Decades

Date Night

When the elevator doors opened, Lindsey saw the back of a familiar red dress and the blonde who was wearing it throwing back her head in a laugh as she walked through the front doors of the upscale hotel's lobby with a tall, handsome man with salt and pepper hair wearing a well-cut suit. As they exited the building, his hand rested on the small of her back. Lindsey had to resist the urge to club that guy over the head and drag his woman back to his room like a caveman.

He'd always hated the idea of other men touching Stevie. Though, for a while, she hadn't hated it at all, that's for sure. He rolled his eyes, blew out a breath, and shook his head just thinking about it.

A lot of his worst behavior came when he'd heard or imagined things she was doing with other men. He didn't want to go back to that dark place. He didn't own her. Even if, deep down, he felt that she was his. He just had to hope she'd willingly come back to him. Tonight, preferably.

He stopped at the bar and had a couple more drinks. Staring into his glass, he wondered where that guy had taken her. Hopefully, not back to his place. He thought of Stevie in her red panties and bra. She looked so sexy. Imagining what he'd do to her if she'd stayed with him instead of going on this dumb blind date did things to him. He felt himself getting hard right there in the bar, "Like a godforsaken 15-year-old," he thought.

It didn't take much to get the situation in his pants in check as his mind drifted to this man she was out with. This man who had behaved familiarly enough with Stevie on the first date to have his hand on her lower back. Simply imagining what he knew the man would want to do with Stevie in her red lingerie was a definite boner killer. 

Frustrated, Lindsey took the elevator back to his room and went to the balcony to smoke a joint. He needed to get his mind off of Stevie and her smoking hot red panties, for fuck's sake.

It was a stupid thing to do, but he called Kristin. He needed to have his ego stroked a little. They chatted for a while, and it helped some. She was very interested in him. She mentioned how excited she was about seeing him perform with his band when he was back on the West Coast. He feigned excitement, too, knowing full well he wouldn't be seeing her. He intended to have sealed the deal and be in a relationship with Stevie again by then. 

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Stevie and her date had a really nice evening. Dinner and dancing. He'd held her in his arms and spun her around the dance floor. It turns out he was a really good dancer, especially for an attorney. Lindsey hated dancing, she reminded herself. Looking for reasons to like her date, Edward, more than her old flame.

He was handsome, not rockstar handsome like Lindsey. More corporate attorney in a smart suit handsome, nothing edgy about him. But, he was very smart, well-traveled and well-read. He had a good sense of humor and genuinely made her laugh throughout their date. As they walked down the street, she'd caught their reflection in a store window and they made a striking couple.

They shared quite a few of the same favorite authors. He knew and enjoyed her music and had an eclectic taste in music himself. He actually offered to come to a couple of the West Coast cities they'd be visiting to take her to small venues to see some local artists that he thought she would enjoy. He liked her, she thought, or he wouldn't be interested in making future plans. If she gave him a chance, she wondered if she'd like him too.

He didn't ask her any of the usual Lindsey-centric questions that so many people gravitated toward when getting to know her. If she were telling anyone about the date, she would have listed this as a positive. 

She was ashamed to admit it, but she would have liked it if he would have brought Lindsey up. She actually enjoyed opportunities to talk about him, as strange as that may be. As hard as she tried not to, she found herself occasionally dropping his name into the conversation. He was hard not to naturally bring up since so many of her stories included him. Her mom called it "mentionitis" and claimed she always suffered from it when things were "on" with her on-again, off-again lover. She hoped it hadn't been too obnoxious.