I snapped my face to his. “Don’t you dare say your real name.”
“I won’t. I’m Isaac Morrison through and through,” he responded, and I laughed.
“Yes, it suits you.” I smiled at him, and then spotted my mother’s best friend, Denise, frowning at us. My shoulder blades pinched back, and a nervous chill drummed up my neck.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, sipping his drink and scanning the crowd. The tension in my shoulders released as I realized how quickly he read me.
“Nothing—ummm, well, it’s about my ex,” I began, my eyes dropping to the parquet floor and when they landed back on Isaac, he was reaching for me, cupping a hand around my jaw and he leaned down to whisper in my ear.
“So we need to make him crazy jealous?” The breath from his mouth heated the skin below my ear, and goosebumps rose on my flesh. His other hand traveled down my ribcage toward my hip.
I tilted my head back and reluctantly admitted, “He’s not here.”
Isaac grinned, swiping a thumb against the hinge of my jaw. I sensed him preparing to let go, so I quickly added, “But this—I like this.” I cleared my throat, clarifying. “This is believable.”
His hand moved down my neck to my shoulder, and he kissed my forehead. My eyes fell closed. He was so tender, so thoughtful with each of his movements that I felt my heart swooning without permission.
“So, tell me, Anna. Why are we mentioning your ex if he isn’t here? If he’s occupying that pretty little mind of yours, I might start to get jealous,” he whispered before pulling his lips from my ear. The scent of his cologne lingered, making me feel hypnotized.
My gaze floated toward his. “You’d really get jealous?” He wet his lips, but before he could speak, I shook my head out of the clouds and answered. “I mean, it’s not that he’s occupying my mind, per se. It’s just that almost everyone knows about the broken engagement because half of these guests were once invited to my wedding, which didn’t happen.”
Clarity was written in his gaze as soon as I revealed the information, but instead of getting weirded out, he spun me around so my back was to his chest in a protective embrace, nuzzling close. The rough scrape of his stubble against my cheek made me want to kiss him and run my hand against it. Irestrained myself as he spoke, “Ah, who cares? He probably had it coming.”
I smirked up at him. “How do you know he wasn’t the one who called it off?”
Isaac turned me around, his presence nearly swallowing me whole. “Because I’m looking at you, and there is not a man on this earth who wouldn’t beg you not to break his heart.”
I let out a breath of a laugh and fidgeted with the stem of my glass. “Yeah, well, a good portion of this room thinks I let a good one get away, so—”
“Do you think that?”
I stared up at his deep blue eyes, wondering how he asked the right questions that cut straight to the core of the matter. “Are you sure you aren’t a therapist?”
“I’m a teacher, same difference.”
“And a snitch,” I added with a sneer.
“Mandatory reporter,” he corrected with an expression that walked the line between wanting to strangle me and carry me away.
“Same difference.”
“You aren’t answering my question.”
“Which was?”
“Do you think you let a good one get away?”
I drew in a long breath, buying time to come up with an answer. “I think he was a good one. But I think he wasn’t the one for me.”
He nodded as if that settled it. “So everyone else can fuck off. It’s your life, Anna. You’re the one that has to live it.”
These were simple words I had heard over and over from self-help books and tiny squares on Instagram, but that night, coming from his lips, they hit me square in the heart. A slow smile spread over my lips. “I feel like I could kiss you.”
The right side of his mouth pulled slightly, revealing a dimple, and I reached out and brushed my thumb over it. “You should,” he whispered. “It’s the only way people will believe us.”
As I tossed my head back and laughed, I saw Marie gaping at us from the corner of my eye. I averted my eyes quickly, but it was too late. I knew she was heading straight for us.
He licked his lips and nodded. “You’re uncomfortable.”
