The Blind Date Read Online Free PDF Page A

go. What do you usually do on a Friday night?”
    “Sometimes I go out.” She paused, giving him a considering look. “There’s a place not too far from here. My co-workers and I have gone a few times. It’s in the basement of a building and has this whole house-party vibe. They play a lot of songs from the eighties and nineties.”
    “Sounds like fun.”
    “Ryan, I leave in a couple of days.”
    “All the more reason to pack in as much as we can tonight, right?” He reached across the table and took one of her hands in both of his. The same jolt of electricity vibrated through his fingers, but this time he didn’t pull away. This time he embraced it, enclosing her smaller hand and holding on tighter when her fingers trembled. “I just want to spend time with you. I feel like something’s happening here, and I don’t . . . I-I . . .”
    He fumbled, searching for the right words and coming up short, unable to explain what was happening but knowing he didn’t want to get off this ride they were on.
    But maybe he hadn’t totally screwed up. Because she smiled the sweetest, softest smile that turned his insides to mush.
    “I know what you mean,” she said softly.

Chapter Six
     
    After circling the area several times, Ryan parked the car a few blocks from the venue. They took a set of stone steps below street level where music poured from the open doorway of a townhouse basement.
    A few men loitered outside, smoking cigarettes and watching the women walk in wearing their booty-hugging dresses and sky-high heels. The predominantly African-American crowd squeezed into a space too small to accommodate a group of that size, resulting in a fire marshal’s wet dream.
    Stuffed into a corner on a makeshift stage, the deejay called out, “Did y’all come here to paaaar-tay?”
    A resounding, “Yeah!” erupted from the dancers.
    “This place is crazy,” Ryan said. His breath tickled her ear.
    She nodded in agreement. “It’s always like this.”
    They stood on the edge of the crowd, watching everyone shake and shimmy.
    “Do you want to dance?” he asked.
    As much as Shawna wanted to, she hesitated. How much rhythm did he have? “Why don’t we stand back and watch for a minute?”
    He nodded. “That’s probably best. I’m not much of a dancer.” After a few minutes, he dipped his head to her ear again. “If you want to dance, go ahead. I’ll stand here and watch.”
    “You came here to watch?”
    He placed a hand at her lower back, and the touch sent sparks dancing along the base of her spine. “I like to watch.” His steady gaze held hers, leaving no doubt as to what he’d implied by the words. He straightened, his attention drawn back to the dancers.
    Shawna rubbed the goose bumps from her arms.
    “I’m going to get something to drink. You want anything?” he asked. She shook her head. “Be right back.”
    She watched him disappear to the other end of the room in the direction of a small bar.
    “Hey, you want to dance?” A black guy with dreads stood beside her.
    She looked over at Ryan, now engrossed in conversation with the bartender. He had given her permission to dance.
    “Sure,” she said with a shrug.
    She and Dreadlocks squeezed between the bodies and started dancing, but after several songs, Shawna broke away from him when he got too handsy.
    She looked around for Ryan. As the only white male in a sea of black faces, he shouldn’t be hard to find, but she didn’t see him anywhere.
    Outside she asked a couple of people if they’d seen him. No one had. She climbed the steps up to the street and looked around but didn’t see any sign of him. She wondered if she’d offended him by dancing with another guy. But she couldn’t have, because he’d given her permission to. Hadn’t he?
    She went back inside to search for him, and that’s when she saw him.
    Shawna couldn’t believe her eyes. Her mouth fell open. Ryan was dancing, shaking his hips and bouncing his shoulders to LL Cool