“Drew Campbell?”
And the sound of the arena manager bellowing her name down the empty corridor.
Drew groaned.
Maisie took a step back, her lips slightly red and swollen. “Oh my gosh. I’m so sorry. I—”
“No, Maisie. It’s—”
“Drew Campbell?” the manager called again. “Are you in here?”
Maisie’s breathing had quadrupled in speed, rivaling that of a hummingbird. “I really don’t know what’s gotten into me tonight. It must be the Vegas effect.”
“What happens in Vegas,” Drew began, but before she could finish, the manager called for her a third time. He sounded beyond irritated, so she turned around and yelled back, “Yes, I’m here!”
“It’s about time,” he said. Drew could see his shadow coming closer, though he was still out of sight. “If you’re not out there in five minutes, I’m locking up and heading home.”
“Yes, sir.” Drew spun back around, intent on apologizing to Maisie. It was too late. The space where she’d been standing was empty.
Stormy, silent all this time, let out an indignant snort.
“What was that?” Drew asked, pretty certain Stormy understood she was not referring to the snort. “Did that really happen, or am I dreaming right now?”
CHAPTERSEVEN
Maisie took a step back,studying the pyramid of boxes with a critical eye. After much deliberation, she gave the top one a gentle nudge. A second later, she pushed it back where it had started and sighed.
Absolutely nothing was riding on her getting the box perfectly centered. Given that Cheryl had a hangover, Donna was texting with her boyfriend, and not a single customer had been by the booth in at least twenty minutes, it was safe to say no one would notice, let alone care, how the display looked. But it gave Maisie something to do.
Something thatwasn’ttying herself into knots while overanalyzing what the hell she’d been thinking kissing the hot cowgirl the night before. Maisie had done quite enough of that already. She’d spent what felt like years trying to come up with a reason for her crazy behavior but hadn’t managed to make sense of it. All she knew was on a scale of one to ten, based on every kiss she’d ever experienced, that one had scored a fifteen, easily.
Cheryl stood and stretched, her eyes crinkling in a way that suggested the aftereffects of partying were still very much with her. “I’m starving. Anyone want to take a break and cruise the samples with me?”
Maisie’s stomach flip-flopped at the mention of food. It was well into the afternoon, and she hadn’t eaten since breakfast, but the prospect of cramming a hodgepodge of food expo vendor samples down her gullet left her queasy. “I’m fine for now. How about you, Donna?”
“I wouldn’t mind a break.” Not needing to be asked twice, Donna was already out of her chair and stuffing her phone into her handbag. “We can be back in thirty minutes so you can take your turn.”
“Make it an hour,” Maisie said. “I doubt there’s going to be a big rush on cardboard packing materials between now and then.”
“Are you sure?” Cheryl asked. “It’ll be almost quitting time by then, and you won’t have much time to explore the hall.”
“There’s still tomorrow,” Maisie replied, pressing a hand discreetly to her midsection and praying maybe this time her ever-present anxiety would subside. It didn’t. This is what happened when you went cavorting around Vegas, kissing people all willy-nilly. Even now, the memory of that kiss burned her lips in a way that eclipsed all desire for food. “You two go have fun.”
“Okay,” Donna agreed. “We’re still on for dinner tonight, right?”
“Not that hundred-dollar place,” Maisie said with a shake of her head.
“Definitely not,” Cheryl chimed in. “Not after the night I had at the poker tables.”
“We’ll go someplace cheaper,” Donna promised. “My stop at the casino this morning wiped me out, too.”
“The cheaper, the better.” Maisie still had her winnings she’d cashed out the night before tucked in her wallet, but she wasn’t about to go spending it. She may have lost some of her senses in the past twenty-four hours, but not all of them.
It was only once her coworkers had wandered off that Maisie realized the downside of remaining behind. She was alone with her thoughts. No matter how hard she tried, those thoughts kept returning to one thing.
Drew.
More specifically, Drew’s lips and how Maisie had come to find them pressed against her own in what Maisie would be lying if she said was not the most amazing, sensual kiss that had ever happened in the history of the world.