“Ah, I see. I’m a little older than you guys. My friends tease me about being a cougar because Joe is only thirty-two.” Her mouth turned down in an exaggerated frown. “I was hoping you’d give me some intel on what they were like.”
I smiled around my glass as I took a sip.
“Most of my friends crushed hard on Joe.”
“I could see that.” She nodded with a snicker. “I crushed on him pretty hard when I first met him, too.” A wide smile stretched her lips. “I picture him as this understated and aloof hunk full of swagger. Am I right?”
“Mostly.” We shared a laugh. “Joe was always nice, though. He didn’t let the swagger go to his head.”
She leaned in closer. “So, if your friends crushed on Joe, did you crush on Dominic?”
My cheeks heated a little. “Maybe.” A smile danced across my lips remembering how he’d hardly known who I was, but my skin would prickle with goosebumps when I passed him in the hallways. He was always in the midst of a large group of friends, a constant center of attention.
Even back then, he’d had me.
“He was as you’d expect. Making everyone laugh and being a general pain in the ass.”
“Why does that sound like you’re talking about me?”
I turned to find Dominic behind me, as if he’d appeared out of thin air.
He nodded toward my wrap. “Came back for more croutons?”
We’d been meeting on an almost daily basis going over estimates and timelines and, to my surprise, we shed the tension between us enough to be friends, or at least friendly. The lines still blurred from time to time, the bursts of familiarity between us still messing with my head, but bringing up old times wasn’t always so painful. At times, it was even nice. Sometimes, too nice.
He wore a tank top and sweat shorts, the tattoo on his bicep in full view. We weren’t together and hadn’t been for a long time, but, unfortunately for me, he’d always affect me somehow. The view of all that bronze skin over toned muscle affected me a whole lot.
My gaze caught his after my eyes lingered on the ink on his arm. I spotted his mother’s name surrounded by angel wings.
“Think she’d like it or be pissed at me?” he asked, crinkling his nose at me while tilting his chin down toward his arm.
His hopeful smile drained a little air from my lungs.
“I think she’d give you a dirty look when she first saw it but then would check to make sure her name was spelled correctly.” The light in his eyes as his smile grew triggered a lump in the back of my throat. “She’d love it,” I croaked out.
Caterina cleared her throat, breaking the trance we’d fallen into.
“Thea was just spilling a little tea about you guys in high school.”
His shoulders shook with a chuckle. “There isn’t much to tell. Sorry if she’s disappointing you.”
“So wait, if you weren’t friends in high school, how did you guys end up…” She motioned back and forth between us with her finger.
I slipped a glance toward Dominic, both of us wearing the same smirk. The question should have triggered tension between us, but even in the darkest times, this was one of the few memories of us that still made me smile.
“One night, my friends and I ended up in the same bar in Manhattan as Joe and Dominic and all of their friends.” I inhaled, heat creeping up my cheeks as my skin prickled under Dominic’s stare. “Dominic came up to my table and asked if I was hurt.”
Caterina’s brow furrowed. “If you were hurt?”
“From when I fell out of heaven. Because I looked too beautiful to not be an angel.”
She fell back in her seat. “Stop it. You really said that?”
He replied with a silent, slow nod, his lips twitching.
She gaped at Dominic before she looked back over at me. “What did you say?”
“I asked him if he hit his head.” I peered back at Dominic, his eyes still on me as his lips lifted into a half smile. “He didn’t realize at first that he made a total ass of himself in front of Thea Kelly from high school, who used to live just a few blocks away in the same neighborhood.”
