Whole Lot More

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Seventeen

The girls camped out on Julie’s couch later that night, ice cream in their laps, and an endless marathon of “chick flicks” playing.

It felt good to Brynne to be able to sit there in her pajamas, her hair pulled up into a messy bun and pigging out on ice cream and other foods that were definitely not healthy, and not having to worry about impressing anyone.

It’s not that she felt she had to dress up and impress Martin, because he really didn’t seem like one of those guys who demanded it, it was more that she felt she had to in order to  compete with the legions of women who threw themselves at him on a weekly basis.

Knowing that she was the only one he was looking at though, made her feel powerful and more feminine than she’d felt in a long time, and it made her knees weak every time he looked at her with that intense look on his face.

Julie giggled and scooped some ice cream into her mouth after Brynne got done telling her about the time Martin had fallen asleep while talking to her and how he snored, and was fully prepared to launch into another story when her cell phone interrupted her.

She looked down at the ID flashing up at her and smiled, mouthing to Julie that it was Martin.  “Hello?”

“Hey,” he said quietly.

“Hey yourself.”

“I just wanted to call and make sure you two made it safely back to Julie’s without any problems.”

“Yep,” she chirped, “We’re sitting her in our pajamas, eating ice cream, having girl talk and watching The Notebook – and totally intending to cry like babies at the end.”

“In your pajamas, huh?”

Brynne giggled and shook her head, “Get your mind out of the gutter that I know it was heading to any minute.”

“My mind in the gutter?” he questioned, “Yeah right, I’m so innocent it’s not even funny.”  She rolled her eyes, knowing he was anything but innocent.  “I was just wondering why I wasn’t invited to the slumber party.”

She rolled her eyes again and shook her head, not bothering to hide the smile that twitched at the corners of her mouth, “Sorry, no boys allowed.”

“I’m not a boy, though!” he protested, “I’m a man!”

“Sorry,” she giggled, “Let me correct myself.  No one of the opposite sex allowed.  Does that cover it?”

He laughed, “I got your point, Bry.”

“Good.  So, what are you up to?”

“Just waiting for the flight to land so I can finally get to sleep in my own bed again, tonight.  Junior and Josh passed out on me an hour ago and I was definitely bored, so I called you to make me un-bored.”

“Guess they didn’t get enough sleep this morning?” she asked with a giggle, completely ignoring the fact that he’d made up his own rendition of bored in that sentence.

“Nope, they were too wrapped up in each other to sleep much.”

She laughed out loud at that, and shook her head, “They’re never going to live that one down, are they?”

“Oh, definitely not.  I’m going to hound their asses even when we’re all greyed and not even racing anymore, sitting around on the porch and talking about how it was back in the good 'ole days.”

She had no doubt that he would hold this over their heads forever, and she could only imagine what he’d do when he found the pictures on his camera.