Devoted to Her (Dream Date Book 2) (5 page)

“Just the standard four years,” she replied.

“Guys,” Ashton said. “How about we have one last night
of fun before classes begin? This is the last week that we’re not going to be
super busy.”

“Yeah,” Claire agreed. “We should hang out. There
won’t be a free week for us until spring break.”

“Where should we go?” Grecia asked. The group thought
about a good place. Claire used her smartphone to search the Web.

“Guys, there’s this place I think you’ll like,” Amanda
said to them. “Kellan took me last semester. It’s a night club in Rochester.”

Ashton raised his eyebrows.

“I didn’t take you for the night club kind of girl.”

“Me, neither. But I liked it. What do you all think?”

“What is the name?” Oswald asked.

“Nola’s. It’s fun. You’ll like it.”

Grecia searched for the club on her smartphone. She
showed the screen to Ashton.

“It’s near the lake,” he said.

“Yeah,” Amanda replied. “We’ll be indoors most of the
time, but you can always go outside.”

The group debated on whether to go there. Ashton argued
that they had a whole free weekend. They could afford to take the time to drive
to another city.

“Settled,” Grecia said. “We’ll go there.”

“When do we meet?” Ashton asked.

“It’s a two-hour drive,” said Amanda. “We should take
off at five or six.”

“Five thirty,” Claire
said. They all agreed.

Amanda walked back to her apartment to get ready. She
walked alone, thinking that she was going to invite Emmy and Judith.

As she got to the top of the stairs and emerged into
her floor, Amanda spotted a guy. He was walking toward her. She didn’t
recognize him.

The guy was listening to music on an MP3 player. He
had earbuds on. When he got closer to Amanda, the guy looked up at her.

“Hi,” Amanda greeted. She quickly searched the guy’s
eyes for a sign of recognition. His mouth opened.

“Amanda Tilley?” he asked, taking off his earbuds.
Amanda stopped walking. She smiled. “You’re
the
Amanda Tilley?”

“That’s me,” she replied. The guy looked awed.

“I’ve seen you online, but the way you cut your hair
threw me off a bit.” The guy offered his hand to Amanda. “I’m Christopher Holt.
I can’t believe I’ve just met you.”

Amanda shook hands with him.

“You don’t look familiar.”

“I’m new here. I just transferred from a college out
of town. It didn’t have a couple of classes I needed.”

“Welcome to Cornell,” Amanda told him. “What year are
you in, by the way?”

“Junior,” Christopher replied. “You?”

“I’m a freshman.”

“Don’t say? And here I meant to ask you for a bit of
advice on the classes.”

Amanda and Christopher laughed together. He ran a hand
through his blond hair.

“I’m not much help to you with classes, but I could give
you a tour of the campus if you’d like.”

“You’d do that? If I’d already had a tour, I’d lie just
for the honor to repeat it with you.”

Amanda nodded to herself.

“I see you worship me.”

“Worship? Only the man upstairs,” Christopher said. He
jerked with his head toward the sky. “I admire you a lot, which is different.”

Amanda looked into Christopher’s eyes. They were a
nice shade of blue. In them, Amanda saw the same look she often saw in her most
devout fans. It was a mixture of loyalty and adoration.

“Impressive answer.”

Christopher smiled, looking a little proud.

“Do you live here?” he asked.

“Yes. I assume
you’re
not here visiting a
friend.”

“Right. I live here, too. That room there, in fact.”

Christopher pointed to a spot behind him.

“Cool. You’re just…three doors from mine.”

“The room belonged to a guy like me,” Christopher
said. “A transfer, I mean.”

“You got lucky, then. This is one of the best
apartment buildings in the city.”

“It is? I wouldn’t know.”

Christopher smiled again. Amanda couldn’t help
returning it. The guy exuded charisma.

“I’ll let you be on your way now,” he said.
Christopher started to walk toward the stairs.

“Thank you.”

“I’ll see you later.”

“You, too,” Amanda replied. She turned to walk back to
her apartment. When she had taken two steps, she heard Christopher’s voice
again.

“And…I’m really neighbors with Amanda Tilley?”

Amanda looked back at Christopher. He had his hand on
the stair railing. She laughed.

“Amazing,” he told her.
With that, Christopher disappeared down the flight of stairs. Amanda had a
smile on her lips when she walked back to her room.

A few hours later, Nathan was waiting outside the
entrance to Nola’s. Amanda, Emmy, and Judith were with him. He’d brought them
in his car.

“There they are,” Judith said. Nathan and the others
looked in the direction she was looking. Claire, Oswald, Ashton, and Grecia
were approaching. They’d arrived in another car.

“That was a long ride,” the latter said. She stretched
her arms, and then her legs. “I’m stiff.”

Ashton suppressed a smile.

The group walked inside the club. There weren’t many
people inside at that moment. Only about half of the tables in the middle of
the room were in use.

“It looks nice,” Grecia said. She squinted, her eyes
still adjusting to the darkness.

“Let’s go get a table,” Amanda said. She led her group
forward. There was a table near the stage that had enough chairs for them all.
They sat down.

“There’s no one on stage right now,” Oswald said.

“I guess the owners didn’t book anyone tonight,”
Judith said.

“They might still have unscheduled talent on stage,”
Emmy told them.

A waiter arrived at that moment.

“How may I help you tonight?” he asked.

“We’d like a menu,” Amanda requested. With a nod, the
waiter handed a copy of the menu to each of them. The group examined their
choices.

“Should we get an entrée, or do we begin with some
appetizers?” Claire asked. The rest of them considered the options.

