Round Twenty-Three
MAGGIE
“What in the world?” Alana drags me across Ramone’s yard, around the pergola strung with fairy lights, past the barbecue already sizzling with lunch, and all the way to the far end of the not-yet-occupied hot tub. She wrenches me around and forces me to face her. And Fox. And Rose. And Eliza.
Oh my god.
“You slept with Billy?” Eliza hisses.
“No! I didn’t. I—” I drag my sleeves down and cover my trembling hands. To stop myself from chewing my nails all the way back to the quick. To save myself from clawing at my face, because that’s what the anxiety swirling in my belly would have me do. “I didn’t sleep with Billy! Are you insane?”
“But you slept in his bed?” Fox insists. “According to his kid.”
“Well, yeah—”
“That’s not a small deal!” Wide-eyed, Alana looks at Fox. “He didn’t tell us. What a sneak!”
“If you wanna date him, do it,” Eliza presses. “Jesus. Finally, we’re getting somewhere—”
“I don’t want to date him!” Wait… do I? “He was out with one of my matches on Thursday night. He got back late, and I guess I fell asleep on the couch. Next thing I knew, I woke up yesterday morning with Jeremy’s nose almost touching mine.
He said they didn’t want to send me home alone, so Billy put me in his bed and he slept on the couch. ”
“Jeremy slept on the couch?”
“No! Jeremy slept on the floor beside my bed, because he didn’t want me to be lonely.
Billy slept on the couch. Oh my God.” I crush my eyes with the heels of my palms. “Jeremy didn’t technically lie, but he’s just a kid.
He doesn’t understand the implications of his words.
This is such a mess,” I whimper. “Everyone will think we… Billy and I…” Kill me now.
Please! Put me out of my misery. “He was dating someone else that night, I swear.”
Eliza hitches herself onto the edge of the hot tub. She wears jeans and a floaty top, her long blonde hair tied into a ponytail so the ends dangle to the middle of her back. “What exactly are you looking for when you’re finding these love matches, anyway?”
“What?”
“Humor me. Please. You’re shopping for women… what are the parameters of your search?”
I slide my gaze across the yard and stop on the duo as they stand together, Ramone’s head thrown back and loud laughter bouncing through his chest.
“Maggie?”
“Um…” My voice crackles and tickles my throat on the way out. “T-twenty-nine to thirty-five years old. He likes eyes, so I pay attention to those.”
“What does he like in a pair of eyes?” Alana questions. “Specifically.”
“He likes them large. Expressive. He has a habit of reading all the things a woman isn’t saying, and he does that by looking into her eyes. He prefers darker, earthy tones, like brown and hazel. Olive green. Gold. He’s less drawn to the blues and grays.”
“What about hair?” Fox questions. “Color? Length?”
“Brunette,” I rasp. “The darker, the better. But not black. He doesn’t dislike blonde—” I study Alana and Eliza, both with their blue and blonde features. “It’s not that he has a problem with that, but he prefers women who are brown and brown.”
Eliza’s lips quirk into a grin. “Height?”
“He hasn’t really expressed a preference, but the dates I’ve lined up so far tend around the five-seven range.
I saw photos of him and Aria. In almost all of them, he rests his chin by her forehead.
” I shrug. “I dunno. I figured he liked that. Probably makes him feel more protective, wrapping around her the way he did.”
“Personalities?” Fox presses. “I know he’s not into arrogant loudmouths like Eliza.”
“Hey!” Eliza swings her leg forward. “Everybody loves me.”
“He likes them quieter. But strong. She must be firm in her beliefs, or he’ll walk right over her, and even when he says he wants submission, what he actually wants is a woman who could be submissive, but has a spine anyway.
Someone who may choose to be submissive to him in the, uh…
” Warmth floods my cheeks, rushing like a tidal wave into my stomach and leaving behind a wash of nerves.
“In certain private circumstances. But she must be able to speak her mind, or he’ll get bored, and even if he disagrees with a decision she’s made, if she flops and defers to him, he’d consider her weak and vapid.
He likes them to have brains, so I’ve been selecting women who use their intellect in a positive way.
