The Plan (Capitol Love Series Book 1) Read online

  “Tell you what, let me give you my card,” Ryan said as he reached into the breast pocket of his suit coat, “and if you have any questions between now and then, you can just drop me a line.” He smiled as he pressed the card into Savannah’s hand.

  “Thanks.” She glanced down at the card and saw that in addition to his business information, it included a photo of him and a handwritten number labeled “cell.”

  “Now you give me one of yours, hon. That’s how this networking thing works,” Ryan said with a chuckle, leaning in closer than necessary and putting his hand lightly on Savannah’s elbow. He was making her a little uncomfortable, but she decided to chalk it up to nerves on her part and an odd sense of humor on his part.

  “I don’t have any on me because I wasn’t planning on coming here tonight,” Savannah said rather than admit her cards wouldn’t be ready until Friday.

  “No worries.” He reached into his breast pocket again and pulled out his cell phone. “Why don’t you give me your number and then I can let you know if anything changes for next week?”

  Savannah knew he was just trying to get her number, and although this was exactly what she had set out to do, she found herself reluctant. She glanced toward the bar and felt a pang of disappointment at not seeing Colin—and knew what she needed to do.

  “Good idea,” she said to Ryan. As she recited her cell number, she congratulated herself on taking the next step in The Plan.

  When she got back to her seat, Rayne and Chase were deep in conversation.

  “Well, hey there, Miss Popular,” Chase teased.

  Ignoring him, she said to Rayne, “We’re definitely coming next week.”

  “Is it because of the Ken doll you were talking to?” Chase asked, and Savannah glanced at him, wondering why he seemed so interested.

  “No!” she answered a little too forcefully. When he responded with a playful lift of his eyebrow, she said, “Well, not exactly. I mean, we came to check it out and it seems good, so we should participate next time.”

  “I saw you give him your number,” Rayne said.

  “I didn’t have a card to give him, and he…” Savannah trailed off, suddenly feeling self-conscious about admitting he was flirting with her.

  Around a mouthful of wings, Chase said, “I predict he’s going to text you within three days and suggest that you meet for a drink. To ‘talk about the group’ before the next meeting.”

  Both women turned to look at him. Shrugging, Chase said, “I’m just saying. It’s the player’s play. And that guy,” he pointed to Ryan, “is a player.”

  Savannah suspected he was right and glanced down at the bar.

  “You seem to know a lot about players,” Rayne said to Chase. “Takes one to know one?”

  Chase laughed and winked at her. “I know a lot things about a lot of things.” He pushed himself away from the bar where he’d been leaning and said, “Ladies, it was lovely to meet you both. I hope I will see you again soon.” With a tip of an imaginary hat, he strolled out of the restaurant.

  Watching him go, Savannah said, “He seems—”

  “Really cool?” Rayne interrupted as she gazed after Chase with an almost dreamy look that Savannah had never seen on her before.

  “I was going to say different from Colin, but we can go with cool.”

  A minute later, Diana came up and dropped the bill on the bar between them. As she was gathering their dirty plates, she asked, “Can I get you anything else?”

  “I think we’re good,” Savannah said.

  “Great. Have a good night.” As Diana turned to leave, Savannah asked, “Where’s Colin? We wanted to say goodbye.”

  Diana looked at Savannah for a second before saying, “His shift ended. He’s gone home.”

  “Oh!” was all Savannah could think to say. She was disappointed, and she couldn’t help noticing a chill coming off Diana.

  After she left, Rayne looked at the bill and said, “No way all that food and drink only cost twenty bucks!” She dropped two twenties on the bar and slid down from the chair. “He’s way too nice. And he’s going to go broke if he keeps feeding us like this.”

  Out on the sidewalk, Rayne looped her arm through Savannah’s as they started walking toward home and asked, “So how many boxes did the Ken doll check on your list?”

  All the excitement Savannah had felt about Ryan earlier had evaporated, but she wasn’t going to admit it, not even to herself. She sighed and said, “About three, so far.”

