Page 83 of Big Girl Panties

"Get dressed," she announced with the authority of someone who'd already made all the decisions. "We're going out."

I shook my head. I already planned an evening of ice cream and self-pity. "Absolutely not."

"Yes."

"Nope."

"Brooke…"

"Davina."

She blew out an exaggerated sigh that could have inflated a balloon. "Brooke, you cannot spend the rest of your natural life hiding in this apartment wearing clothes that should have seen a landfill two years ago."

I rolled my eyes. "I'm not hiding from life. I went to work today. I interacted with other human beings. I made coffee drinks and everything."

She grabbed my shoulders and spun me around before marching me toward my bedroom like a woman on a mission. "And tonight, you're going to continue that streak of human interaction at the bar with Kali and me."

I groaned dramatically. "Fine. But I'm not promising to be fun."

"I knew you'd see reason eventually." She gave me a gentle but determined push toward my closet. "Now go put on something that doesn't look like it survived the apocalypse."

Chapter 35

Starting Over

Music pounded, vibrating the floor beneath my feet. Leaning on the bar, I forced a half smile as my gaze followed Davina as she whipped her long hair around dramatically before flipping it back and moving her hips with the music. She was trying hard to make me smile, but it was so hard when all I could think about was Matt.

Everything Leilani said earlier replayed through my head, and it only made me think more about Matt. I didn't want to come tonight. Especially not to the bar where we'd met. The one where his friends bet him to ask me out.

Tomorrow was his niece's birthday party, and I still hadn't decided if I should go or not. I wanted to talk to Matt, but I wasn't sure I was ready for it yet. Mostly because I wasn't sure what to say to him. I was half mad at myself for shutting him down so quickly before truly hearing him out, and half mad at him for not being honest with me from the start.

What was even worse, though, was that I missed him.

"Rough day?" A familiar deep voice boomed over the music, and I froze as my eyes widened. My gaze met Davina's for a long moment as a slow, devious smile spread across her face as she continued to dance.

My heart pounded, and my pulse thrummed so loudly it drowned out the music as I slowly turned. My lips parted slightly when my gaze collided with Matt's deep brown eyes.

My brows pulled together, face twisting with confusion. Placing both hands on the bar, I pushed up to my toes. "What are you doing here?" I yelled over the music.

He shrugged slightly before leaning in so he didn't have to shout. "Starting over?" He said more as a question than a statement.

We stood silently staring for a long moment as a million different thoughts raced through my mind. His eyes searched mine like they were waiting for me to make the next move.

I had two options: walk away and never look back, or play along and see what happens.

"You told Leilani you wished we could start over." I nodded, but I wasn't sure we could. "So, let's start over. Give me the chance to do it right this time."

Pressing my lips into a thin line, I sucked in a deep breath before slowly exhaling. The weight of the decision pressed against my chest. If I walked away now, this would be our ending. If I stayed...

"Kind of," I finally said, a smile tugging at my lips as I remembered what I'd said to him the first time we met. "Are you new here?"

His whole face lit up like I'd just handed him the winning lottery ticket. "Yeah, kind of, actually no." He shook his head, grinning. "I may have bribed the owner to let me work behind the bar so I could officially meet you."

"Really?" I raised an eyebrow. "That's either very romantic or slightly stalker-ish."

"I prefer charmingly persistent." He grabbed the bar towel from his shoulder and started wiping down the already clean bar. "Plus, I lost a bet tonight."

"That's rough."