Page 26 of How Not to Date a Griffin

How did so many people care about erecting another hotel? Was the one they were standing in not enough? Did this city really need another mini metropolis for the elite to throw their money at?

Nolan made it on time for the next presentation, something about bettering customer service, offering rewards to employees for this or that. Nolan just stopped himself from rolling his eyes. No one cared about pizza parties and printed pieces of Employee of the Month papers. Give them a raise and maybe they’d be a little more enthusiastic about showing up to their soul-sucking, gut-wrenching job.

Maybe Nolan was projecting.

He held it together through the entire slideshow, tense and bored but on his best behavior, since his father was seated right next to him.

“I’m going to grab some lunch,” Nolan said once the assembly began to break up.

“Next presentation is at—”

“One-fifteen, I know,” he said, interrupting Chase, and walked off before they could stop him.

The morning was dragging, the day grating, and Nolan was practically vibrating out of his skin. Restless, that’s what he’d call it.

Granted, there wasn’t much else he could be doing…

An image flashed through his mind of Reid sleeping soundly in the bed as he’d shut the door to the room that morning.

Well, maybe he could think of a few things.

The air was too warm and the sun too hot as he walked out the glass doors of the hotel, pedestrians on the sidewalk zipping around him.

He didn’t know what made this day so different, what made him want to crawl out of his skin and leave it behind for a bit. But the urge itched at him, a pestering sensation he couldn’t get away from.

Maybe it was the lack of sleep. He had been out rather late with Reid.

Forgoing the hot weather, he walked back into the hotel with a grimace and glanced at the signs, arrows pointing in different directions to the little shops and restaurants on the ground floor.

Burgers, salad, pizza…

He doubted any hotel pizza would live up to the slice he’d had last night. With Reid.

Aiming toward the salad and smoothie place, he smiled politely at passing faces and checked his watch, dreadfully counting down the time until the next assembly.

Were his presentations this boring as well? Or was it just different because he was another face in the crowd, instead of up on stage?

Mentally reviewing his own presentation, he followed the signs for the line and stood behind a businesswoman in a pale pink suit. Cute. Bold.

It suited her, and he imagined how he looked to anyone outside his own head, glancing down at his own suit for the day. It was sharp and expensive, at his father’s insistence. It was also a boring, bland gray, and even though he tried to give it some life with a teal tie, he knew his attempt fell flat. As flat as his purpose.

God, that was rather depressing, wasn’t it?

He recalled Reid’s outfit, the coral button-up and the band tee and the boots. There was something about him, his style. A quality Nolan could only hope to exude one day.

He sighed, pulling out his phone to check the time again, because his watch wasn’t enough. Disappointment laced through him as his notifications remained quiet, and he finally admitted to himself why he was so restless in the first place.

Either Reid wasn’t awake, or he’d decided not to text Nolan. Maybe letting him stay had been the wrong move?

Was Nolan supposed to have awoken him? Sent him on his way in the dead of night? Nolan wasn’t familiar with these unsaid rules of… of whatever was happening—had happened—with Reid.

He took a deeper breath, heart suddenly thumping against his chest with emphasis.

It wasn’t a hook-up. No actual hooking up happened, had it? And if Reid wasn’t going to text him, Nolan supposed it remained… nothing but a local showing an out-of-towner around.

Not a date.

Nolan wasn’t daft enough to ignore the way the thought condensed into a dark gray cloud above him.