  Chapter 9

  Jealousy was not a familiar emotion to Colin, and he definitely wasn’t a fan. In his experience, most women weren’t easily distracted from him, but if they were, he just moved on. He didn’t get any masculine pride or rush from competing for a woman’s attention or “winning” her away from another guy. Although, now that he thought about it, he hadn’t actually faced this situation before. He’d never had such an obvious attraction to a woman who stubbornly refused to acknowledge that she felt it, too. It was usually the opposite—women insisting they had a connection with him that he didn’t feel at all.

  Not that Colin was a womanizer. When he was with a woman, she had his full and monogamous attention, and he expected the same from her, for however long it lasted. But when it was over, it was over. Easy come, easy go.

  Until Savannah had twirled into his life. This woman had him twisted up in a way he’d never experienced. And he was completely unprepared for the gut punch he’d felt when he’d seen her talking to that guy in the bar—a guy who fit into her Plan in all the ways she believed Colin didn’t. He’d wanted to grab him by that fancy tie and drag him out of the bar. Instead, he’d left in an attempt to regain his sanity.

  He wandered along the waterfront for a while then started walking the fifteen or so blocks back to his apartment. Along the way, Colin made some decisions. He knew in his gut, in a way he couldn’t explain or justify, that Savannah was meant to be with him. But he was going to have to let her figure it out on her own. Which meant he was going to have to watch her flirt with—and probably even date—other guys, and he was going to have to keep it together while she did.

  The only way she was going to change her notion of what “the right guy” looked like was to date the ones she thought were right and see that they weren’t.

  Because they weren’t him.

  When Colin walked into the apartment, Chase was sprawled on the couch in front of the flat-screen TV that took up most of one wall in their small living room.

  “What are you watching?” Colin asked as he dropped his keys on the table by the door.

  “Swamp People, about these families in Louisiana who still hunt alligators for a living. I met some of them when I was down there a few months ago on a shoot. They are a total trip.”

  Colin walked into the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of beer from the fridge. “How long are you here?” he asked, flopping down on the couch and propping his feet up on the edge of the coffee table.

  “No clue.”

  “As usual,” Colin said, taking a long swig of his beer.

  “Plans are for suckers, little brother.”

  “Amen to that.” Colin reached out his bottle to clink with Chase’s.

  They watched TV and drank their beers in companionable silence for several minutes before Chase said, “So what’s the story with your friends from the bar earlier?”

  “Which friends?” Colin asked.

  “Come on. That cute dark-haired chick with the hippie name...Storm?”

  “Rayne,” Colin corrected.

  “Right. And her friend...uh...Georgia?”

  “Savannah. How do you get as much play as you do when you can never remember anyone’s name?”

  “Because every girl answers to Sunshine,” Chase said with a grin, holding out his bottle for a supporting clink, which Colin ignored.

  “Anyway,” Chase said, dropping his bottle back to his thigh. “So what’s the deal with you and this Savannah? You hit that and then she
decided she could do better? Again?”

  “You’re such an ass,” Colin said, but his tone was light. “There’s no deal with me and Savannah. She just moved to the neighborhood. We barely know each other.”

  He got up and went into the kitchen, where he tossed out his bottle and pulled two more from the fridge. “Why is there never anything to eat in this apartment?”

  “Liar,” Chase called from the living room. “I saw it all over your face. Especially when she was talking to that douche in the suit. This chick has got you all twisted up.”

  “I’m not twisted up,” Colin said, restlessly opening and closing cabinets. “Why don’t we ever go grocery shopping?”

  “Because I live here about 10 days a year and you spend at least twelve hours a day at restaurants where we can eat for free.”

  “This isn’t how adults live. Adults have more than just beer and coffee in their fridge.”

  “Do they, Mr. Cranky Pants? Did you read that in your Being an Adult for Dummies book?”

