When I finally turned away from the photo, I noticed Avery was already changed and sitting on his bed, watching me. His face was back to that neutral expression he’d worn when I’d first arrived, the only difference now was his fingers tightly gripping his pant leg.
I pulled in a slow breath. Might as well bite the bullet and get it over with. “We need to talk.”
He merely nodded.
Silence fell over us.
Apparently, neither of us wanted to go first with popping the bubble that was the elephant in the room. This was the part I hated about being the more upfront one out of the two of us. I hated confrontation, but when it came to bringing up issues, I was usually the one that had to get the ball rolling.
“So—”
“Were you two out on a date?” he asked.
My brows knitted together. “At the festival?”
He nodded again. “You mentioned before your sister’s friend set you two up. Was that your first date?”
“Uh...” Folding my arms around myself, I let my body weight shift to my right foot, planting it firmly against the carpet. “You could say that.”
He went quiet for a moment, a small crease forming between his brows. “What does that mean? He harassing you for something else?”
“What? No. Nothing like that.”
How did I even go about explaining this without sounding like a total failure in the dating world?
“We were... the friend of my sister’s is actually a matchmaker. That’s how Max and I got connected. My sister is determined to find me the ‘perfect guy’ to bring to her wedding.”
“I see...”
My stomach churned again.
Why the hell was he so hard to read?
I used to be able to predict his every move—the very sentence that would next come barreling out of his mouth. This man in front of me was a book locked tightly with some kind of special key that I didn’t even know the shape of, let alone where to find it.
It made for a confusing scenario, one where I was reading way too much into everything with no context clues to back anything up.
Avery rolled off of the bed and onto his feet. His strides were slow as he headed for me, a predatory sway to him.
I stayed rooted to my spot, too scared to move a single inch and break whatever tension was building between us.
“And is he?” he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
My heart stuttered in my chest. “Is he what?”
Avery leaned close, his breath fanning across my face. “The perfect guy for you.”
“I...”
How was I supposed to answer that?
I darted my tongue out to wet my bottom lip, a motion that Avery’s gaze darted down to track before leveling with mine again. Something in his eyes shifted then, the uptick in his breathing catching me by surprise.
“I can’t get it out of my head, Bran,” he mumbled.
My throat felt parched. “Get what?”
“This.” He grabbed at my hips, shoving me back against the wall to pin me there. A small gasp left me, my hands coming out to flatten against his chest.
