Falling for Trouble

by Sarah Title

  “Hey.”

  “Hey! You’re here! And, oh my God, you smell good.” Joanna put her arms around him quickly, then let go just as quickly. She was trying to be all professional, which she said did not include her hanging all over her hot librarian fiancé. But when he took hold of her hand, she didn’t let go. So he stood there while she finished her conversation with a reporter from the Halikarnassus Herald, and, when asked for comment, said that he knew the citizens of Halikarnassus would see that Joanna was the only one for the job.

  “Oh, God, I’m so nervous,” she said once they were alone. Well, alone in a bar swarming with her supporters. “What if I don’t win? Oh my God, what if I do win? Is this a terrible idea?”

  “Too late now, babe. You’re going to have to live with the fact that you made the right decision.”

  “But what if I screw it up? What if—”

  “Joanna.” He took her head between his hands, even though it didn’t look very professional. But he had to make sure he could look her in the eyes. “You can do it. If I didn’t think you could do it, I wouldn’t have voted for you.”

  She kissed him then, just quickly, but enough to let him know that she heard him and she wasn’t running (well, she wasn’t running away), and she loved him.

  “That’s Rick!” Trina called out as her phone rang. “Hello? You better have news or I swear to—” She stuck a finger in her ear so she could hear better. “Uh-huh. Are you sure? The commissioner? So it’s official?” She started squealing and bouncing on her heels, still on the phone. “It is? And you’re definitely sure.”

  “Oh my God, Trina, what is he saying?” Joanna shouted in a very professional way.

  “You did it!” Trina shouted back, and the bar erupted. That was the only word for the cheer that went through the crappy ceiling tiles, and Liam was caught up in a sea of people coming to shake Joanna’s hand and congratulate her.

  “She looks surprised,” Peggy said, coming up to his side and giving his arm a squeeze. “She shouldn’t be surprised. I knew she could do it. And so did you.”

  “I think she’s more stunned. Now she’ll have to stop talking about it and actually do it.”

  “You’ll be there for her.”

  “You know I will.”

  “Well,” Peggy said, stepping away from him. “She promised I could make the announcement.”

  He handed her up the short step to the stage, where she stood at the mic. She gestured for Joanna to join her onstage. Joanna blushed, but she did it. She had to.

  “Ladies and gentlemen!” Peggy shouted into the mic. “After a long, hard campaign and an even longer adolescence—” Folks in the crowd laughed while Joanna rolled her eyes. But she rolled her eyes with a smile. “I present to you my granddaughter, Joanna Green, the new Mayor of Halikarnassus!”

  Don’t miss the next book in Sarah Title’s

  Librarians in Love series!

  LAWS OF ATTRACTION

  available November 2017!

  PRE-ORDER YOUR COPY TODAY!

  It’s taken law librarian Becky Schrader a long time to stop comparing herself to her family of overachievers and home in on what she really wants—a normal life, white picket fence and all, Mr. Dream Guy included. But before she gets ahead of herself, her girlfriends convince her she needs to let down her hair for once, meet a hot guy and let the moment take over . . .

  After graduating from an Ivy League law school and practicing in New York for a few years, the plan for Foster Deacon was to return home to Denver and join the family firm, marry the right woman, shoulder his responsibilities. Except Foster’s always been a bit of a rebel, and he’s decided to suit up with his family’s rival firm. What better way to celebrate than to spend a night with a gorgeous blonde who leaves before he can say, “Good morning . . .”

  Becky feels she did the right thing, leaving her lover’s bed and not her number. After all, she needs to focus on her job at Glassmeyer & Polak—until the new hire walks through the door . . . with a bad case of happily-ever-after.

  KEEP READING FOR A SNEAK PEAK!

  Chapter 1

  “What about that one?”

  Becky followed her best friend’s not-very-subtle pointing toward a guy in a Broncos hat with his eyes glued to one of the seven big-screen TVs in the bar.

  “Never mind, he’s too into the sportsball,” Dakota said.

