The Hate Date, page 2
“I would have thought you were on a date with the half-naked girl you pulled out of the water instead of sitting in this boring meeting,” Liam said.
“Walker can track her down,” Mike said with a snicker.
“No,” I said. “Walker is supposed to be working on the collaboration with Svensson PharmaTech, not playing internet stalker matchmaker.”
“Funny you should mention matchmaking,” Liam said, sitting up. “I have your speed-date ticket here.”
“You must have lost your mind if you think I am going on a speed date,” I said flatly.
“But you have to.” Beck gave me a slight smirk. “That’s the only way to run into Martin Shaw.”
“I’ve been monitoring his social media,” Walker added, “just like you ordered. He’s big into dating right now.”
“No.”
“But we haven’t been able to score a meeting with him,” Mike reminded me. “I have several new hotels for Greyson Hotel Group to build. I need him to invest his fund in the building costs. We can’t just sit around waiting for him to finally decide to stop yacht shopping and to schedule a meeting with us. Everyone in Manhattan is going after his account. We need an in.”
“If you don’t, some other firm is going to swoop in and nab his investment,” Beck said.
“I’ll do it if you don’t want to,” Carl offered.
“Absolutely not,” I barked. “Liam, send me those tickets. I’ll have that contract signed this time next week.”
3
Belle
“What are your New Year’s resolutions?” Emma prodded thirty seconds after I walked into her teeny, tiny, micro, studio apartment.
“Make money,” I said emphatically.
“I know, right?” Emma said breathlessly as she raced in a circle around the tiny apartment, picking up clothes off the bed then running to the oven, where she had a macaroni and cheese heating up, then to the freezer to chill the bottle of champagne I had brought.
“I got it on sale this morning,” I said.
“You know I love anything on sale!” she said happily. “Oh shoot, can you grab the champagne flutes?”
She pointed. Her micro apartment was literally taller than it was wide. The ceilings were fifteen feet high, a vestige of the building’s former use as a warehouse.
“A tall friend is super practical,” Emma said with a giggle as I climbed on her step stool then easily reached up to grab the shoebox she directed me to.
“Why do you still keep these?” I asked her, handing her the box.
She petted it. “If I could afford a therapist, they would probably tell me that it’s mentally unhealthy to keep the wedding goblets you stole from your lying, cheating ex’s wedding to his lying, cheating co-cheater.”
She handed me the goblet that read groom.
I looked at it and sighed. “It’s ironic, you know. The guy at the wine store called me sir earlier.”
“Oh!” Emma squeaked. “I’m sorry! You can have the bride glass.”
“It’s fine.”
“He probably wasn’t looking closely,” she assured me, taking out the champagne bottle and pouring me a generous helping.
“You’re a great catch,” she told me earnestly as I drained the glass. “Guys like girls who can keep up with them drink wise.”
“No, they don’t,” I replied. “They like delicate, petite princesses who eat half a hot dog and claim they’re so full.”
“Only if they have a spinning fetish,” Emma replied with a snort into her champagne flute. “You know, they want to put her on their lap and spin her around!”
I rolled my eyes. “They certainly don’t want you to jump in the freezing-cold water and rescue them in front of their friends and relatives.”
“You have to tell me more about your watery prince of the deep!”
“Merman? Hopefully he’ll drown the next time he’s out there.”
“It was a big moment,” Emma said, digging into the cardboard box that she used as a coffee table. “He could be your prince come to rescue you.”
“Doubtful.”
“Was it big?” she asked, eyes wide.
I gave her a questioning look.
She pulled an entire chocolate cake out of her makeshift coffee table.
“You know, his shark fin.” She pointed down to her crotch area.
“I didn’t cop a feel! Besides, it was freezing cold.”
“That’s how you know if he’s really packing or not. You should stalk him and then just randomly fling yourself in his path. Maybe he’s rich!” she said in excitement.
I stood up to take the pasta out of the oven. “I don’t think wealthy men go scuba diving early in the morning.”
“Yeah, they do. That’s eccentric rich.” She cut a slice of cake for her and then one for me. “If he is, then you have to pretend to get hit by his limo, and then he’ll take you back to his penthouse, and you’ll live happily ever after. Even if he doesn’t like you, at the very least you could still get a payout.”
“Fairy-tale endings do not happen for large and tall girls,” I said matter-of-factly. “We do our own rescuing.”
Emma made an exaggerated pout. “That’s not a good attitude to have at the speed-dating event.”
“No, Emma.”
“You have to!” she cried “It’s a new year! Your resolution can be dating and getting back out there! You never had fun in high school—your parents never allowed you to do any extracurriculars, let alone date, because you had to take care of your brothers. This is your time to shine!”
“I’m fifteen years behind everyone else.”
“So now we’re playing catch-up!” Emma insisted.
“No one is going to want to date me. I’m too tall.”
“Except…” Emma was gleeful as she pulled out a flyer. “I found you a dating event for tall people! You’ll fit right in!”
