy to have been recognized tonight, that the conversation is less painful than many I’ve had since arriving at the conference.

When I still don’t see her after twenty minutes, though, I start to get worried. When I realize the sweater vest douchebag is also nowhere to be seen, my worry shifts to something sour and dark, deep in my belly.

I make my excuses to the small crowd that have joined me and award-winner-Jim and head off in search of my roommate, stifling a bitter laugh at the thought. Roommate. That’s an awfully innocent way of saying obsession.Girl who’s been driving me out of my mind for the last six weekswould work, too.

Six weeks. Sure, Malone.Rose has been driving me crazy from the day I met her.

It’s not hard to find her sitting at the bar in the next room over. Her red-flowered skirt stands out amongst all the boring suits and dowdy dresses. I’m not sure if I’m relieved to see she’s alone—or worried about how quickly she’s throwing back the glass of liquor in her hand.

I slide up beside her. “Let me guess—a gin fizz.”