Yes! Finally! See, now this is a woman I can appreciate. Soul sisters.
Women who understand each other! I briefly consider giving her my tube of red lipstick and asking her to exchange numbers, but I decide against it.
Once all my business is complete, I emerge from the bathroom like a hostage released from captivity. It's good to be back in the world. Are the Kardashians still famous?
I make my way down the dark, slender hallway toward the bar. The music pulses through my chest, and my heels pound the floor with the confident strides of a six-foot Amazonian on the catwalk rather than the five-foot-two Southern dumplin' I am.
Right now, I am all confidence-high on my own determination as I step out of the hallway into the trendy sports bar. I have no time to scan the room before I'm grabbed hard by the arm and yanked to the side.
"Ow! What the-"
"He's here," Sophie whispers loudly into my face. And WOW has she already had a lot to drink or what? I'm going to need to slip her a Tic-Tac.
"Who's here?" But I know who she's talking about. I'm just getting into character with my false disinterest.
"Didn't you get all my texts?" She sounds frantic. It makes me laugh a little because I know that even though this is our first stop of the night, she's already a little tipsy. Sophie is a lightweight. And when Sophie gets tipsy, she turns into the star of a reality TV show. Which reality show? It doesn't really matter. A drunk girl is the driving force in all of them.
"No, I left my phone on the table."
Sophie looks appalled. "Why'd you do that?"
"Because I was proving that I-it doesn't matter. How long has he been here?"
"About five minutes. He's standing over at the bar."
Nerves zing through me because this is it. After 7 years, my archnemesis is once again standing in the same room as me, and I fully intend to squash him.
My little black dress is hugging all of my curves, and my loose-wave, honey-brown hair is tickling my spine. I've been saving this dress for exactly this occasion. It has a high neckline but low-cut open back, making it the perfect combination of sexy and sweet. The mullet of dresses, if you will. Business in the front, party in the back.
Even better, the slender long sleeves cover almost all of my shoulder tattoo, leaving only the tiniest sliver of pale-yellow sunflower petals to peek out over my shoulder blade I take in one deep breath before turning around and scanning all of the men at the bar. I scan. I scan again. I scan one more time because... "He's not here."
"Yes, he is," Sophie says in a matter-of-fact way that gives me a sinking feeling. "He's right there." She points toward the bar, and I whip my head
around to her.
"No. He's. Not," I say through my teeth. "I don't see any ugly men with greasy hair and rotting teeth!" I'm doing that thing where I'm yelling in whisper form with a smile still plastered to my face. It's scary.
Sophie doesn't back down from my crazy. She gives a look that says this ends here and now. "That's because Mark is not ugly or greasy."
"But you said he was!" I sound so desperate now. I'm seconds away from breathing into a paper bag.
Sophie shakes her head, and if I wasn't completely freaking out right now, I would tell her how pretty her new blonde highlights look. "Nope. You always assumed he was, and I just never corrected you."
"Why! That's the kind of thing that you correct a girl about."
Her eyes go wide, and her mouth falls open. "You've got to be kidding me!
The last time I tried to mention anything remotely complimentary about Mark you took my fifteen-dollar glass of wine and poured it into the restaurant's ficus!"
I did do that. And I stand by it.
"Now! Like it or not, Mark is here, and he's not ugly, greasy, or unhygienic, so it's time to put on your big girl panties and woman up."
Right. She's right. This pep talk was good. I nod my head in agreement, trying to get hype like those football players before they run out of the tunnel. I feel a new adrenaline coursing through me-an electric shock to my system that triggers my brain to switch into high alert.
Because suddenly, the game-or rather, the opponent-has changed.
"Which one is he?" I go shoulder to shoulder with Sophie as my eyes cut fire across the bar.
"The navy suit with Miss USA draped over him."
Of course.
Of freakin' course.
__
VAMPDIVYA
YOU ARE READING
SINNERS LUST
FanficHate... Hate is what connected us some might think it would turn to love little did I know myself or allowed myself to fall for him however..it's a game with a complicated rules that will show mark Ryder he chose the wrong partner to play with Mayb...