  “Screw you,” Colin said as he threw himself into the armchair to the left of the couch and handed Chase a beer. They continued to watch groups of men hunt alligators in swamps for a few minutes until something occurred to Colin.

  “Did you just refer to Rayne as ‘cute’?”

  “I did,” Chase said, wiggling his eyebrows at Colin as he took a sip of beer.

  “She’s not your type.”

  “All women are my type. Plus, she can actually carry on an intelligent conversation, which, although not a requirement, is a nice change of pace.”

  “She’s Savannah’s best friend, and...she’s not that type of girl, OK?”

  “By ‘that type of girl’ you mean the type who would be interested in me?”

  “I have no doubt she’d be plenty interested in you. But you’ll do that thing where you make her fall for you and then you’ll take off to your next job, which just so happens to be in the last remaining corner of the universe that doesn’t have cell service, and you’ll end up staying for three months and she’ll end up heartbroken and sadly asking me if I’ve heard from you every time I see her.”

  “That is not what I do.”

  Colin snorted and took a long pull from his beer.

  Chase sighed and said, “Fine. But it’s not like I do it on purpose. I’m always upfront about my lifestyle, and nothing happens without their full consent. I can’t help it if they all think they’ll be the one I’ll want to hang around for.”

  “Stay away from Rayne, Chase.”

  Chase grunted in response, which Colin chose to take as agreement.

  The next day at work, Savannah sat in her cubicle learning her way around the internal network and going through the files of the programs she would be working on, trying to get oriented. She was supposed to meet with her supervisor Sarah that afternoon to go over any questions, but so far Savannah only had one question, and it was “Huh?”

  For the third time in the last twenty minutes, she leaned back in her chair, closed her eyes, and did a cleansing yoga breath to regain her focus. A focus that kept wandering from her files to Colin’s blue eyes and wondering if he’d seen her talking to Ryan. And if it had bothered him at all. Not that it mattered.

  “Argh! Focus, Savannah, focus!” she scolded herself under her breath.

  “What’s that?” Sarah’s head popped around the opening of Savannah’s cube. “Did you say something?”

  “No!” Savannah said a little louder than she’d intended. “Nope, just talking to myself. A bad habit I have when I’m concentrating.” She hoped that sounded reassuring and not like Sarah had hired a crazy person.

  “No worries! I know there’s a lot to take in with all those files,” Sarah said. “Maybe just focus on getting to know the ones with reviews coming up next month. You can find the schedule on our shared calendar.”

  “Great idea!” Savannah plastered a big smile on her face to stop herself from saying she wasn’t sure she could remember how to access the shared calendar.

  For the next two hours, she managed to focus at least eighty percent of her brain on her work, devoting a scant twenty percent of her mental energy to thinking about the way the color of Colin’s eyes changed slightly depending on his mood. Her concentration was finally broken by her stomach rumbling at noon.

  She stood up from her desk and stretched her hands over her head to work out the kinks in her back. When her phone dinged with an incoming text message, she dropped her arms and took a second to stifle the butterflies that set loose in her stomach at the idea that the message could be from Colin.

  “He doesn’t even have your number, fool!” she muttered as she rummaged in her bag for her phone. She was only mildly surprised when she read, Hi Savannah, it’s Ryan from last night. Just wanted to say it was great to meet you!

  She sighed and dropped the phone back into her bag. She hated those types of texts—vague and with no clear indication of what he wanted. If he wanted to ask her out, he should just say so, instead of playing this game, where she has to write back Yea, me too! and then wait for his next message, which would hopefully include an active verb. She could reply with an invitation to get together, but she didn’t like starting out having to do all the work.

  When she glanced across the sea of cubicles to the windows and saw that it was a beautiful sunny day, she made the executive decision to take her lunch outside and deal with Ryan later.

  Exiting her office onto the busy downtown thoroughfare of Connecticut Avenue, she turned north toward Dupont Circle and eventually found a low wall to sit on amid the other office escapees, dog walkers, homeless people, and nannies out for some sun with their charges. She popped open her Tupperware container and settled in to do some people watching while she ate her salad.

