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“Especially tonight.”

His hand presses a fraction more firmly against my back, drawing me close enough that the front of his jacket brushes my dress.

My breath catches.

His eyes drop to my mouth, and suddenly I’m aware of everything. The warmth of him. The clean line of his jaw. The faint scent of his cologne. My fingers have somehow found the lapel of his jacket.

I smooth the fabric beneath the weak pretense that it needs fixing.

“You look acceptable too,” I say.

“Acceptable?” He raises a brow.

“The tailoring is doing a lot of work.”

He laughs softly. His gaze stays on mine.

“Thank you,” he says again. “Really.”

I look away for half a second, toward the lights spilling from the ballroom.

“You’re welcome.”

When I look back, he’s still watching me.

“This is getting dangerously earnest,” I tell him.

“Terrifying, isn’t it?”

“Deeply.”

He steps back, and the loss of his hand is immediate and irritating.

Then he holds it out to me.

“Come on, Doc. Let’s get you back to action to watch another cardiologist look at you like he wants to marry you.”

I place my hand in his.

“Please. Martin couldn’t handle me.”

“No,” Cal says, threading his fingers through mine. “I’m starting to think nobody can.”

He doesn’t let go for the rest of the evening.

Chapter Nineteen

Cal

Istep outside and pull out my phone, because something has been crawling under my skin all night.

The boys.

Maybe it’s the champagne making me sentimental. Maybe I just fucking miss them. Either way, I can feel the distance growing between us, one unanswered message at a time.

They’re losing faith in the plan. Worse, they might be losing faith in me.

The group chat used to be the first thing I checked in the morning and the last thing I read before bed. Now there’s a three-day-old meme from Luca with two half-assed reactions beneath it and a message from Harrison that says yeah, good call in response to something Eli suggested.