His face went from neutral when I opened the door to anger and concerned.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, not waiting for me to invite him in, putting his hand on my stomach and pushing me back inside and closing the door behind him before I even had a chance to realize my mistake.
“You were crying. What happened?”
Well, crap. There went my chance of covering up the red splotchiness on my face.
His hands went to cup my face as he tilted my head up. “Iris, talk to me. What’s wrong?”
“I heard a noise while I was getting ready and freaked out,” I told him, my body slumping in embarrassed defeat. “It was just the tree branch by my bedroom window, but I thought it was someone breaking in, and I panicked.”
He pulled me in closer to his body. Feeling his warmth and scent wrap around me made me feel safe, and I just let everything pour out of me.
“Once I realized what it was, I started crying because I hate being that dumb, scared person who is afraid of their own shadow. That made me even more emotional, and I just started freaking out more because I don’t want to move apartments, but I feel weird about my space being violated.”
“You can stay with me tonight,” he said calmly, his fingers stroking my face softly.
“Hector, I love your place—I do—but I don’t want to be scared of my own place. I need to be able to stay here. I don’t want this person to take that away from me.”
I sighed again. Both my emotions and my pride felt like they had taken a beating.
“I get that, sweetheart,” he said softly. “I don’t have Sarge with me, and I can’t leave him all night. Let’s stay at my place tonight, and then I’ll bring him over tomorrow after work, and I’ll stay here on the couch. We’ll ease you back into your place until you aren’t scared anymore.”
This man.
“Pack a bag, and we’ll go to dinner,” he said.
“Okay,” I answered, wiping underneath my eyes. “Can I have another five minutes to fix my makeup?”
“Yeah, but you don’t need it,” he said softly and then kissed my forehead.
I sighed and leaned forward to rest my head on his chest. As I wrapped my arms around him, I whispered, “Thanks.”
Not giving him a chance to respond, I turned and started to walk back to my bathroom when he spoke again.
“Iris,” he called out, and I looked back at him. “I really like that dress,” he said with a small grin, which made me smile, knowing I had made the right call with this outfit.
Hector took me to a really nice Italian restaurant. We sat in a cozy half-circle booth, which allowed us to sit next to each other but at an angle so we didn’t have to turn our bodies fully to see each other during conversation.
The restaurant had soft lighting all around, and a blend of Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, and Sammy Davis Jr. played in the background.
“You okay with this place?” Hector asked. “I didn’t think to check to see if you liked Italian food.”
See—super sweet and just didn’t realize it.
“Yes, I love Italian food,” I responded as a slow grin took over his face.
God, he was already attractive, but when he made thatslow, sexy smile, parts of my brain short-circuited. Unfortunately for me, it short-circuited the part of my brain that regulated speech, because it rendered me incapable of saying anything intelligent for the next sixty seconds. Of course, this happened to be when the waiter came up.
“Could I interest you folks in some wine?” he asked, and Hector looked at me expectantly.
In my defense, my brain was not working fully, so I blurted out the only thing that came to mind.
“I like wine. Italy has one of the best climates for wine, thanks to its sunny, Mediterranean climate.”
See, this is what happened when I got nervous. I started to spit out random facts—usually weather or climate related because that was what my brain knew best. But it was also awkward because, most of the time, no one asked for these facts…or cared.
Taking pity on me, Hector ordered a glass of wine and a water for each of us before the waiter walked away.
