Valentine's Day

Chapter 1

Valentine's Day sucked. Big time.

Maddie Parker lifted a mug of hot buttered rum to her mouth and drained it. On the "things that suck" scale, it ranked somewhere between leaving a red lipstick in the laundry after it ruined all the clothes and having a flat when you were already late for work.

The warm rum heated her up from the inside but couldn't do anything about the cold empty feeling she had from being in the Bellagio alone on Valentine's day. She was feeling sorry for herself and she hated it. Normally she wasn't the kind of girl to sit around be depressed about being alone. She usually was the sort to get on with life but there wasn't anything worse than a whole stupid holiday to make a single girl feel like a pathetic loser.

Maddie looked around the bar in the hotel decorated with red hearts and red garland along with romantic candles on each table. Everyone inside was dressed up to impress their mates and she felt slightly out of place in her blue jeans and favourite fuzzy green sweater that made the most of her eyes. She turned around from her stool on the bar to gaze out the large windows where she could see the raindrops falling  to the ground. It had started sprinkling earlier when Maddie crossed the into the city limits and as it got dark fell heavier. She made a good decision, or so she thought to stop for the night in Las Vegas but she had completely forgotten the date.

Normally she would have driven straight through but she was exhausted from the 6 hr trip from Salt Lake City. She'd have to wake up early to hit the last three hours home to Long Beach. She hadn't given Long Beach a single thought since the day after college graduation when she followed her boyfriend Mason to a new architecture job he'd manage to secure. He had convinced her that they'd start a family and get married and she easily disregarded her own path of being an artist. But after getting dumped a few months earlier, she felt like she needed to go home to get back to reality.

Maddie ordered her third buttered rum and turned her attention to the handsome bartender. He looked as old as she was with his great smile. Unfortunately he was wearing a wedding ring.

 "Can I get you anything else, Maddie?" he asked with a toothy grin.

"No thank you" she answered, impressed that he remembered her name.

She turned her attention the couples around the room who all were laughing or talking or staring intently into each other's eyes. She remembered last year on Valentine's Day she was with Mason on a romantic date she'd planned. Over dinner, she let him know that she'd reserved a romantic room at Hotel Monaco along with some new lingerie she'd worn. Over dessert, she'd brought up marriage. After using the room, the lingerie and Maddie, he had dumped her. Something about not being ready for marriage. She'd moved on with her life pretty easily thinking that maybe he was right. With his career on the forefront and his constant traveling, there was no way they were ready for marriage. It might be years before they were mature enough to handle it. At least that's what she told herself. That is until she saw his wedding announcement in the newspaper 6 months later. So it wasn't marriage he was opposed to. It was marriage to HER that he didn't want.

She faced the bar and finished off her drink thinking that it had been a really long time since she'd had a good date. She hadn't had sex since the night with Mason. She didn't miss him at all but she did miss the feel of a man's hands on her body. She sighed wishing she was the kind of woman who could pick up a man in a bar. No regrets. Just pick up and leave when it was over. His touch would burn her alive and she'd get lost in his kiss. Maybe they'd make it to a hotel room but maybe they wouldn't and he'd just take her in the elevator. Or maybe she'd fulfill of her many fantasies that went through her brain.

Since her breakup with Mason, all her fantasy men were the complete opposite of her old boyfriend. They were all bad boys with big hands and bigger.... Maddie was lost in this thought when she felt someone take the stool beside her. Whoever it was accidentally bumped her shoulder and her drink sloshed.