“Can I go in this?”
She smirked and gave my ratty OSU sweatshirt and stained sweatpants a once-over. “Only if you want to prevent us from getting hit on.”
“Then I’m good to go.” The last thing I wanted to think about tonight was impressing men.
She gave me a playful shove toward my bedroom. “Go get dressed. It’ll be good to be hit on by men who are emotionally available and vulnerable in their drunken state.”
I huffed out a laugh. “Because that doesn’t sound predatory or anything.”
“Put some real pants on,” she shouted as I walked into my room.
A few minutes later, I walked out in skinny jeans, purple chucks, and my favorite AC/DC T-shirt. Zoey smiled and nodded. “Much better. Now we at least have a chance at not paying for drinks tonight.”
“I thought you said I didn’t have to drink.”
She shrugged. “You don’t have to, but I wouldn’t mind one.”
Before we locked up the apartment, I grabbed my coat and phone, my credit card and ID, opting to forgo a purse in case I got drunk enough to decide to dance.
A line wrapped along the side of Dean’s as we strode up to the building. Rock music boomed out of the open door, blocked by a black velvet rope and a stacked bouncer talking to an equally muscular guy in a very nice fitting suit.
“Good thing I brought my coat.” At the rate Mr. Muscles was letting people into the bar, I’d be a Popsicle by the time we were admitted into the place.
“You won’t need it for long.” She grabbed my arm and led me to the front of the line.
Closer up, the neon lights from the window shone on the man in the suit. He had extraordinarily high cheekbones and muscles stacked on his muscles. I’d have recognized him sooner if he’d had his shirt off, because it was none other than Shirtless Dude—er, Ryder.
His sullen look changed to a megawatt smile the second he spotted my best friend. “Zoey!” He beamed, and heck if I didn’t hear her let out a soft sigh in response.
Apparently we had a lot of catching up to do, because this was the same look Bruce got when we passed the neighbor’s poodle.
He nodded to the bouncer, and he opened one side of the velvet rope and motioned us in. “Have a good time tonight. If you need anything, I’ll be around.” He winked down at her, and it was my turn to sigh.
I bumped her with my elbow. “I see things are going well with Ryder?”
Her smile vanished the moment I mentioned his name. “It’s purely professional. We work together, that’s it.”
“Please tell me by ‘work’ you mean ‘in his pants.’”
Her shoulders tensed, and a line creased the skin between her eyes. “No. We’re just friends. Barely.”
I looked at her. “Oh, girl. You obviously don’t see the way he’s looking at you.”
She rolled her eyes. “Just because he’s flirty does not mean he’s interested. He acts that way around everyone.”
“And he winds up shirtless at ten in the morning at people’s houses, too?”
She flushed.
Ha. I got your number, Zoey Reynolds.
Yeah, no. I wasn’t convinced, but wasn’t going to push it any further. She’d been nice enough not to get into my business—because I certainly didn’t want to admit I was on the losing end of this whole fling deal. Nope, tonight was about hitting the reset button on life. We were here to hang out, just like we did in college, and that beer was sounding pretty good right about now. Who cared if Brogan’s wine beat a Blue Moon, hands down? Certainly not me.
We managed to find two spots at the bar and plunked down our coats on the back of our stools. The bartender bustled over to us almost immediately and placed two napkins on the granite.
We ordered a beer and Tom Collins and swiveled to look out at the dance floor. People a few years younger than us were grinding, already drunk, hours before last call.
Dean’s had been a regular spot for us the past couple months. It had a nice variety of country dancing, karaoke, pool, and an upstairs that was quieter for when you wanted a calmer atmosphere.
“That used to be us last year.” I pointed to the drunk girls on the dance floor, gyrating their hips to the beat of the music.
She pursed her lips as if to say ohh, girl. “Please. We looked way better than that.”
I smiled and sipped my beer. “True.” Or at least the alcohol made it seem that way. “Remember that one time you danced on the bar at Malone’s like you were in Coyote Ugly?” I giggled and pressed my lips to the top of the beer bottle.
“No. I really did that?” Tequila was Zoey’s kryptonite. Two shots and the girl went from southern belle to Pretty Woman in the span of an hour.
“It was the night you broke our toilet seat and then wore it around like a necklace.”
She shuddered. “Yeah, I’m so glad we’re over that phase.” She lifted her Tom Collins as a salute to our younger, alcohol-hazed college years.