Читать книгу Two Grooms and a Wedding - Adrianne Byrd, Pamela Yaye - Страница 9

“You never caught her name?” Charlie repeated.

“I know. I haven’t crashed and burned that badly since elementary school,” Derrick told his friend at the hotel’s bar while he tried to understand his disappointment every time he thought about the shy, skittish woman.

Charlie gave his buddy a good hearty pound on the back. “Well, don’t beat yourself up about it. We all have one off day every once in a while. Never happened to me, but I’ve heard stories.”

Derrick laughed. “Of course not.”

“Drinks are on me, old man,” Charlie chuckled. “It’s probably all downhill from here. From now on you’re going to have to start prowling for dates at the local bingo halls.”

“Very funny.”

“I’m just saying.”

Derrick let the fact that Charlie was the eldest of the two by ten days slide because today Derrick’s game was indeed off. He took another deep pull from his beer bottle and imagined for the umpteenth time what his little drowned rat would’ve looked like with dry hair and makeup. He hated he couldn’t see what dangerous curves lay beneath her bulky, black trench coat.

But then there was that moment in the cab when their eyes had met. He felt…something. It wasn’t sexual, though there was no question he had been attracted to her. It was…

“It’s not about who has the deepest curves or the thickest backside, but someone who, when you look into her eyes, her soul speaks to you down in here.”

Derrick gulped hard at the sound of Herman’s gravelly voice floating in his head. He looked at the three empty bottles lined on the bar and decided he’d had too much to drink.

“Oh, it’s just as well,” he mumbled. “The last thing I need to do is screw up another woman’s life.”

Nestled in bed, Isabella pored through her clinical sex books with a growing sense of disappointment. Where was the hot, spicy or even juicy stuff that was going to make her a star in the bedroom? All her life, she’d heard how sex was such a big deal; from the whisperings in high school bathrooms to hormone-charged sorority sisters to every cable show in America.

Sex was a big deal.

True, she wasn’t completely clueless. She knew the logistics, but not what unlocked passion. And passion was what she and Randall desperately needed.

Or at the very least a spark.

Derrick Knight’s dreamy hypnotic eyes blazed to the forefront of her mind and her body tingled in response. Handsome failed to describe a man like that and undoubtedly women were reduced to silly putty beneath his twinkling gaze. She would have been too if it hadn’t been for her complete mortification for toting sex how-to books around town.

The phone rang, snapping Isabella out of her make-believe conversation.

“Hello.”

“Mahogany is on HBO,” Rayne, another close sorority sister sing-songed over the line.

Isabella quickly searched among the books for the TV remote.

“You got it?” Rayne asked.

“Just a sec.” Isabella found the remote and quickly tuned in to the spot where “Do you know where you’re going to?” floated through the speakers.

“I love this movie,” Rayne sighed.