Love at Blind Date Complete Series: Books 1-4

by Lorelei M. Hart

  “Excuse me,” I hated to leave him there or at all, but the urge to touch base with Monty and make sure what I wanted to do wouldn’t piss him off began to overwhelm me. He had a soft spot for Richard which was probably well-deserved, but I wanted to take home—no, I wanted to date Jesse. The longings from all those years ago were even stronger now.

  How stupid I’d been back then to let social normatives and concern over what others thought prevent me from speaking up and letting him know that I was interested. Or maybe that was for the better? Kids had no clue what they were doing when it came to dating, and we’d have messed it up before prom most likely.

  Heck, did years really make that better? I might easily mess it up before we left the restaurant with my track record.

  “Okay.” He gave my hand a squeeze, and I immediately regretted my decision. I wanted to stay there with him, to bask in the moment. You only get one first time, and sure, it was our first time holding hands and not the big first times people liked to document and celebrate, but it had been such a long time coming, it meant something.

  Gah, all the engagements, music, and sparklers had turned me into a sap.

  I slid out of the booth and to the back where the restrooms were, first catching our waiter to pay, only to discover it had already been taken care of before I sat down.

  Monty.

  I dialed his number as I passed the bathroom, standing in front of the little storage room labeled linens. This place was so fancy it had a room just for tablecloths and washcloths. Crazy.

  The phone rang and rang until it reached his voicemail. Monty always answered his phone, citing that texts were impersonal.

  Which meant I was about to get impersonal.

  Monty—Answer your phone. Richard is a no show. Not that I was upset about that. It was the best thing that had happened in a very long time, but he needed to know so it wasn’t me getting the stink eye for ruining our perfect match or whatever he thought he was creating.

  He replied almost instantly.

  Have fun with Jesse. The bill is taken care of. It’s on me.

  When did he know? Heck, did it even matter.

  Thanks for dinner, I typed back.

  And thanks for my date...I left that part off. He was going to gloat enough come Monday. Of that, I was sure.

  6

  Jesse

  I couldn’t help staring at Dean’s ass as he wandered off to what I guessed was the men’s room. It was as cute as it had been back in high school. But my mind was imagining his cock. And my dick reacted as I pictured Dean peeling off his pants and slipping down his briefs—or maybe he was a boxers guy—and his huge cock bounding out.

  I’d imagined that moment in high school, but not knowing how he felt and being a teen who never really examined his emotions, I’d stuffed them down deep inside me. But meeting him again had them bubbling to the surface.

  And with Dean gone, I examined those bottled-up feelings. After digging them up, I was bowled over at how raw they were. Guess that’s what happens when you don’t deal with something. I was so stupid never telling him how I felt. But I was a kid who’d been terrified of rejection. Just as I was right now.

  Outwardly, I was a former football player, now a teacher, doing something I loved after retiring from football. But inside, I was a teenager worried of revealing what was in my heart. And not just my heart.

  After making sure no one was looking, I wriggled my ass and adjusted my cock. Shouldn’t have worn these pants. Not much room to spare.

  I was a mess. I never should have agreed to this. I could have remained blissfully ignorant about Dean, thinking of him occasionally as the school orchestra performed. Yeah, watching the kid who played first chair violin always brought memories tumbling back. Damn Richard and his complicated love life.

  But who was I kidding? Sure, the night had dredged up a lot of uncertainty and some pain, but my feelings about the guy were unchanged. I wanted him in my life—and inside me. If he was into it, I’d let him fuck me on the table. Nah, might be messy. Under the table.

  All the other couples had eyes only for each other. I could do a strip tease in the middle of the room and they wouldn’t notice. Getting thrown out would be a bonus if Dean got to see me naked.

  I came down to earth with a bump as a waiter filled my water glass. I was tempted to throw the contents over my face. Too dramatic, perhaps.

