Page 16 of Not Quite Perfect

“You could what?”

He dropped his hand from his neck and blew out a breath. “It’s probably a bad idea, but we could head over together?”

He was right, it was averybad idea. If we were alone together, I didn’t know if I’d crawl into his lap and kiss him senseless, or if I’d wind up crying on his shoulder about how the world was so unfair.

Then again, a ferry full of end-of-season travelers didn’t exactlyalone.

He nodded, almost like he was trying to convince himself as much as he was trying to convince me. “It sounds like your mom and my dad might actually make a go of this whole marriage thing, which means we’ll be seeing a lot more of each other. We should probably start practicing pretending like last night never happened.”

“Right,” I agreed, my stomach churning with unhappiness. “Like it never happened.”

Eight

David

Staringdown the barrel of family dinner night, I tried to think up a valid excuse to skip it. Again.

I’d been lucky so far, but there was nothing on my schedule I couldn’t get out of. Hell, there was nothing on my schedule, period. If I didn’t come up with an excuse fast, I’d be forced to sit across the dinner table from Victoria, and I wasn’t sure I was ready for that.

It’d been a month since I’d last seen her, but I hadn’t forgotten a thing about the woman.

And it wasn’t like I hadn’t tried.

I’d even gone out on a blind date with my friend’s girlfriend’s cousin. Unfortunately, all that night had done was solidify that Victoria was the woman for me. I’d never met someone I’d felt so comfortable with. I’d also never met a woman I’d wanted to take to my bed—and keep there—more than Victoria. One throaty laugh out of her luscious mouth and I’d been instantly hard.

Which was my most immediate problem.

I wasn’t sure I could be near her and not imagine all the ways I wanted to make love to her. A boner at the dinner table wasn’t generally considered polite.

What to do? What to do?

Staring at the email from my dad that reminded me—yet again—about Sunday’s meal, my cursor hovered over the reply button. But in the second before I pressed the mouse down, my cell phone rang. I reached over and picked it up, checking to see who it was before answering. If it was my dad, that sucker was going straight to voicemail.

Thankfully, it wasn’t.

“Hey, Hank. What’s up?”

“Are you going to the talk Friday night?”

“Which one?” There were three on campus from our department alone.

“The one on the role of feminism in modern literature.” Hank snorted in disgust, but otherwise kept his commentary to a minimum. As if I didn’t already know how he felt about Professor Miranda Whitcomb and her lectures.

It wasn’t that Hank was a misogynist, but he and Miranda got on like oil and vinegar. They hated everything about one another. Unfortunately for Hank, the department had set up the program so that students were forced to take Miranda’s course in the fall, and then his in the spring semester. He spent the first two weeks of every January hearing students say, “But Professor Whitcomb said …” He’d once confessed it had taken every ounce of patience he possessed not to scream that he didn’t give one flying fuck what that stuck-up she devil had told them.

Personally, I didn’t see what was so wrong with her, but that didn’t mean I was excited to go to her talk either. Unfortunately, I didn’t think I had a choice in the matter. The department head liked to see their professors supporting one another by attending as many lectures as possible. Since I’d skipped the last one in favor of spending the weekend on Dobber’s Island instead—drowning myself in memories of Victoria in my house—I didn’t have the luxury of missing Miranda’s. Inwardly, I tried to drum up some enthusiasm. It wasn’t a topic I was particularly interested in.

But then inspiration struck.

I happened to know someone who was interested in the role of feminism in modern literature.

A certain beautiful, smart, lovely someone I’d been avoiding.

Mentally, I catalogued all the reasons why the idea slowly forming in my stupid head was a bad one. Maybe I was simply looking for an excuse to see her without our parents and her brothers around, but in less than twenty seconds I managed to convince myself that if she went with me to the lecture, by the time we sat down opposite one another on Sunday, I could get through the meal without staring at her like the thing I’d rather be eating.

I leaned back in my chair and propped my feet up on my desk. “I was thinking of bringing a friend, actually.”

“Really?” Hank asked. “I didn’t think you and Greta hit it off last weekend.”

---