“If you’re taking me to the zoo, we can skip it and head back to your place.”
I scoff. “The zoo? Totally unoriginal. And we could head to your place.”
“But I like hanging out with your parents.”
Her eyes are sparkling, her cheeks flushed, and that smile—god, it’s so radiant.
For a dumb old puckhead like me.
“C’mon,” I say, rising to my feet and offering her a hand. “We don’t want to be late.”
“Is this what the keys were about?”
It totally is. “What? No. I just ran out of ideas. Tomorrow you’re getting paperclips.”
“Nick.”
I wave to Elmer, who waves back from the kitchen. I paid him two days ago when I talked him into opening up just for us tonight.
“You need paperclips at the clinic, right? For paperwork and shit?”
“Not the size or quantity of paperclips you’d send if you were actually sending paperclips.”
She might be right. I might be pretty simple to understand.
We leave the building and a blast of cool fall air swirls leaves around the parking lot. She shivers, and I take full advantage of the opportunity to wrap an arm around her shoulder. “You don’t really feel dumb, do you?”
“No, but…I do feel less smart. I thought you might—never mind.”
“What?” I press.
She sighs. “I always thought your ego was overcompensation for being the dumb one too. Not that you’re dumb. Or unsuccessful. You’re just…not Felicity-smart.”
“Or talented,” I agree. “I tried talking without moving my mouth once, and I strained my tongue.”
“You did not.”
She’s hiding a smile as I unlock her door and boost her into the Cherokee. But instead of shutting the door, I lean down so we’re at eye level.
“I didn’t want to be smart,” I tell her, and my heart gives a weird jolt, like it knows what’s coming.
“Not even a little?” she teases lightly.
“Smart kids get bullied. I—” Fuck. I have to clear my throat, because even though it’s been twenty-something years since it happened, it still feels like yesterday.
But if Kami needs to hear why I’m a shithead, then I’m going to tell her.
No matter how much I don’t want to think about it.
She tilts her head, brows drawing together.
“I was little,” I tell her. “For my age. It’s part of why my mom’s so…like she is. I was short and scrawny and I never gained enough weight for the doctors. And the other kids noticed.”
“Did you get picked on?” she asks softly.
“Well…yeah.” And shoved. And kicked. And mocked. Crazy the things the right first-grader will say to make you feel like shit. Especially when you’re a little peewee and your dad’s a huge fucking retired hockey player. “A little.”
“Nick.”
I roll my shoulders back. “Kids are mean. And my dad was fucking huge. Not just tall and built, but known, you know? So I asked to play hockey when I was four so I could learn to be huge too, even if I was little. So, no, Felicity being smart didn’t bother me. Me being a pipsqueak bothered me. I wasn’t gonna be a nerdy pipsqueak on top of it. Especially once I realized how much Felicity needed a tough older brother to protect her, no matter how big I wasn’t. But you—” I squeeze her arm. “You’re perfect. So quit thinking you’re not. Okay?”
She doesn’t answer right away. Instead, she studies me with serious dark eyes until she asks, “Is it true you don’t practice hard?”
The cocky grin is automatic. “Says who?”
“You want the whole list? Keep in mind, I have half your teammates programmed into my phone.”
“I…could probably practice harder,” I concede.
That earns me a raised brow.
She’s fucking adorable when she’s grilling me. “Ask my mom sometime how awful I was the first couple years I played.”
“Your mom would never say you did anything wrong.”
Probably true. “She has awful embarrassing pictures though.”
“Your mother thinks you’re practically perfect.”
Also probably true. “She used to take me to the skating rink for two to three hours a day to practice. Not because she made me. Because I wanted to.”
Her brows knit together. “You’d practice three hours a day? In grade school?”
“Yeah.” I shrug, playing with her hand, because I’m getting a little warm in the cheeks. “I was fast. I had a stick. And then I had all the goaltender pads. It was my safe place.”
“Oh,” she says softly.
“So, yeah, it probably looks like I’m slacking off a lot,” I admit. “But when you do it right the first time, you don’t have to spend hours doing it again.”
“You have muscle memory.”
“Not quite good enough this year though.” I brush her cheek and pull back. “Time to go. Can’t be late.”