  Making sure Dean wasn’t in sight, I messaged Richard hoping he was on a break. Don’t hate me but I really like this guy. After pressing send, I waited and drummed my fingers on the table. Answer, Richard. Please.

  But what if he said he was hoping to hook up with the sexy alpha he’d heard so much about? A single bead of sweat dribbled over my nose and plopped onto my lap. I’d never wanted something so much in my life. But how far was I willing to go to get it? Would I screw over a friend? I didn’t have an answer.

  And after what seemed like an eternity, the phone beeped and the screen lit up. I scanned the words that read, All good. I’ve got my eye on a sexy new nurse. I let out the breath I’d been holding and ignored what was likely to happen with Richard’s latest conquest-to-be.

  But a thought occurred to me, bringing me down off the high my roommate’s message had given me. This was all in my head. Sure, the later part of the evening was more relaxed than at the beginning. But Dean had come here thinking he was meeting a doctor. And instead he got his old school buddy who had no head for math.

  Maybe he was being polite and right now he was on the phone begging a friend to send a message saying there was an emergency. His get-out-of-jail excuse. It was what I’d do if I were him stuck with someone from his past. Fuck! It was time to end this charade. Scram while I still had a shred of dignity.

  I caught the waiter’s eye and held up Richard’s credit card, but he explained the check had been taken care of. Not only had my former school friend been forced into a double blind date, if there was such a thing, he’d footed the bill.

  From the corner of my eye, I noticed Dean strolling through the restaurant. Don’t look up. Be cool. I downed a last mouthful of wine and pretended to be reading something on the phone. My palms were sweaty, and I wiped one on the napkin. “Hi.” Why’d I say that? He was only gone a few minutes. I was such a doofus.

  “Hi,” he replied.

  Now we’ve both greeted one another again. What’s next? “Thanks for dinner, but you didn’t have to pay. Richard insisted as this was all his fault.” I pulled my roommate’s card out of my pocket.

  My dining companion held up both hands. “Don’t thank me. That was my colleague, Monty’s doing.”

  “I’ve met him. He’s our neighbor and really sweet.”

  “Mmmm. He is. Sounds as though we have two guys in our lives who are trying to…” He paused. What? Don’t stop there?

  He grinned, and it sent a message to my dick. I licked around my mouth as desire rippled through me. A strangled sound escaped his lips. Was that a gasp? Or was he as desperate to get out of here as I was to stay?

  A busboy approached. “Coffee?”

  Normally I’d refuse. It was late and I didn’t care to be awake half the night. But I also didn’t want the evening to end, needing to stretch out the remaining minutes.

  I caught Dean’s eyes as they darkened, and his gaze drilled into me causing goosebumps to prickle over my skin. I shivered as time stood still, and I willed him to say yes.

  And as I nodded, he did the same. I’d been given a reprieve of, what, ten minutes? 30? How long could I make the coffee last?

  7

  Dean

  “We should probably switch to decaf,” I teased after our third refill. It was nice being like this, just sitting here, talking about old times.

  I wasn’t sure how much Monty had paid for this all, but the waiter seemed content enough to just let us sit there as other tables came and went. He would be rewarded handsomely, by me as well. I wasn’t ready for this night to be over, and he was making th
at wish easier to obtain.

  “Decaf is not coffee,” Jesse gave a wrinkled nose of disgust, the same one I remembered from when I introduced functions to him. In some ways he was so very much that guy, the one I crushed on so hard way back when. In other ways he was so different. More mature, sure, but also more something else, something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. “How did you end up here, anyways?” he asked, his body rotating just enough to face me, his eyes holding mine, his lips far too close to ignore, especially when he bit the bottom one just enough to make it pale slightly.

  “Monty is my assistant, and he’s kind of pushy, you may have noticed.” And he saw my loneliness even when I did not.

  “No, not here here, I know how Monty is—believe me.” He rolled his eyes and maybe there was a story or two behind them, a story I would ask more about later. Now? Now I was trying to figure out what he was asking me. “I mean, in the city. I figured you would be a suburb alpha with three-point-two kids and a picket fence by now.”