  “Dakota, I’m not—”

  “Hush. Hey, he’s kind of cute.” She nodded toward a tall, dark-haired man in a suit who had just stepped up to the bar, loosening his tie. “The suit makes me think he’s probably boring, so you’ll like that.”

  Becky shook her head. “I thought the point was for me to have a one-night stand with someone who isn’t my type.”

  “Oh yeah. Maybe I’ll go talk to him. Dang.”

  Dakota’s distraction wasn’t distracting enough, unfortunately, and she continued to scan the bar for men Becky could have random sex with.

  It was all a very fun game they were playing because Becky had been dumped, once again. And Dakota had a bee in her bonnet that Becky chose the wrong kind of guy to date, and then came up with the brilliant idea that they needed to reset Becky’s sex drive by getting her laid by someone who was totally not her type. Which wasn’t fair. Becky didn’t have a type. She just wanted to settle down with a nice, normal guy like Paul, the kind of guy who had a job and a normal family and—fine, his apartment was kind of a sty and he’d just bought these really weird paisley curtains she’d laughed at and he got offended…

  “Stop thinking about him.”

  “I’m not!” Becky insisted. She was thinking about his curtains.

  “You’re a terrible liar,” Dakota said.

  That was true.

  “The only thing you’re worse at than lying is picking boyfriends.”

  “There was nothing wrong with Paul.” He didn’t want to date her anymore, sure, but he wasn’t a bad person. “Just because he’s not your type.”

  “Becky,” Dakota insisted, “you are way too nice. There was a lot wrong with that dude.”

  “Like what?”

  “Uh-uh. No. We’re not talking about this anymore. Tonight was supposed to be the night we doused the pain of your heartbreak.”

  “I’m not heartbroken!” Becky insisted. She was just…well, she was sad, that was all. Not the same as heartbroken. She was sad, and a little tipsy, and that was why her eyes were pricking with tears.

  “Oh, Beck,” Dakota said and enveloped her in a full-body hug. “He was so not worth it.”

  “I know!” she insisted, because she did. Paul wasn’t a bad guy, but he was a crappy boyfriend. He was so crappy that he wouldn’t even admit he was her boyfriend, even after six months of monogamy.

  “But we’re not talking about it, because if we’re talking about it, you’re thinking about it, and you need to stop thinking about the completely forgettable, totally-not-worth-it Paul. How about him?”

  She pointed to a guy in very nicely fitted jeans who had his arm around a petite woman in similarly nice-fitting jeans.

  “Um, I think he’s taken.”

  “You don’t know that! It could be his sister.”

  Mr. Jeans leaned down and planted a sloppy kiss on Ms. Jeans’s mouth.

  “Eh, fine,” Dakota gracefully conceded. “Maybe it’s the venue. I just thought a sports bar would be full of dudes.”

  “I still don’t understand how it’s possible you’ve never been to a sports bar before.”

  “I hate TV.” That was true. Dakota was the only woman Becky knew for whom Netflix and chill was a deal breaker. She wouldn’t even watch TV for the sake of the euphemism. “If a guy wants to have sex, he should just invite me over for sex,” Dakota was fond of saying.

  Becky preferred the euphemism. At least, she thought she did. But it wasn’t getting her very far in the romance department.

  What Dakota didn’t understand was that sports bars were full of
bros, those suburban white guys who grew up with natural athletic prowess, good-enough intellect, and never had to deal with bullying or, like, actual problems. Paul was a bro. He wore rugby shirts but didn’t play rugby. He still talked to all his frat brothers. He didn’t understand the misogyny inherent in the system. Becky shouldn’t date bros. Bros didn’t usually date girls like her either—bookish girls with too much imagination and sunny dispositions that belied the huge chips on their shoulders for people who grew up having it easy. She shouldn’t have dated Paul, that was for sure, because look where that got her?

  Dumped, buzzed on beer, and surrounded by the kind of guy she wasn’t supposed to be dating anymore.

  She wasn’t supposed to be dating anymore, period.

