“What?” Sam jumped up and crossed the room. He opened the swag bag that was still on the floor near the door. He searched through it and sure enough his Oscar statue wasn’t in there. But there was a small, see-through makeup bag with some mints, lip gloss, and the extra condoms they hadn’t used the night before.

“Shit. She must have taken it by accident.”

“Who?”

“Uh—no one. Just—”

Walls slapped the table, then pointed right at Sam’s chest. “I knew you went home with that chick last night!”

“What chick? I don’t know what you’re talking about?”

“Uh, the thick girl with the braids, all up like this,” Walls said, gesturing above his head in a swirling motion. “Sparkly jumpsuit thing. I saw you watch her Milly Rock back from the bathroom.”

“Oh, her! It wasn’t like that.”

“What was it like?”

“Listen. She’s an old friend. We just wanted to catch up and it was loud in there. Couldn’t hear my own damn thoughts.”

“Old friend, huh? From Charming.”

“Yeah, sure. That sounds about right.”

“You’re a dog, man. I hope you wrapped it up.”

“I did. She came prepared.” Sam’s dates for the evening had been his elderly grandmother and his bi-flexible cousin. The last thing that had been on his mind was whether he would end the night with someone in his bed. Lesson learned. Always come prepared, no matter what.

“But for real, who was she?” Walls said as he walked toward the bed. He looked at the sheets for a moment, then headed for the love seat on the other side of the room. “I saw her talking to Kata for a sec, but the rest of the night she was crushing it on the dance floor. Big girl had moves,” he laughed. He wasn’t lying either. His mystery woman had some serious moves and some serious curves. Sam almost got hard thinking about it. Instead he cringed.

“I didn’t get her name.”

“Man, what?!”

“Yeah, yeah, I know.” It wasn’t like Sam to pull off the anonymous run-in. He was in his prime, but he’d always been a relationship guy. He wasn’t ashamed of that fact. He was also fiercely private. He never stopped Walls from doing his thing, but his buddy knew when he joked about going out and using the Pleasant name to pick up girls, Sam wasn’t really into it. He wasn’t shy like Jesse, and he wasn’t the former lady killer his brother Zach pretended not to be before he finally got back with his childhood sweetheart. He fell somewhere in the middle. He needed to get to know someone, establish a little something before he fell into bed with her. Also, falling into bed with random people in his line of work wasn’t the best idea.