Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 58142 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 291(@200wpm)___ 233(@250wpm)___ 194(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 58142 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 291(@200wpm)___ 233(@250wpm)___ 194(@300wpm)
I’d been about to dip my spoon into my bowl of chili, but I set it down instead. “Wait a minute. Back up. You want me to move in with you?”
“Of course,” Chase says. “Why do you sound so surprised?”
“Would you consider it?” Maddox asks.
“We know you have a roommate,” Diesel says, “and you probably can’t just leave her —“
Before he can finish his sentence, and before I can figure out how I’m going to respond, we’re interrupted by two women in athletic wear and ponytails. They might be in their late thirties and appear to have been out for a run.
“Oh my god. Are you Dodge and Diesel?” one asks, coming right up to our table, her eyes wide and her mouth hanging open.
The other woman doesn’t come as close as the first one, but is looking at all four of the men with wide eyes. “Of course they are,” she tells her friend.
Oh my god!” The first woman is squealing now, clapping her hands to the side of her face, and fangirling hard. “I can’t believe it’s you!” She steps back to get a better look at all of the men. “You all dance, don’t you? Oh my god, you are so gorgeous!”
The woman flashes a jealous scowl in my direction and then completely ignores me as she flirts shamelessly with all of the men, telling them how many times she’s been to the club, and that she has a picture of them on her desk at work. “I like to tell people that you’re my boyfriends,” she says with a loud laugh.
For their part, the Stanton brothers are polite and friendly, though not overly so. After a minute of the woman reciting everything she loves about their performances, Chase says, “Thank you for coming over to see us, but we’re having lunch with our friend here. We hope to see you at the club again soon.”
“Oh, I’ll definitely be there,” the lady purrs. “Bye bye.” The second woman practically has to drag the first one away.
“I’m sorry about that,” Chase says, turning his full attention to me. “Sorry about referring to you as a friend, too. You are obviously much more than that, but I didn’t want to be presumptuous.”
“That was something else we wanted to talk about with you today,” Dodge says.
Diesel’s voice is solemn when he says, “We’d like to make things official.”
32
Finished
“We know your parents don’t like us, but we hope we can have the chance to win them over,” Maddox says, his winsome grin telling me that he’s used to charming anyone he sets his sights on.
This was something I thought about a lot last night, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t imagine a meeting between my parents and these men going well. My parents wouldn’t want anything to do with them even if I wasn’t involved with them, but me dating them — or moving in with them! — would never, ever be acceptable.
If I were to continue seeing the men, it would mean cutting off contact with my parents, or rather, my parents cutting off all contact with me.
“Even though we meet a lot of women, it’s been hard for us to find someone who sees us for more than how we look or who we are on stage,” Dodge says.
“We love that we can be ourselves with you,” Diesel says.
Chase lays his hand on my arm. “Of course, we’re still getting to know each other, but so far, you seem perfect for us, and we’d like the chance to see if we might have a future together.”
I’m so full of conflicting emotions that I can’t speak. They talked about taking me out on dates, but I had no idea they were this serious or felt this strongly about our potential. As I’m processing my thoughts, a young woman appears out of nowhere at the end of the table.
“Dodge and Diesel? Oh, wow! All of you are dancers at Club Red, aren’t you?” Before any of the men can respond, she whips out her phone. “Can I take your picture?”
Dodge puts his hand over mine, maybe to comfort me or to signal our connection, while Diesel slides closer to me on the bench.
“You can take a quick picture,” Chase says, “and then we’ll want to get back to our lunch.” He nods his head toward me and catches my eye before turning back to the woman.
“Oh gosh, I’m so sorry to interrupt, but I thought I recognized you, and I just had to come and say hello. I’ve been to your show three times. Actually, I was wondering if you were looking to hire dancers, because my boyfriend is jealous of me going to your shows, and he thinks he could be a performer.”
Even though I wasn’t hungry a few minutes ago. I reach for the plate of apple turnovers and break off a large corner of the flaky pastry, popping it into my mouth while the men explain to their fan how someone can apply for a job with them, and answering other questions she has.