Because she’s Kami, she doesn’t push it. But she does start asking questions when we pull up to the warehouse in Copper Valley’s revitalized downtown thirty minutes later. “Is this a haunted house? I swear to God, Nick, I might be an animal doctor, but I still know how to use a scalpel on your testicles if you even think of tricking me into going to a haunted house.”
“You don’t like haunted houses?”
“No.”
“That sudden chainsaw sound doesn’t rev your engines?”
“Don’t make me use your middle name.”
Fuck, that’s a legitimate threat. “It’s nothing any scarier than being alone with me for an hour,” I promise her with a brow wiggle.
We head inside, and she goes from suspicious to amused. “Are you serious? The keys make total sense now.”
“I picked the zoo theme,” I tell her on our way to the check-in desk.
And then I crack up at the scowl she gives me.
“Okay, okay, I didn’t pick the zoo-themed room. But you’re gonna love what I did pick.”
We get to the check-in desk, and the dark-haired woman behind the desk gives me a once-over.
And not the good kind of once-over.
Nope, this woman’s wearing the frown of pretty much every Thrusters fan I’ve met this season. “Murphy…Murphy…Murphy…” she murmurs as she scrolls through the computer. “Oh, right. There you are. You can join your group over there.”
She points to a ragtag bunch in overalls sitting on benches lining the opposite wall in the lobby. Their scowls don’t entirely mesh with the black tile floor and gray walls covered with huge posters of the various escape room themes.
“No, I had a private reservation,” I tell her.
“We’re going to need to search you for contraband animals,” she adds.
Kami turns around and coughs into her elbow, but I’m pretty sure she’s actually laughing, which is the only thing keeping me from getting irritated with the receptionist. “We’re in our own room, right? Just the two of us?”
She shakes her head. “Your reservation is for a group event with that family right there.”
Fuck. “What other rooms do you have available tonight?”
“They’re all booked.”
She flashes a diabolical smile. No point in asking to talk to the manager.
She is the manager.
“All of them are booked?” I ask.
Kami squeezes my hand. “It’s okay. We’ll make new friends.”
I look across the way again and realize one of the older guys in overalls is glaring at a younger guy with earbuds in, who’s scowling back like he hopes the lights go out and our escape room experience turns into a live-action version of Clue.
I’m about to suggest we skip it when Kami adds in a whisper, “I have bad date karma. It’s my fault.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I had a date with an old guy who kept grabbing my ass two weeks ago. And then that…thing…with someone we all used to know that you’re not allowed to think about. And then Muffy set me up with her neighbor, who is super hot, but it turned out he needed a date to his ex-girlfriend’s wedding to his boss, and I mean old guy boss, and we all got thrown out because… that’s not important. The point is, I think I just have bad date karma.”
My blood pressure is rising by the millisecond as I think about all the other men who’ve been within kissing distance of Kami since her birthday.
“Or Muffy’s a really bad matchmaker,” I point out with a scowl. “You’re with me. This is supposed to be a good date.”
“It could be, if you don’t act like a spoiled child.”
Now the receptionist is having a coughing fit.
A woman in a black T-shirt with a name badge around her neck steps out from behind one of the doors leading to the escape rooms.
“Wankers and Murphy?” a voice calls.
Kami and I both do a double-take and simultaneously choke on snorts as the entire contingency of overall-clad guys—and token woman in jeans, boots, and a sweater—all stand.
“I’ve got the Wankers,” the woman announces.
“Oh my god, Nick, we have to,” Kami whispers. “How often do you get to spend a first date with a bunch of Wankers?”
I can’t talk because I’m still choking on snorts, so when the woman calls, “Murphy?” again, Kami tugs my hand and pulls me toward her.
“We’re here,” she says. “Sorry. My boyfriend inhaled some dust. He has breathing problems sometimes. It’s a congenital condition.”
I should be threatening to pay her back later, but seeing her eyes sparkle and shine like that—she can make up stories about me anytime she wants.
I wouldn’t even care if she said I had a small dick, because first of all, she knows better, and second of all, so long as she likes my dick, I don’t really care what anyone else thinks.