“When you’re rich, the world’s yours. If he really wanted to know who you were, he could… I don’t know, pay some detective to track you down or something.”
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right about that. So what’re you saying that he doesn’t care enough to do that?” I followed this up with a grin, letting her know I was only messing around.
“If that’s the case, then he’s an idiot and doesn’t deserve you and all your awesomeness. All the same, I think it’s a little weird.”
“It’s actually weird that you think it’s weird. He and I hooked up and that’s all. I didn’t even spend the night. Not like we had some months-long relationship or something.”
“See? There you go again.”
“Go again what?”
“Acting like this thing you and he shared was no big deal.”
“That’s because it wasn’t. We hooked up, it was fun, he was hot, but that’s it. There doesn’t need to be any more to it than that.”
“You’re saying that like hooking up with guys for one-night stands is something that you do on a regular basis. Shoot, I can’t even remember the last guy you slept with.” She scrunched her brow, trying to think. “Oh, wait! It was that guy… um, Mike! The one who wore that stupid beanie everywhere and was obsessed with bad horror movies.”
I groaned. “Don’t even remind me. That was a, uh, desperate time.”
She laughed. “I still think that he wore the beanie when you guys were, you know…”
“Gross! And no, for the thousandth time, he didn’t. I had to draw the line somewhere.”
“Still, it proves my point. The last time you slept with a guy was some dork you met on Hinge that you weren’t even that crazy about. But Alex… he was different.”
“Says who?”
“Oh, don’t even try to play it cool. I’ve noticed the way your eyes light up when you talk about him. Youlikedthe guy.”
I pursed my lips and looked out the window. The sun was well into setting behind the westward mountains, and it was beginning to shape up into another gorgeous Colorado summer night. My windows were cracked a bit, and perfect, fresh-smelling air was breezing into the car.
The conversation was starting to make me a little uncomfortable. After all, the connection between Alex and I was far more serious than Haley knew.
“I mean, so what if I did? I liked him, fine.”
She crossed her arms, a pleased smile on her face that made it clear that she was happy with my admission.
“There. Just so long as you admit it.”
“But liking someone that you have a one-night thing with, that’s the bare minimum. It doesn’t mean that anything more is ever going to happen between us.”
“It could if you really wanted it to. You could look him up.”
“Look up a doctor named Alex? And where? I don’t know where he lives. There’s got to be thousands of Dr. Alex’s running around.”
“So? Narrow them down.”
“OK, let’s pretend that I was even interested in doing something like that. Imagine that I went to all the trouble of finding this guy for him to be like, ‘uh, who are you again’?”
“He wouldn’t do that.”
I laughed again. “How do you know? The guy swooped me off my feet and brought me to hisyacht. Something tells me that’s not the first time he’s done that. Heck, seducing starry-eyed American women is probably his go-to activity when he’s bored on a Friday night.”
“Or, just maybe, you caught his eye in a way no woman had before. He couldn’t help but bring you back to his yacht and make sweet, passionate love to you on the Mediterranean.” She clasped her hands together, bringing her tone up to theatrical levels. “And right now, he’s sailing the seven seas—in his yacht, of course—trying to find the love of his life.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Alright, alright, that’s enough.”
“Really though, you never know. It’s only been a month.”