Page 2 of Those Heartbreak Scars

After a while the alcohol and the movement loosen my mood. All my problems… everything I’m stressing about will be there when I get home, but for tonight I’m all about limoncello cocktails and having fun with my friend. “You were so right. This is what we needed.”

“I know.” Her gaze locks on something or someone over my shoulder. Her lips part and her teeth sink into the bottom one.

For the next few minutes she flirts over my shoulder like it’s an Olympic sport, before eventually she says, “Would you forgive me for dragging you off the dance floor for a minute?”

I laugh. “You see something you like?”

“Like. Want.” She practically purrs, leaning in like we’re sharing the best kind of secret. “He keeps making eyes at me. The least I can do is go say hello and tell him to look elsewhere.”

“Absolutely.” I turn around and head in the direction she was looking, weaving between groups of dancers until we’re out of the throng and can snake our way around. “Which one?”

“Him.” She points over my shoulder, and I follow the direction to a man with brown hair who seems to be searching the crowd like he’s lost someone.

“No way.” I blink at my best friend Indy’s older brother EJ, like doing so will clear the familiarity and prove the guy I’m looking at is a stranger. It’s only been a couple of months, hasn’t it? But it feels like forever. What is he doing here? Thousands of miles from home. “This is unexpected.”

“Wait. You know him?” Dove wraps both hands around my upper arm and tugs on it excitedly. “You can introduce me.”

“I… uh…”

EJ’s cinnamon-colored gaze catches with mine and flares, then slides temporarily to the girl beside me before returning. His lips turn up as he moves from his position and starts striding toward us.

EJ, Indy, and I grew up together, and though he’s older than me and Indy by a handful of years, he’s always treated me less like a cousin and more like another pain in the ass sister.

“This is so weird…” I turn to Dove. Indy never mentioned her brother was taking a vacation. Well, not since he went with herand her husband Theo on a bucket list trip to Japan. “But yes, I can introduce you. He’s my cousin.”

“I did not see that coming,” Dove says. “Perhaps it’s best if—”

“Aren’t you supposed to be in Cambridge?” EJ asks me, swooping in for a friendly hug. “Your parents know you’re skipping school?”

“Very funny.” What is it about older brothers, including pseudo ones, that makes a girl want to roll her eyes so hard? “Shouldn’t you be arguing with someone in Chicago? I thought you hated flying.”

“Yes, well, you have enough of these…” he lifts a short, fat glass of a dark colored spirit up between us and swallows the contents. “And you don’t notice when your feet leave the ground.”

“So true.” Dove sighs next to me like EJ’s half-drunken ramblings are Yoda level utterances of wisdom.

His gaze settles on her with a keen amount of interest and an easy smile. “So who is your friend?”

“Dove.” She slips her hand into his when he offers it and gravitates into his personal space like she literally can’t do anything else.

“Just the one name?” he asks.

“Uh-huh.” She continues to shake his hand in slow-motion.

“Like Prince or Bono,” he says.

“Or Beyonce,” she adds.

“Nice.” His smile grows wider. “Edward James, but you can call me EJ.”

Wild horses couldn’t break the connection between them. Which is weird for Dove. She likes the attention she getsin crowds. Men flock to her, their tongues hanging out of their heads. Normally, though, they’re the ones feeling the connection, while she’s just in it for the fun. As soon as there is potential to move to one-on-one interactions, she retires from socializing.

This seems different. This feels like it could actually go somewhere. Like back to a hotel room with the way they’re undressing each other with their eyes.

Thankfully we’ve sworn off men for the night. I don’t know how I feel about my brother from another mother wanting to dick down my flatmate at first sight.

“I got you another drink.” A familiar masculine voice hits my ears as an arm—the wrist wrapped in an Oris watch with an aged brown leather strap—appears over my shoulder holding a second short, fat glass of black liquid. “I think you’re falling behind.”

That voice. That watch. That cologne. Spicy and warm. Sexy and comforting. As familiar as the perfume I carry everywhere I go, I’ve inhaled it so many times. His body heat behind me has my bare shoulders and arms breaking out in goosebumps.

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