  After twenty minutes, she picked up her phone and reread Ryan’s text, and remembered Chase predicting he’d wait three days to contact her. Savannah figured the fact that he’d texted her the next day meant he wasn’t the player Chase pegged him to be. And since it would be counterproductive to ignore his text at this point, she hit reply and typed, Hi Ryan. Thanks! It was great to meet you too.

  Three minutes passed before her phone dinged with a response.

  Would you be interested in meeting for a drink or something tomorrow night?

  Savannah smiled. At least he got there quickly.

  Sure! Where?

  Zipped again? @7?

  Um, kind of tired of that place. How about somewhere else?

  Five minutes later, when Ryan hadn’t responded, Savannah stood and put her empty container back in her bag.

  “Something tells me Ryan doesn’t know anywhere but Zipped,” she murmured to herself as she slung her bag over her shoulder and began to slowly walk back to her office. As she passed Starbucks, she decided to treat herself to one of her guilty pleasures—a mocha latte. While she was standing in line, her phone dinged, and she pulled it out to see that Ryan had finally responded.

  How about The Lounge on C Street right by the market?

  Savannah had passed by that place, and it looked pretty nice. Ryan was quickly redeeming himself from the initial lame text.

  Savannah typed, Sounds great. See you tomorrow at 7.

  As she walked back to her office sipping her latte, Savannah felt a small seed of anticipation about her date.

  The next phase of The Plan was in motion.

  The afternoon flew by in a blur of reports and statistics and shared calendars. At the end of the day, as Savannah stood pressed between hundreds of other commuters on the Metro train heading home, she realized that she’d been so busy all afternoon she hadn’t thought about Colin or Ryan or even checked her personal email for new matches or updates about networking events. It felt good to be totally focused on work. As she was contemplating a quiet night spent in her PJs with some reality TV, her phone beeped with a message from Rayne.

  Is tonight the trivia night at Zipped?

  Savannah sighed an
d typed, That’s Thursdays.

  A moment later, Rayne replied, Oh. Is there anything going on there tonight?

  Savannah suspected Rayne’s sudden interest in Zipped might be connected to trying to play matchmaker with her and Colin, and she had no interest in going along. So she wrote back Dunno. Don’t care. Need a night IN. Please?

  Several minutes passed without a response from Rayne, so Savannah typed, PLEASSEE?

  Can we get Chinese?

  Savannah smiled and typed, YES. My treat!

  She couldn’t believe how relieved and excited she was at the idea of a night in with Rayne. She’d been so focused on getting her life set up for the past month that she felt like she’d been working two jobs.

  At 10 p.m., Rayne and Savannah were in the living room with half-empty Chinese takeout containers and two empty bottles of wine on the floor and a Project Runway marathon on TV. They were painting each other’s toenails when Carol walked in.

  “Carol!” Rayne called, waving her hands above her head.

  “Having a girls’ night in?” Carol asked in a tone that Savannah thought could be either snarky or amused.

  “We are! You should join us! We...uh…” Rayne hesitated as she picked up both empty wine bottles. “OK, there’s no more wine, but we have some fortune cookies. And we’ll paint your nails!”

  “Tempting, but I’ll pass. I have a very important date with my bed that I don’t want to be late for.” Savannah decided that this was Carol being friendly, which was something new and interesting.

  “You’re just getting home,” Rayne said as a statement more than a question, making a point of looking Carol up and down through narrowed eyes. “You were on a date!” Rayne shouted. “Sit! Tell us EVERYTHING.”

  Carol laughed but still managed to sound a little sad. “I was definitely not on a date. Just a work dinner with some donors.”

  Turning to Savannah, Rayne said, “Carol is a bigwig over at the Smithsonian.”

  “If by bigwig you mean the person who has to be first in and last out and go out to dinner with boring old men, then I guess I am,” she said.