It was nice. His hands laid gently on the curve of my hips and went no further. He wasn’t a creeper trying to cop a feel. His eyes sparkled blue not unlike my own but his hair Was sandy brown. Also, I wasn’t left wondering what he had going on under his shirt and whether it’d be worth the wait. He had strong shoulders, but there wasn’t much muscle about him. He wasn’t heinous but I didn’t find him attractive either. And let’s not even talk about sexy.
During the two slow dances, which he refused to let me out of, I discovered he worked at a mid-sized law firm about an hour away from me. He was a corporate lawyer. Everything about him screamed ‘opposite of Gio’, which might have been exactly what I needed. Calvin also told me about his family, which had enough people in it to be a small town all on their own with eight kids. I couldn’t imagine having one sibling let alone seven. Then the beat picked up making it impossible to talk. I was sort of thankful for the change. There wasn’t any more pressure to tell him about me.
Dropping onto my chair, I guzzled an entire glass of water in the most unladylike fashion. I didn’t care. It had gotten hot as hell in there. I knew I needed a break.
“I’m gonna step outside for a few,” I said to Bailey who was about to jump into the lap of a guy at our table. At least she picked the single ones. She always made sure of it. The guy, Evan, was a friend of Calvin’s as well. Calvin offered to come with me. I tried shaking him off, but he insisted.
A rush of much cooler air met me at the door causing goose bumps to cover every inch of my skin. It wasn’t cold, but I’d been so hot from dancing that my body reacted. And it felt good.
Calvin and I made some more small talk while I gathered up all my hair into a ponytail, held it in my hands off my neck. I liked Calvin. He was pretty funny. I didn’t have any overwhelming attraction to him. I didn’t want to push him against the wall and have my way with him the way I had Gio when we first met. But maybe attraction would come if I got to know him better?
Laughing at whatever he’d just said, I glanced around watching the people up and down the sidewalk and my eyes fell on the shadowy figure across from us. He leaned against the building across the street, his hands shoved into his pockets, but his eyes—they were on me. Barely enough light fell on his face to be sure I could see his gaze on me. Because God hates me and enjoys watching my torture, apparently. I tried hard to act as if I hadn’t seen him, kept up the conversation with Calvin and everything. But I did glance over my shoulder one more time when we turned to go back in. Gio still stood there as intense as ever.
“Hey, I’ll meet you inside,” I said without thinking. Part of me still wanted to be near Gio. Why was he around knowing how it’d make me feel?
With a quick look each way, I crossed the one way to get over to where he leaned against the brick building. Gio straightened to his full height and the look on his face was sort of priceless. Wide, surprised eyes with raised eyebrows mixed with a tight jaw of anxiety. If I were to guess, he had his teeth clenched tightly.
“What are you doing out here?” I asked coming to a stop more than an arm’s length away from him.
“I…I remembered that the reception was here.” He sighed. “I thought I might see you.”
“Why? Why do that? Don’t you understand what this does to me?” I tried making myself proud by keeping a stiff upper lip which made my voice come out sharp. He’d listened to me cry for hours the night he left, he wasn’t getting a replay. Just knowing that was humiliating enough.
“I don’t want to hurt you. I just…I miss you.” He whispered the last part, shoving his hands back into his pockets. I wasn’t going to let him know I missed him, too. The him that loved me. The him that wasn’t sleeping with me as part of a bigger corporate espionage type mission. The him that touched me like I was something special, something precious he didn’t want to lose. In the middle of the crapstorm of our breakup, I thought long and hard about how he’d been with me. And I knew all of it had been there. And it felt real. It had to have been real.
“You don’t get to do this, Gio. You don’t. You don’t get to pop up places you know I’ll be.” Taking a giant step back and a deep breath to steady the suddenly present nerves. “Just go home. Or better yet, go back to work.” Low blow, but whatever, I hurt. I only regretted it about twenty percent when he took a sharp breath in through his teeth.
He blinked rapidly. “How’s your hand?”
“Fine,” I said while folding my arms specifically hiding the angry skin covering my knuckles. They’d started to bruise within the hour after I’d hit Mr. Diamati. And I backed away from him. “You broke my heart, Gio.”
He fell back against the brick, hung his head low and nodded slowly. “Broke mine, too.”
Get the fuck out of there. Get away from him before you let his words affect you. Who was I kidding, they already had. And when he finally lifted his eyes to me, they were glistening with moisture. Seeing a big tough guy like Gio with tears in his eyes would undo me. I turned my back to him and while everything in body screamed to run away, I walked slowly. I didn’t have the energy to run. I silent sob wracked my chest and I hoped he didn’t see it in the curve or shaking of my shoulders. I wasn’t sure my legs would carry me all the way back to the reception but I somehow I made it. When I stopped outside the door, I took a deep breath, ran a finger under each eye in case any tears had fallen, then went back inside. Even though I no longer felt like celebrating.
Just past midnight with Bailey well past drunk, I needed to go.
“All right, Bailey, time to go,” I said tugging her toward me. She stumbled on her heels. Gramps grabbed her other arm to help me steady her. “Thanks, Gramps.” He gave me a nod. “What’re you still doing here? I thought you were going to head back to the hotel earlier.”