  “You look glum,” Dakota told her. “You don’t want to sleep with the kind of guy who wants to sleep with a girl who looks glum.”

  “I’m not glum.”

  “You need more beer. It’s your round.”

  Becky sighed and picked up her purse. The bar was three-dudes deep and she was going to have to jostle and push her way through, which was annoying.

  Dakota grabbed her purse from her. “I should make you try to get someone to buy us a round.”

  Becky grabbed her purse back. “Baby steps.”

  “OK, baby steps. First, a little physical interaction. Then, sex!”

  Becky widened her eyes in embarrassment, trying to channel a look that said, I know you’re my best friend, but please shut up. It didn’t work.

  “Hey, a girl’s gotta get her rocks off, too, you know. You should try it some time, Beck.”

  “I did get my rocks off.”

  “Don’t say it—”

  “With Paul.”

  “Girl, you barely got your rocks tumbled with that guy.”

  Becky immediately regretted the less-than-steamy details of her sex life that she’d spilled over the last bottle of wine they’d shared.

  “You shouldn’t settle for that.”

  “I didn’t think I was settling!”

  “Please. That’s your problem, Beck. You don’t want to get your rocks off unless it comes with a spare key and half of the closet.”

  “What? No! I can…ugh, I can’t keep saying ‘get my rocks off.’”

  “I’m just saying, you’re young—”

  Becky raised an eyebrow.

  “You’re hot—”

  Becky raised the other one.

  “Now is not the time to be settling down. Now is the time to sow your wild oats!”

  Dakota’s enthusiasm was starting to draw the attention of other bar patrons. Only Dakota could tear a man’s gaze away from a dozen sportsball games.

  “'Sow your wild oats’? Why are we talking like old-timers?”

  “You durned whippersnapper, ain’t you kids ever heard of casual sex?”

  “Hey, I can have casual sex!”

  Dakota got a determined gleam in her eye. Becky knew what was going to come out of her mouth before she even said it.

  “Prove it.”

  Becky went for a mouthful of beer, only to find there were no mouthfuls left. Maybe Dakota would go get this round. Maybe she would go away and never come back.

  “I bet you can’t,” Dakota goaded.

  “I’m not taking a bet about casual sex!”

  “Why not?”

  “This is how all those romcoms start. I’ll take the bet and go home with the rando and he’ll be the love of my life. Except then he’ll turn out to be a commitment-phobic narcissist with bad taste in curtains and I’ll end up shouting over the crowds in a loud sports bar drinking beer and waking up with a hangover and what’s the point?”

  “I hate it when romcoms end like that.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “I don’t even think you know what you mean.”

  The truth was, Becky wanted to meet the love of her life. She wanted marriage and kids and all those boring, traditional things her feminist heart felt a little guilty about wanting. She wanted equal pay for equal work, too. She just also wanted someone to go home to at the end of the day, someone to cook dinner with and talk about how great it was to be earning the same amount of money.

  Not that picking up a stranger in a bar would net her any of that.

  “I’m just saying that I don’t see how going home with a stranger is going to get me any closer to the love of my life.”

  “No. No love stuff. You’re too focused on it,” Dakota said, just when Becky was starting to warm to the idea of taking home a stranger who turned out to be her one true love. “You’re obsessed with love and you keep trying to make it work with guys who don’t deserve you. You need just pure, straight-up, no-strings-attached sex.”

  “I do?”

  “Yes. Hot, sweaty, dirty sex with someone who makes you see stars and who you never have to see again.”

  That didn’t sound terrible. It had been a really long time since she’d had hot, sweaty, dirty sex. Paul was more of a lights-off, man-on-top kind of guy.

  “But what if I fall in love with the dirty-sex guy?”

  Dakota shook her head. “No. You can’t. You can’t even think about that, because if you think it’s a possibility, you’ll start putting your eggs in his basket and, knowing your taste in men, his basket will have a hole in the bottom. Or a wife,” she added, and they took a moment to remember the guy before Paul, the one who worked late hours during the week, or so he said. Turned out, he wasn’t busy at work. He was busy with his wife.

