“No offense, but you have a tendency to take the reins on things like that. If I’m being honest, you have a tendency to take the reins on most things,” he says. I stop sucking on my straw to stir my thick shake.
“How so?” I ask, and Gavin shakes his head.
“This feels like a trap,” he chuckles.
“No trap. I want to know,” Josie says. “You have no chill.”
“Josie knows you well,” he says, and I frown.
“Well, I like to think that’s not always true.”
“Yeah?” he asks, raising his voice to compete with the music. There’s a live band on stage that is playing covers of everything from Matchbox Twenty to Green Day. Suddenly he pushes up from his seat and holds out a hand.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“Dance with me,” he says.
“Here?” I ask, my heart speeding up in my chest. “Now?”
“No, at the wedding in a couple of weeks,” he says, clasping and unclasping his hand a couple times impatiently. “Come on. It’s just dancing. It’s a very chill thing to do.”
I’m not much of a dancer, but saying no would definitely not be chill. So I put my napkin on the table and take Gavin’s hand.
“I have to warn you,” I tell him. “I wasn’t a party-girl in college and didn’t go clubbing much. The only dance I think I ever formally learned was the lindy hop. Even when I do that one, I have two left feet.”
“Lucky for you, I have two right feet,” he teases.
He pulls me to the floor where a few other couples are dancing to something by Hootie and the Blowfish, and we fall into step in a sort of casual swing. I have no idea what I am doing, but Gavin seems to. He’s good at leading, and after a minute or two, I catch on and find I’m actually not bad.
“There you go,” he says, spinning me. I shriek and laugh, and Gavin smiles, pulling me against his chest. He smells like oranges and cinnamon, and his eyes are alive and focused on me. As the song ends, he lowers me into a quick dip before pulling me back into his arms again. The room claps and cheers for the band, and we hug.
“These guys are really great,” he says as we watch the band kick into another song.
“Yeah, they’d be great at the wedding,” I agree.
“Totally,” he says, and we both stop and look at each other. “Holy shit. Did we just agree on something?” he asks.
“Hiring this band for the wedding?” I ask.
“Yes!”
“I think we did,” I laugh.
Then he laughs too and kisses me. It’s sudden and unexpected and public, and I don’t even care. Josie may have been wrong about one thing, but she might have been right about another.
Chapter 21
Gavin
“This is amazing,”Charlotte exclaims from the passenger seat of my truck. “I have to text Josie.”
“Text her what?” I ask.
“That we agreed on something! We made a decision about a wedding detail without arguing. And it’s something I don’t hate!” she says as her fingers tap out a message on her phone.
“Is it really that hard to believe?” I ask.
“Are you kidding?” she asks, while still focusing on the screen. “Considering our history, I think it’s a freaking miracle. Like holy smokes!”