I took the flyer from her. In spite of myself, I was intrigued. During high school and community college, I had always been jealous of the girls who always had a steady stream of boyfriends to choose from. They did fun things like go to the mall and hang out with friends, while I had to go straight home after class to take care of my brothers.
“Maybe I could actually find a boyfriend there,” I said begrudgingly.
“Yesssss,” Emma said, bumping my fist. “Now eat your mac ‘n’ cheese, then we’re going to find something for you to wear.”
“Am I at the right event?” I asked the woman at the table at the entrance to the hipster bar in Manhattan.
“You here for the tall-dating event?” she chirped then looked up at me, craning her neck. “Wow! You are really tall!”
“I thought that was the point.” I tried not to sound annoyed as I looked around. I was the tallest girl there by quite a lot.
The hostess giggled. “This is actually an event meant for tall men,” she clarified. “Not women.”
“Oh.” Feeling embarrassed, I fidgeted with my purse strap.
“But you can totally stay!” she said cheerfully, handing me my name tag. “Usually, all our tall girls are models and are obviously not going to come to a silly, little dating event!” The hostess handed me two drink tickets. “Have fun, and good luck!”
I almost wish she had told me to leave, I decided as I headed over to the bar to order a drink. Then I went to awkwardly wait for my drink near a petite girl flanked by two investment-banker types.
“Wow, you can really drink for someone your size,” one guy said, obviously flirting with the girl. She let out a braying laugh, eating it up.
“I’m small, but I can drink like a fish and eat like a horse! Hahaha!”
Ahahahaha!!! Barf.
I know, I know. I sounded like a bitch, but honestly you could always tell when a short girl was in the room because she would always, always, without fail, make guys spend ten minutes guessing her height, then insist that the one-half inch mattered.
“Oh, let’s play a game,” Short Girl said, clapping her hands. “You guess my height, and then I’ll guess yours!”
Here we go.
“Five even?” the investment bro with the red tie asked.
“Cloooseee!” Short Girl said, taking another sip of her drink.
I desperately wanted mine.
“Five one?” the blue-tied investment bro asked.
“Nope! Too high!” she said and gave a snorting laugh.
I shifted my weight.
The bartender set my drink on the counter. He gave me a frightened look when I went to pick it up.
“Thanks,” I told him and handed him a dollar bill for a tip.
He gingerly took it from me.
“Then I guess six one!” Short Girl said to one of the investment bros as I walked past.
“You got it, girl!” he said happily.
I paused.
Just let it go.
But I was annoyed. I was annoyed at the merman. I was annoyed at the speed date. I was annoyed that the bartender had not put enough alcohol in my drink.
“He’s not six one,” I said, interrupting their little height jerk-off session.
“The hell?” Investment Bro yelled.
I turned. “You’re not six one. I’m six feet tall, and you’re shorter than me.”
“You’re wearing heels,” he blustered.
“I assure you, I am not. I never wear heels.” I gave him a toothy smile. “Men find it intimidating.”
4
Greg
I hate dating. I hate the ritual of it, the fake getting-to-know-you peacocking, the personality-less bars, the bland overpriced drinks. I never dated. In fact, I had sworn I wasn’t ever going to marry. My father was on wife number eleven or twelve by now and was actively looking for the next one if rumors were correct. I had promised myself when I escaped the cult that I was not going to end up like him. And a big part of that promise was avoiding the endless courting rituals Leif Svensson loved so much.
“Hi!” The girl at the front desk looked up at me, eyes sparkling. “You might win the prize tonight!”
“Excuse me?” I said in a clipped tone.
The hostess giggled. Did she think I was flirting with her? I resisted the urge to make a cutting remark. I had eyes on my mark. I couldn’t get thrown out before I had a chance to talk to Martin Shaw.
“There’s a prize for the tallest guy here,” she said with another giggle. “You’re super tall; how tall are you?”
“Six five,” I replied, trying to keep the annoyance out of my voice. I needed to get to Shaw.
“You’re in the running.” She held out two drink tickets. “Have fun!”
I pocketed them. They could be used for bribes if need be.
Shaw was across the room with his brother. I pushed my way through the crowd, ignoring the women who tugged at my bespoke suit, trying to entice me to talk to them.
I would need to have the suit dry-cleaned after this endeavor. This bar smelled like, well, a bar.
Shaw and his brother didn’t seem all that happy to be there. They were angrily arguing with a tall woman with platinum-white hair.
“It’s not my fault that you’ve been able to get away with lying for so long,” she was saying, arms crossed.
Fuck. It was that girl—the crazy one from the river. Why the fuck was she here?
“Honestly? It’s pathetic,” she said.
“You’re pathetic!” Martin’s brother yelled at her. “You just get off on making men feel bad and laughing at them.”
“Let’s go, Todd!” Martin yanked his brother back then turned and left.
Fuck.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” I snarled at the tall woman. Her name tag read BELLE.
“Oh, did I insult a friend of yours?” she asked in a mocking tone.
“Why are you always in my business?” I snapped.
“Your business? I don’t even know who you are.” She glanced at my face then gazed into my eyes. Hers were an intense shade of blue, like the clear blue sky over a fresh snow.