“Nah,” he said shaking his head as we encouraged Bailey toward the door. “Needed to escort my girls home.”
I snorted. “Gramps. That makes us sound like prostitutes. Which would make you our pimp.”
“Bianca.” He gasped. “Inappropriate.” I bit my lips together trying not to laugh at him. Until he started to chuckle himself. Then I let mine go.
We pushed Bailey into the cab between us, but she couldn’t even sit up. She sloshed left then right with absolutely no control over her own body. I wished I felt like that.
“I saw Gio today. Yesterday, too, actually.” I said quietly as the cab driver maneuvered into traffic.
“Yeah, I noticed him across the street tonight.”
“Gramps! Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Hoped you wouldn’t see him.” The car hit a hard bump sending both of us into our respective doors. “Bianca,” he sighed, “you’ve been hanging on like a champ but I know you’re faking it. You’re sad. I don’t want you to be, but you are.”
“I still love him,” I whispered again.
“I know.”
“But I don’t want to. I shouldn’t. He tried to ruin us. Him and his parents and their stupid Trinity Corporation.” Gramps and I talked about anything and everything as far back as I could remember, but talking about Gio seemed different. It was different because the end of my relationship with him wasn’t only about me. It involved Gramps’ business which Trinity really wanted.
“Did he? He could’ve.”
I twisted my face in confusion.
“Think about it Bianca-bear. Every time an offer came in, every time it was even brought up he spoke against it. He hated Gemma being there, tried to keep you from becoming friends with her.”
“Are you talking about Gio Diamati?” The cabby butted in. Gramps nodded so I assumed the driver looked at him in the rearview. “Crazy what’s going on—”
“Don’t want to hear about it,” I snapped effectively shutting the poor guy up. All conversation ended.
Seeing Gio was the last straw, the icing on the cake I needed to move on. Even if I wasn’t totally ready, Calvin might be the perfectly safe rebound I needed.
***
Calvin called me two days after we got back. Apparently, Nick had seen fit to give his new friend my phone number. The conversation was pleasant enough and he invited me to a baseball game. Normally I only watched with Gramps, but I needed to get back on the horse, and it was as a good an offer as I could hope for. So, I agreed.
He lived about an hour away from me which could end up being convenient.
Calvin said he’d pick me up and we’d make the half hour trip to the ball field together. I could do this. Even if my heart wasn’t completely into it, Calvin and I had hit it off at the wedding. Before I talked to Gio outside, but whatever. This date needed to happen and I made sure I told Bailey about it so I couldn’t back down.
I hadn’t been nervous about a date in a long time. At least not unless I really liked the guy already. Now it was because he wasn’t the guy I liked. The butterflies in my stomach were for a different reason. I don’t know if I was worried the date wouldn’t go well or if I was worried that it would go well.
Instead of focusing on that, I pulled outfit after outfit out of my closet. A skirt didn’t make sense. We were going to a baseball game. I tossed that aside and went for a pair of jeans instead. But I avoided the ones that Bailey had said “holy shit” to when I tried them on during a shopping trip. I didn’t want holy-shit-pants for this night with Calvin. Not yet anyway.
We were going to a night game, so I grabbed a fitted t-shirt and a hoodie. It could get cool once the sun went down. I pulled my hair back into a ponytail, flicked some mascara on my eyelashes and ran a lip gloss wand over my lips once. There. I was done.
I wanted to be excited about tonight and on a certain level, I was. Dating after a breakup is hard and needed to be done unless I wanted to ban myself to the life of a nun, it was time to rip off the dating band-aid. But it wasn’t the same as being excited to finally go out with a guy I really liked. Though, I did have to wipe my hands down my jean covered thighs twice before I opened the door.
Everything about Calvin was the opposite of what I wanted. Or thought I wanted, because I still had a Gio obsessed brain. I wished I hadn’t seen him in Chicago.
Calvin didn’t carry himself with the cocky, confident swagger I’d grown used to. He was more conservative with jeans and a button-down shirt, the two top buttons undone and the sleeves rolled to his elbows. I took another breath and smiled.
“Wow, you look great,” he said with a smile.
“Thanks.” I returned.
We rode mostly in silence until I decided that part of enjoying our date meant we should get to know each other better.
“So, work. You’re a lawyer?” I asked. “How do you like being a lawyer?” I cringed, hoping that didn’t sound as dorky as I thought it did.
Calvin chuckled. Heat burned my cheeks. Yup. It sounded dorky.
“I’m actually not a lawyer yet. I still have another year of school.”
“But I thought—”
“I do work at the law firm,” he said interrupting me. “I got the job for the summer but plan to continue working there once classes start back up. Gives me a good in for once I pass the bar.”
“So maybe they’ll hire you permanently?”
“Exactly.”
The way he talked at the wedding I thought he already was a full-fledged lawyer. If he purposely tried to mislead me, I was going to lose it on him.