“What do you recommend?” Nathan asked the waiter.

“Our mozzarella sticks are a great choice to start
with,” he replied. Nathan and Amanda looked at their friends to see what they thought.

“That’s fine,” Oswald and Grecia said.

“All right. Order of mozzarella sticks for eight,
coming right up.”

The waiter left.

“About the music,” Nathan said. “I think Amanda should
ask if she can take to the stage.”

Amanda blushed, laughing.

“Singing is
not
one of my talents. My lungs
aren’t that strong.”

“But you have a nice voice.”

“Nathan, please. I can hardly stand to listen to
myself on a recording. Besides, there’s more to singing.”

Nathan shrugged.

“If any of us should sing, it’s Emmy. She’s the music
major, after all,” said Judith.

Everyone turned to look at Emmy. She looked back at
them, caught off guard.

“Um, I make music, but I don’t sing.”

“Don’t be shy,” Amanda prodded. “Sing.”

“I’m not sure I can just go up there and start
singing. Do they let you do that?”

“Kellan never told me.”

Amanda looked around. She spotted a couple of waiters
coming back with their cheese sticks.

“Thanks,” Claire and Nathan said after the waiters set
the plates on the table.

“Sir,” Amanda said to catch one of the waiters’
attention. “Is there live music scheduled for tonight?”

“No. But we have recorded music playing on the
speakers. It should start in a few minutes.”

Emmy tried to hide her smile. She wasn’t eager to sing
in front of a bunch of strangers. She was studying to be a composer, not a
singer.

“Thanks,” Amanda said. The waiter nodded, and he left
with his colleague.

As promised, music started to play at nine. Ashton and
Grecia looked toward the stage. Between it and the tables was a dance floor.

“We should order the entrees now,” he suggested. “And
burn the calories by dancing.”

“Sounds like a great idea to me,” Amanda said. She
looked at Nathan.

“Okay.”

Around thirty minutes later, the group finished eating
their food. Nathan was the first to ask his girl to the dance floor.

“Let’s go dance,” he told Amanda, standing up. She
took Nathan’s hand and stood.

Grecia and Ashton followed suit. Oswald and Claire
went next. That left Judith and Emmy at the table by themselves.

“I wish I had a boyfriend now,” Emmy muttered.

“Rather alone than with some jerk,” Judith said.

“Ashton turned out to be pretty loyal.”

“Yeah. I didn’t expect that.”

Emmy’s eyes switched to a spot above and behind
Judith. The latter felt a prod on her shoulder. She turned.

“Hi,” said a guy. He was quite handsome. “May I ask
your name?”

“I’m Judith,” she said with a slight smile.

“I’m Mike.”

Judith nodded.

“Nice to meet you, Mike,” she said. She looked behind
him to look at his group of friends. It consisted of two guys and a girl.

“Would you like to dance with me?”

Judith pursed her lips.

“I would love to, but I’m afraid I can’t dance. It
would flatter Emmy to dance with you.”

Mike’s eyes switched to Emmy. Once again, she was
forced to catch up. Judith looked at her and flashed a
go-ahead-and-take-the-offer
kind of look.

“Why in the world not?” Emmy said. She pasted on a
smile and stood up. Mike took her hand. Emmy looked back at Judith, seeming
unsure. The latter gave the thumbs-up to her friend.

Meanwhile, Amanda and Nathan were lost to their own
world. They danced among the throng of people already on the dance floor.

“I wasn’t always a good dancer,” Nathan said.

“What?”

“When we were in high school, I didn’t dance. Unlike
most guys, I was a bit nervous about prom.”

“That’s funny,” Amanda said, grinning. “
Prom
made
you nervous?”

“It did. And I’d lost my mother. I didn’t have a
female figure to teach me. So I taught myself.”

“You did
what
?”

“Yeah. I signed up for dance classes at a local
studio. Dad thought I was taking karate lessons.”

Amanda and Nathan laughed in unison.

“Of course, I studied a little karate and even bought
an outfit to make it believable. I didn’t need to lay it on too thick to
convince Dad. He was still distraught over what happened to Mom.”

“It’s no surprise you were able to save me the day I
almost get kidnapped.”

“Actually, it is a little surprise. I only studied
enough to become a red belt or so. I’m not that skilled. It’s just that I’ll
never let anyone hurt you.”

Amanda continued dancing with Nathan, absorbing what
he had just shared with her.

“What motivated you to learn to dance?”

Nathan thought for a moment.

“You.”

Amanda’s eyebrows furrowed.

“Me? Really? But you never asked me to prom.”

“No. I wish I had, but would you have said yes? You
were in love with your boyfriend. Most likely, I would have freaked you out.”

Amanda said nothing, sighing.

“
Did
you go to prom?”

“Of course. You? I’d bet a million bucks yes. I can
picture the long line of guys competing for the chance to dance with you?”

“You would be right. I was still a little hurt at that
point, so it didn’t matter to me much who I picked. To be on the safe side, I
opted for a good friend of mine.”

“Brad?”

“No. He went to high school in L.A.”

“Oh.”

The two continued to dance. Halfway through the third
song, Amanda’s head snapped to the side. Nathan’s brows furrowed.

“What happened?”

Amanda’s eyes scanned the room. Frowning, she turned
back to Nathan.

“Nothing. I thought…never mind.”

They kept on dancing. When the song ended, Nathan
excused himself to go to the restroom. Amanda watched him leave, and then she
looked around. Ashton and Grecia were still dancing. Oswald and Claire were
going back to the table. Amanda made to follow them.