Business owners, educators, that sort of stuff.
He appreciates soft fabrics. Dresses that aren’t necessarily form-fitting, but form-accentuating.
He’s mentioned their outfits during every single debrief so far.
I’ve noticed a pattern in the outfits he smiled about more. ”
“Right.” Fox clicks her tongue. “So brown hair.” She grabs a lock of my hair, “and golden eyes. Business owner, back-talking, steely-spined, intellectual.”
“And stands about five-seven,” Alana finishes. She places her hand on top of her head and grins. “Five-six.” Then she presses her hand to the top of Fox’s head. “Five nine.” Finally, she looks my way. “You land right there in the middle, no?”
“Yeah. You basically just described yourself,” Eliza snickers. “Maggie. Honey. Wake up and smell the sex pheromones in the air.”
“What?”
“You’re searching high and low for you! You’re shopping for brown-haired, brown-eyed girls, and completely ignoring the one you see each day in the mirror.” Sliding off the edge of the hot tub, Eliza takes a threatening step closer. “It’s you, doofus! Set him up with you.”
“No! I can’t—”
“You can’t possibly tell me you haven’t thought about it,” Fox huffs. “You’ve been discussing dateable women for weeks already, you’re in his house late at night, and now you’re attending a barbecue together.” She flattens her lips and glances straight over my shoulder.
Horrified, I twist as subtly as I can and stop on Jeremy’s sweet face smiling right back at us.
“You look like a family unit to me. His kid is head over heels in love with you.”
“No, he—”
“Literally told the kids at school if his dad screws up and you’re still single in fifteen years, it’s all over for these other suckers in town.”
“He…” I lay my hand over my cartwheeling stomach. “You’re insane.”
“Ramone tried to toss Hudson at you, and Jeremy peed on your leg! And he didn’t even pee for himself.
He peed for his dad. Girlfriend.” Fox’s lips firm into stern lines.
“I don’t know what’s happening in your brain, but Billy Caster’s is screaming and running in circles, trying to figure out a way to ask you out without sounding like he’s suffering a stroke. Trust me.”
“The poor guy is way out of practice,” Eliza snickers.
“He grew up with Aria, and eventually, she changed from ‘the chick who hung around the house a lot’ to ‘the chick he got to kiss and make a baby with’. He didn’t have to try.
He didn’t even have to learn how to speak to women, because he only ever had to speak to her. Now he’s practically forty—”
“He’s thirty-three, actually.”
“He was born in the nineteen-hundreds,” she counters. “Which makes all of you ancient as hell.”
“Calm down,” Alana growls. “You were born three minutes after the turn of the century, so don’t get too cocky over there, Gen Z.”
“Focus.” Fox snaps her fingers in my face.
“You’re shopping for women like you, Magnolia.
But you’re either too blind to realize he wants you, or you’re not blind at all, in which case, you’re setting him up with women you know he doesn’t actually have a future with.
The first makes you kinda dumb, the second makes you devious and fun.
Maybe the next chick you set him up with could be blonde and lesbian. That would be fun to watch.”
“I don’t—”
“Maggie?”
Ramone’s close proximity catches me by surprise, and as I spin, his kind smile, not the raucous craziness I expect of him, makes my heart tumble.
I look him up and down, concern washing through my veins due to how utterly serious he appears when he so often wears a grin instead, then I tilt to the right and find Billy exactly where I last saw him, his jaw clenched and his eyes burning.
He stares straight at me, as angry as he so often is.
So friggin’ angry all the time.
“I-is everything okay?” I bring my attention back to Ramone. “Did something happen?”
“No.” He offers me a beer, my second of the day, and extends his arm. “Grab on, Magnolia Sava. I wanna take you for a spin.”
“Um—”
“Go.” Eliza shoves my back until I crash into the unmovable Ramone Devereaux. “Talk some sense into her. We tried.”
“It’s sense you want?” He bounces his brows, smirking behind three-day-old stubble. “You’ve come to the right person, baby doll.” He loops his arm around mine. “Walk with me. Tell me about that time you slept in Billy’s bed.”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake.” I groan. “It’s not what you think it is.”