I knew I was being a bitch. It’s not Calvin’s fault he wasn’t Gio. It’s not Calvin’s fault Gio ripped my heart out of my body stomped on it then took the leftover pieces with him in the crevices on the bottom of his shoes. Gio lied to me. Gio broke me. I shouldn’t assume Calvin would do the same. So, I changed my perspective.
Calvin pulled into the reserved lot at the stadium, gave the attendant a yellow slip of paper and found a parking spot right across the street. He placed a hand on the small of my back leading me to an elevator.
“We’re going to the firm’s suite. Best seats in the house,” he said with a smile.
I’d never been inside a corporate suite at a game before. I’d heard stories but never experienced it for myself.
We entered the suite right as the pitcher threw the first pitch. Within that inning, others joined us and Calvin ended up talking shop through a lot of it. He’d introduce me then someone would ask him about a case that was being litigated and they’d spend the next fifteen minutes debating the merits.
I didn’t understand most of it.
Even though all of this shop talk, he never forgot I was there with him. I’d take the last drink in my cup and another would show up in front of me. It wasn’t a waiter that brought it, it was him. “Another?” he asked handing me a third beer.
“Could I have a water instead?”
“Absolutely.”
Calvin went back to the waitress that came in every ten minutes and ordered me a water.
The entire suite erupted in cheers as our team made the last out, winning the game.
“Will we be seeing you tomorrow, Calvin?” The oldest guy in the room asked as we were leaving. He’d been introduced to me but I couldn’t remember his name. He was the senior partner, though. That I did remember.
“Absolutely, Sir.” He dipped his head then shook hands with several of the partners before we left.
“Tomorrow?” I asked.
“Golf,” he said with a groan as he pulled the car out of its spot.
“You golf?”
“No,” he said and I couldn’t help but giggle. “But when a senior partner asks you to golf, you golf.”
“Sounds like you have a big day planned then.”
“Yeah. I’d ask you to go but—”
“I wasn’t looking for an invitation,” I said quickly. “I’d have to turn you down anyway. I’ve never even held a golf club. Someone would likely get injured and there’d go your chances of ever being asked to join that law firm.”
He chuckled. “Then I’m glad you’d turn me down.”
We entered Harbor Point though most of the town was closed.
“Hungry?” he asked as we passed the diner.
“Lord no. I ate so much food at the game I may not be able to eat until next week.”
He snorted then turned onto my street and stopped outside of my apartment.
Walking me to the door, I wondered if he’d kiss me goodnight and found I didn’t hate the idea. He’s a good guy even if there weren’t a million butterflies trying to lift off in my stomach.
“I had fun, Bianca,” he said when I unlocked and cracked open my door.
“Me, too.”
“I’ll call you tomorrow?” he asked.
“I’ll talk to you tomorrow then.”
He didn’t make a motion to kiss me which I felt both relief and disappointment. I didn’t want him to enough to kiss him myself. But at the same time, I wouldn’t have stopped him if he tried.
Chapter Twenty-One
“So, did you have hot monkey sex?” Bailey asked when I called her the next morning as per our previous agreement. I knew she wouldn’t get off my back until I promised to call her with all the ‘dirty’ details. Her words, not mine.
“God, Bailey, no.”
“Why not? Is he a dud?”
“Again, no. He’s a good guy.” I filled her in on the date. Saying he’d been a perfect gentleman, took care of me with the attention you’d expect on a first date, though did do a fair amount of ‘shop talk’ with his associates. Overall, it had been a pretty decent time. The tone of my voice must have given away the real re
ason I didn’t kiss him.
“So, it’s still Gio?”
“I’m just not ready to go there yet, I guess.” She sighed. “Listen, Bailey, I fell in love with him. I know it’s over but these things take time.”
“Are you going out with Calvin again?”
“Yeah. He mentioned getting dinner last night. I’ll wait and see if he calls.” Yet I didn’t tell her whether I hoped he’d call or hoped he wouldn’t. I wasn’t even sure of which one I wanted. I wasn’t a heartbreaker, never enjoyed turning guys down when I clearly knew they liked me, but on the other hand it wasn’t exactly fair to pretend something romantic existed between us when my something still belonged to Gio in theory. In reality, that relationship was over, but try telling that to my heart.
I hung up and got my butt to work.
Calvin did call asking me to dinner a couple of days later. Somewhere along the way, I’d decided to agree. Just taking a first step, I told myself, a big one that needed to be taken. And it went from there. Every few days, we’d go out for dinner or a movie or meet Bailey at Bill’s. We had fun hanging out and not worrying about anything. I grew to like him as a person, but in the same way, I liked Nick. Nothing remotely romantic flitting through my body. No butterflies. No wondering what he looked like naked. Nothing. Calvin was safely tucked into the friend zone.
Now I just had to tell him. He must’ve started to notice or feel the vibes coming from me because two weeks in he still hadn’t tried to kiss me. Either he got it or he was extremely hesitant. I’d told him I’d just been through a breakup. Maybe being fresh off a breakup caused his welcomed hesitation.
But then he did. At the magical two week mark, he walked me to my door after a late movie.
“You hated the movie, right?” Calvin asked as I turned the lock.
“Hate is a strong word, but it wasn’t my favorite.”
Love by the Slice Page 16