Stuff like this never happened to her. Not the stuck-in-the-elevator thing—her life was full of minor crises like that. No, it was being stuck in an elevator with a hot guy that was the unusual part. She was always the one sitting on an airplane next to a chatty toddler, or a knitting grandma, or a bored college student; never a hot guy to be found.
After about a minute of him saying, “Okay . . . okay,” in progressively tenser tones, he hung up the phone.
“Well . . .” He paused and smiled at her. “Wait, I don’t even know your name, my new elevator friend.”
“Alexa, and you, Genie?”
“Drew. Nice to meet you, Alexa.”
“Drew, it’s a pleasure, but . . .”
“Right, these circumstances are not ideal. So, the bad news is that there’s a power outage in the whole hotel.”
Her phone lit up just then with a text from Olivia.
My power went out. Where are you??
“Ahhh, yes, I was just alerted to that.” Alexa held her phone up before she texted Olivia back.
Whole hotel, I’m stuck in the elevator.
“At least that means they were telling the truth,” Drew said. “The good news, or so they tell me, is that they have generators, so the elevators should start moving shortly.”
She slid down to the floor, placing her purse gently beside her. It would be a tragedy to break that champagne bottle.
“We might as well wait in comfort,” she said. Her favorite red heels were relatively comfortable for the first five hours, but she’d been wearing them for nine plus.
He shrugged off his leather jacket, gifting her a glimpse of his stomach muscles as his gray T-shirt shifted. Mmmm. Hot, funny guy who occasionally flashed his abs. Was it her birthday?
“So, are you a guest here, Drew? Where are you coming from?” she asked him so she wouldn’t stare.
“Just flew in from L.A. And you?” He sat down next to her.
“Oh, I live here. Well, over in Berkeley, anyway. I’m just in the hotel visiting someone.”
He glanced at her phone, her shoes, and back up at her.
“A pretty special someone, with those shoes on, and all of that smiling you were doing when you didn’t even notice someone else got on the elevator with you.”
“A very special someone,” she said, and his grin got wider. “Wait, no, not that kind of special someone! My older sister! She’s in town from New York for work.”
Yep, this was how she usually acted around hot guys. Scared to make eye contact, stared at his abs, said something awkward.
“Ahhhh.” He laughed. “Okay, yes, I did think it was that kind of special someone. Do you two have a hot night in the city planned?”
She crossed her legs and adjusted her black wrap dress so she didn’t accidentally flash her underwear at this dude on top of everything else.
“Sort of. We’re celebrating. She just made partner at her law firm!” Alexa smiled down at her purse full of treats before looking back up at him. Not even cheese could compete with this dude.
He narrowed his eyes at her. Light brown eyes, with a really dark rim around them. His eyes were so pretty that she looked away again. Thank God her brown skin meant her cheeks couldn’t get too pink, otherwise he’d be able to see them glow in the dark.
“Okay, I’m happy for your sister, but what is in that bag? You keep looking at it like it holds the Holy Grail.”
She laughed.
“Just champagne and a few snacks. The plan is to drink the champagne here and then go out to dinner . . . Well, that was the plan, but we’ll see how long we’re stuck in this elevator.”
Drew scooted closer to her and looked in her purse. Alexa pushed it toward him, so he could see better in the dim light. She never let people poke around in her purse, but hey, this was a cute guy and a weird situation.
“Okay good, we have sustenance if we’re stuck here for hours. Champagne is so convenient because no corkscrew is needed, and then we’ve got . . . Oh, look at that, cheese and crackers, the perfect stuck-in-an-elevator snack.”
She leaned back against the wood-paneled wall.
“Have you been stuck in an elevator before with a variety of snacks and been able to determine which ones are best for this situation?” she asked.
“No, but come on, cheese and crackers are obviously the best possible option here. First of all, you had the foresight to bring a soft cheese, so we won’t need a knife to cut it; we can just use the crackers to pull off bits and spread it with our fingers. And second, have you ever not enjoyed cheese and crackers? Ever not thought, ‘Oh boy, these cheese and crackers are exactly what I need right now’?”
She considered for a moment.
“Stop, no, stop even thinking about it,” he said. “You know the answer is no. Cheese and crackers are objectively the perfect snack.”
She laughed and pried his fingers away from the box of crackers.
“Okay, fine, you’re right. But you didn’t manage to talk me into sharing Olivia’s you-made-partner cheese and crackers with you, you know.”
He stretched his legs out along the floor and took another glance into her purse.