  He thought about me. Sure, that wasn’t what he said, but that was all I heard and my shoulders straightened a little. Gah, I was one of those alphas, soaking in the praises—existent, or in this case not even implied—of omegas as if they gave me my worth. When did that happen? Because it is Jesse’s praises, you oaf.

  “That’s a boring story. I was in grad school and an internship came up—I applied and here I am.” I didn’t go into the competition for the prized spot in the company or my drive to become a big shot. In hindsight, I hated that drive, all focused on success and nothing more. But I also loved it because it brought me to this very moment. In some ways, I was as much of a mess as Monty thought, though he would never use those words. “How about you? Aren’t math teachers needed everywhere? I thought football was your future.” I’d always half expected to see him on the cover of a sports magazine or in a headline. He’d been granted full scholarships to multiple colleges. And here he was a teacher and not even a coach. Not that there was anything wrong with that. On the contrary, I loved the fire in his eyes when he talked about the work he did—not the paperwork and meetings—that extinguished the fire immediately—but the rest of it.

  “I’m not really sure. When I decided that the negative bullshit that came with being an omega in the national leagues wasn’t something worth fighting for, and when the game had lost its fun and became work, I headed to my advisor and said, ‘Now what?’ I spent hours in there, weeding through the credits I had and what degrees they would fit with careers I might enjoy, and then he said something I’ll never forget.”

  “What was that?” Sitting here listening to him tell the story of how he was sure of everything and then suddenly needed to figure out he had not a clue about anything only highlighted how different we were. I went to college not having an inkling what I wanted until I took the only class that would fit in my schedule and fell in love with marketing.

  “He said, ‘When you close your eyes and no one is around, what do you envision as your profession?’ I didn’t even know how to answer that so I just excused myself and went back to the dorm room. I spent the next week thinking about it, just closing my eyes like he said, and then eventually writing down things I wanted in a career. My roommate asked me what I was doing one night and I told him and he said, ‘You’re a teacher, dumbass’ and threw a pillow at my head.”

  “He was right. I can see it in your eyes when you talk about work.”

  “He was, and once he said it I knew.” He was leaning into me now, subtly, but still there. We were so comfortable with each other. The awkwardness of the initial meeting had waned, and while our touching was innocent—ish, it still had me feeling alive in a way I hadn’t in possibly ever.

  “I had to take an extra semester of classes, and I have not one regret about that, even when I am still paying the student loans on that one. Go me, picking the most expensive college in the US just because it was free at the time. To be fair though, I only had to pay for the one semester, which makes me luckier than most of my colleagues.”

  I knew about student debt. One of the huge reasons I first found the path I did, was because they included their student loan repayment in their application. Other things made it even more desirable, but that had been what drew me there initially.

  “And the big city?”

  “They were the first to offer me a job.” He chuckled. “I didn’t want to graduate and start September asking people if they were ready to check out, you know?”

  “I do.” So many people I went to school with started their first job outside of their field. It was the harsh reality of our generation.

  “Sirs,” the bus boy interrupted us. “I hate to mention it, but we closed an hour ago.”

  Shit. An hour. Have we really been here that long?

  “I’m so sorry,” I pulled out my wallet, handed him a twenty and threw a bunch of cash on the table for a tip. I knew we’d been there a while, but a quick look around the room showed me what I feared, we were the last ones here. “We will be going.”

  “Thanks,” he slipped the twenty into his pocket. “I can unlock the door to let you out.”

  “Who closes a restaurant at ten on Valentine’s Day?” Jesse mumbled low as I helped him from his seat. He wasn’t wrong, and it was nice to see him as reluctant to end the date as I was.

  Four hours with him wasn’t enough.