“Oh my god! It’s the merman prince!”
“Excuse me?”
She tamped down a smirk.
“I am not a mermaid man,” I said, furious. “I am Greg Svensson of Svensson Investment with hundreds of billions under management. Don’t you ever call me that again.”
“Frog prince has an attitude,” she said, mouth quirking.
“Or that.” I snarled. I couldn’t believe this woman. The Shaw account was worth twenty billion dollars, and she had quite possibly just lost it for me.
I took a breath. Calm down. It’s not over yet.
“Why are you even here?”
“Same as you,” she said.
Fuck, is she here after the Shaw contract?
But Belle took a sip of a toxic-looking blue drink that made me want to gag. “I’m here looking for a date.”
Fuck dating.
“Don’t turn up your nose,” she said sarcastically. “This place is filled with the type of women you want.”
“You have no idea what type of woman I want,” I retorted.
“Please.” She snorted. “You rich guys are all the same. You want a petite, slightly ditzy woman who is smart enough to be impressed when you use big, important investing terms like maturity distribution but will still laugh to her friends over drinks that she doesn’t have a clue what her boyfriend does all day and doesn’t care as long as he makes money.” She ended her tirade with one hand under her chin in a mocking Betty Boop gesture.
“That’s not what I want in a woman.”
“Of course it is.” Belle downed the rest of the blue drink. “And I’ll tell you why. It’s because deep down,” she pointed at me with the hand holding the glass, “deep down you and all the men like you are weirdos with mommy issues.”
That hurt. My mom had abandoned me and my brothers when we were kids, leaving us to the violent whims of my father.
Fuck Belle. She doesn’t know me.
“And all women like you,” I spat back, “have daddy issues. You’ve been spoiled your whole life. I bet your dad bought you whatever you wanted, and now you’re trying to find some idiot who will take over your bills.”
“Fuck you. I rescued you yesterday.”
“No, you didn’t!” I practically shouted. “You literally did not.”
Before I could make an acerbic retort, something tugged on my sleeve. I looked down.
“Oh my gooddd! You’re, like, so tall!” a short girl squealed.
I looked back up at Belle.
She made a ribbit noise then blew me a kiss.
5
Belle
I should have known Greg was a Svensson. Multiple billions and multiple brothers—they were all the by-products of a polygamist doomsday cult. Their whole family had been in the tabloids lately. I had my own issues. I didn’t need to add some asshat’s emotional baggage to my load.
“Did you meet your Prince Charming?” Dana Holbrook asked me, one eyebrow raised, when I sat with her and Emma at a rickety café table the next morning.
“Just a frog prince.”
Emma let out a squeal then clapped a hand over her mouth. “You saw him? Your king of the shadow realm?”
“He’s not a king, just a fuckwit Svensson.”
“Yes, but he’s a billionaire fuckwit, which is even better than a merman king! Oh my god,” Emma said, batting at my arm. “Use your super-duper hacking skills to find out where he lives, and then we’ll stalk him, and you can jump in front of his car and live happily ever after.”
Dana made a confused face. “I don’t think that’s how any of that works.”
“It totally is!” Emma insisted.
“I’m not dating him,” I argued. “I despise him. And he hates me.”
“He’s a Svensson brother,” Dana said with an elegant shrug. “They’re high-strung and histrionic.”
“You’re biased. You’re a Holbrook,” Emma said, taking a bite of her enormous cinnamon roll. “Your families hate each other.”
“The Svenssons hate us,” Dana said calmly. “We barely remember they exist.”
“So no other tall men were there?”
“I didn’t really stay to talk to any of them,” I admitted. “I sort of insulted one guy, then I definitely insulted Greg. After that, all the other guys gave me a wide berth.”
“Maybe group dates aren’t your thing,” Emma said. “Maybe you need to do some one-on-one dates. I started a Tinder profile for you.” My friend wiped her hands and took out her laptop.
“I don’t have time for dating. I need to either find a job or work on starting a company.”
“We will get our investment firm off the ground,” Dana promised. “That’s why we’re having the meeting today. Emma, you worked on Wall Street—”
“Yeah, before I got fired,” she muttered, “unfairly because of my cheating, backstabbing ex.”
Dana patted her hand. “That’s why we are starting our own firm.”
“I took a look at our assets,” Emma said. “We really need to pull in more investors. We especially need a big client. The amount of cash we have right now is, in the eyes of Wall Street, basically nothing. Our current assets are as much money as those finance guys make just moving money around every hour.”
“Top priority is to be on the lookout for more investors, ladies,” Dana said.
“But first,” Emma said, “we need to make Belle’s Tinder profile!”
“Step aside,” Dana said as Emma brought up a half-done Tinder profile on her laptop. “I work in media and advertising. This is my wheelhouse.”
“Why is it about me?” I complained while Dana and Emma argued about what to put down for my hobbies. “Dana, why don’t you go on Tinder?”
“My standards are too high for Tinder,” she said. “Now Emma, we cannot use that picture of Belle. She looks like a hobgoblin.”