  “Seriously, Beck, the guy didn’t even deny it,” she said. “He was just stringing you along for his own ego. You don’t deserve shit like that. No, you deserve—” Dakota made a gesture that had some of the bros looking over at them curiously.

  “I don’t know if I can handle that,” Becky said.

  “Becky Schrader! You are a liberated woman in control of your own sexuality!”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Beck, you could have any guy in this room and you’re settling! You have marriage blinders on. You’re seeing the trees of quote-unquote good matches and you’re missing out on a whole forest of dazzling sexual experiences.”

  “A whole forest?”

  “Babe, there are forests out there you haven’t even imagined. Or at least haven’t imagined in a while.”

  Becky instantly and again regretted ever sharing every detail of her sex life with her best friend. But Dakota wasn’t wrong. Becky wanted a normal life, that was true. That wasn’t going to change. But…she was bored. And maybe Dakota was right. Becky was so focused on the right way to achieve her normal life—meet, date, commit—but it wasn’t working. No matter how many Pauls or Russes or Phils she met, she wasn’t finding the one who would stick. Maybe she needed a break.

  She could definitely do with a break from her normal life.

  Oh God, she was starting to agree with Dakota.

  “I can see you’re starting to agree with me.” Ha, so Dakota could read her looks. She just ignored them when it suited her.

  Dakota handed her back her purse. “Let’s discuss this over another round.”

  Becky rolled her eyes and started toward the bar.

  There was a big play—sportsball!—and a cheer went up and she almost got elbowed in the nose, but the distraction enabled her to sneak through the crowd and make eye contact with the bartender. He was cute. She’d never slept with a bartender before. But if she wanted to sleep with him, she’d have to stick around until after his shift was over, and she didn’t think she could stay up that late.

  Wow, was she a thrill seeker or what?

  No wonder she dated boring guys like Paul. Hell, she half-expected Paul to walk into this bar at any moment. Except Paul was away for the weekend, at a cousin’s wedding. To which she hadn’t been invited. Because she wasn’t his girlfriend.

  Not that she particularly wanted to go to a family wedding, but it would have been nice to
have been asked.

  That first part wasn’t true. She’d never been to a big family wedding before. She didn’t have a big extended family; her family was…well, they weren’t much on traditional celebrations. And Becky may have said as much to Paul when he mentioned the cousin’s impending nuptials.

  Hmph.

  She took the beer and her change but left the bartender a nice tip because she wasn’t going to have sex with him and headed back to Dakota.

  Dakota, of course, was no longer alone.

  She had been joined by two guys—oh, great, a setup. One was about Dakota’s height, which wasn’t tall, wearing a Broncos sweatshirt and a game day scarf, which Dakota was clearly pointing at and mocking. It looked like the guy thought Dakota was flirting. Poor guy, Becky thought. The other guy was wearing a similar sweatshirt, no scarf, and…a wedding ring.

  Hadn’t she and Dakota just talked about this?

  “Here,” she said, shoving the beer at her friend, who wasn’t doing a good job of following through on the thing that was her stupid idea in the first place.

  “Thank God,” Dakota said.

  Becky looked at the two guys. They smiled at her. She smiled back. She looked at Dakota. Dakota looked back at her.

  “Hi, I’m Rick,” said the guy with the wedding ring. Becky shook the hand he offered. “This is Eric.”

  “Rick and Eric?”

  “Eric was just explaining to me that I should call him Bullhorn,” Dakota said.

  “That’s what they called me in college,” Eric—Bullhorn—said.

  “Because nothing is more attractive to a woman in her thirties than a man who is still riding high on his college days,” Dakota explained.

  “It’s because I’m so loud,” Bullhorn explained. He didn’t seem that loud to Becky. She could hear him over the crowd, but his voice didn’t seem that nickname worthy.

  “We’re just borrowing some table space,” Rick explained. “We don’t want to interrupt.” He elbowed Bullhorn, who ignored him. He seemed nice, this Rick. Too bad he was married.