  8

  Jesse

  We stood outside the restaurant, him stamping his feet and me blowing on my hands. “This may not have been what you expected, but I really enjoyed myself.” I added, “It was great to catch up.” That made it sound final as though I was giving him the brush-off. “I don’t mean just finding out what you’ve been up to but…”

  My voice trailed off. I couldn’t put into words what was in my heart. Wasn’t sure exactly what it was but I wasn’t ready to say goodbye. “Tonight was nice.”

  “Mmmm.”

  I pushed further. “I had fun.”

  “Me too.”

  An alpha of few words. I glanced at the parked cars and the few spindly trees lining the streets covered in snowflakes. “The snow is stunningly beautiful.” Jesus, that’s dumb shit. What’s wrong with me?

  “It is.” The corner of his mouth turned up.

  You’re not helping, Dean. I jumped up and down trying to keep warm, and he did the same. A couple hurrying along the sidewalk, hand in hand, swerved around us and gave us an odd look. Probably thought we’d had too much to drink, and while we’d consumed a bottle of wine between us, it was adrenaline surging through my veins. “Wanna go for a walk?”

  “In the freezing cold?”

  Snow flurries were sweeping along the street making it difficult to see. “Sure, why not? It’s pretty. Reminds me of a picture postcard.”

  Dean shrugged and gave that half-smile half-smirk I remembered. “It reminds me of something.”

  Without waiting for his answer, I turned and he followed. I was freezing but there was a warm sensation in my belly and it was spreading slowly over the rest of me. I hunched over to protect myself from the wind as Dean said, “Do you remember that time we walked home from the library after I’d been tutoring you and it was snowing? The streets were deserted and my ass was frozen. Just as it is now.”

  I pulled my thoughts away from his ass and returned to the past. Looking back, it was hard to believe that it was Dean who’d built up my confidence and made me tackle math. Many people would have said I didn’t have the ability. I just wasn’t good at the subject. But Dean’s approach was that anyone could do it. Maybe not at nuclear-scientist level, but they could master the basics.

  “Yeah.” It had been a cold wintry day, but we’d been so absorbed in chatting about something or other, we’d reached my house. Mom was getting out of the car and she said we looked like Christmas decorations as we were covered in snowflakes.

  I squinted at Dean, but with his beanie pulled low and his collar up, I could hardly see his face. But as the wi
nd eased and snowflakes swirled around us, I brushed some off Dean’s jacket. It was instinct but as soon as I did it, I regretted it. Too intimate.

  He glanced up, and I froze. I was sure I had a caught-in-the-headlights expression plastered on my face. And despite the temperature, there were plenty of people on the street, holding pink flowers and heart-shaped balloons. One alpha cursed as he bumped into me. “Watch it!” he grumbled.

  “Jesse, you’re right.”

  “About?”

  “Beautiful. No, gorgeous.”

  Is he talking about the snow?

  “Fancy something warm and sweet?” he whispered.

  My cock reacted to his gruff voice and slick covered my ass. I gulped and eyed the snow on either side of us. Not the best place for sex, and rather public, but my thoughts were controlled by my craving to be close to Dean. No, I wanted him inside me. God, how I wanted that. I was ready to throw caution and a sense of propriety away. But a voice of reason sounded in my head, “What the fuck are you thinking? Sex in public in the snow? You’ve taken leave of your senses.”

  “Huh?” was all I could say, or squeak.

  He jerked his head at a small food cart tucked under an awning, jutting out from a tall building on the opposite side of the street. “Hot cocoa.”

  “Oh, right. Of course.” I’m such an idiot. “I’d love some.”

  We stepped off the sidewalk, but I was so wrapped up in my companion and his closeness I paid no attention to the traffic. A car horn beeped, and a hand grabbed my arm and pulled me back. Quick reflexes.

  “Do you always step onto the street without looking?” he quizzed.

  I brushed snow from my cheek. “I was distracted. Sorry.” By you! I placed a hand on my chest and counted the beats of my heart in overdrive.