“The face you’re making right now.”
I laugh and look down. “Is it obvious?”
“You clearly hate it. Like someone is stomping on your toes.”
“Ugh, okay, I’m trying at least.”
“I know. I’m glad you’re here.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Me too.”
We fall into the booth and everyone starts talking again. I sip my drink and do my best to pretend like I don’t hate the taste of vodka. Paul tells a story from his days doing lighting for erectile dysfunction commercials, which gets a big laugh from everyone. Jackson meanwhile sits close to me and laughs along with everyone else, but I keep catching the looks he’s giving me.
“You know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you dressed like this,” he says to me.
“Really?” I ask him.
“Really. You were a little more, uh, casual in high school.”
I laugh and bump his arm with my shoulder. “I had great fashion sense back then.”
“Nah,” he says, grinning. “Not at all. But nobody did.”
“That’s true. I seem to recall you wearing sweatpants to school.”
“Hey,” he says, laughing. “I was an athlete.”
“Sure. You were also a slob.”
“Glad to see you’re all grown up at least,” he says, eyeing my body. Normally I might feel self-conscious, but right now I don’t mind.
“You’re all grown up yourself, you know,” I say, and I mean it. He looks fantastic in an expensively tailored suit, probably bespoke. It fits him like a glove, accentuating his every perfect muscle, and it makes him look fancy and in control.
I hate to admit it to myself, but he looks fantastic. “Of course I look great,” he says in my ear. “Hey, let’s go dance.”
I raise an eyebrow at him. “Seriously? You dance?”
“Of course I do,” he says, laughing. “Girl, I’ll show you just how good of a dancer a Navy SEAL can be.”
I laugh as he pulls me up from the seat and tugs me out toward the dance floor. I don’t know what I’m doing but I feel so good as I follow him out there. We start to dance together, and although I feel a little self-conscious at first, at least Jackson wasn’t lying.
He’s a good dancer. He moves his hips and pulls me toward him, gliding along my body, and I fall into his rhythm. Soon, we’re dancing close to each other, eyes locked as one song turns into two. We sway and move to the music, keeping pace with everyone around us, although it feels like we’re alone in the world.
“Remember this?” he says in my ear. “Sophomore year.”
I can’t help but smile to myself. “We danced for hours,” I say to him.
“Yeah, we did. You looked amazing. Red dress.”
I laugh again, remembering that dress. I pull him closer to reach his ear. “Your suit was too big.”
He grins at me. “It was my dad’s.”
“Of course it was.”
We laugh together, and he tips his head closer to me. He grabs my waist and pulls me against him. I can feel his hard body pressed against mine and my heart is racing through my skin, threatening to make me freaking pass out.
I tip my chin up toward him, not thinking about it at all. His lips are so close to mine, and I know he’s going to kiss me. God, I haven’t tasted that kiss in so damn long. I can remember the last time, it was just like any other day. I didn’t know it was the last time back then. Sometimes I wish I had known, so that I could have savored it.
Now though, I have a second chance. I can taste him again, feel the way it used to feel. I remember kissing him was like nothing I’ve ever felt before. It made me alive, made everything seem so much better.
He left me, he broke my heart, but he’s here now. And I want to taste him so badly.
“Hey, you!”
Jackson turns away from me. Holly Hart appears next to him and they hug quickly in greeting. She waves to me and says something to him.
He frowns at me and says something to her. She waves and heads off back toward the table, but the moment is gone.
I don’t know what I was thinking. He turns back toward me, but I step away. “Sorry,” I say to him, shaking my head.
“Tara, hold on.”
But I’m already turning and walking away from him as fast as I can. I don’t want to run and I’m definitely not going to cry.
I don’t know what I was thinking. I can’t just let him back into my life like this. He broke my heart. I’m not ready to trust him, not yet. Seeing Holly just made me realize how much I still don’t know about him.
Maybe he makes me feel like my old self, but that girl is gone. I’m a different person, and so is he. I can’t just fall back into old habits.