Page 19 of When We Meet Again

Henry taps Roman on the shoulder and laughs. Roman, though? His eyes don’t leave mine. His thumb swipes over his bottom lip, eyes holding mine hostage, and I’m locked in. That lip is bitable. It could’ve been if Victoria hadn’t saved me. Am I even ready to kiss someone new? I don’t know. More importantly, am I ready to kiss Patrick’s little brother? Not even a little bit.

I’m a liar.

Victoria gently squeezes my arm, bringing me out of my head.

“I’m not sure, but…”I liked it.I’m ashamed to say that I enjoyed it. I enjoyed being touched. Being desired.

I allow Victoria to lead me over to the brown wooden bar where she turns to me. “Are you okay?” She beckons the bartender over, “Do you want to leave?”

I shake my head. “No. I don’t. But I think I’m done with dancing, though.” My fingers skirt over my neck where the feeling of Roman’s fingers branding me still ghosts over my skin.

We order our drinks and bring them over to a table next to where the guys remain on the dance floor. They don’t see us. Clearly, they don’t, because I hear Henry say a little too loudly, “...Then you can tick ‘fucking a cougar’ off your list.”

Is he talking aboutme? A cougar? The thought of being called such a name disgusts me. So, I turn forty in a couple of weeks, and Roman’s twenty-four—almost twenty-five. Technically that would qualify me as a cougar, but I don’t feel like one. With Patrick, we were close in age. No title. No trope to label it. Just a relationship. But this isn’t about Patrick. This is about Roman: someone whom Ithoughtwas my friend. Someone Ithoughthad my best interests at heart.

“You know, I’m right here. And I’m notfuckingeither of you.” Victoria stares at me, her mouth agape, as I slam my drink down on the table. “NowI’m ready to go,” I snap in her direction, never taking my narrowed eyes from Roman.

Roman Huxley. Sweet talker. Bad boy. Too sexy and smooth for his own good. And mine, too. I grab my keys and push past him.

“Waverly, wait! Hendrix is drunk, he didn’t mean—” Roman steps out to grab me.

Hendrix! That’s his name. Not that I neither care nor need to remember it after tonight.

I hold my hand up to his chest, being sure not to touch him with more than just my fingertips.

“Roman, no. We both know this friendship is one-sided. I’m just the poor widow whom your brother left you to deal with…” The realization hits me, and I slap my hand on my forehead. “I’m not even technically a widow. I’m just a woman who had a questionable relationship, if you can even call it that, with a man who’s dead.”

Voicing it out loud, finally, gives me pause. That’s all I am. That’s all I was. Was what we had even real? Or was it more like a pseudo-relationship with a roommate?

I don’t allow myself to think on it another minute as I storm out of Two Balls and A Bull and leave those two guys alone.

CHAPTER 11

ROMAN

Hendrix can have such a big mouth sometimes. Am I attracted to Waverly? Fuck yeah, I am. Have I been since Patrick introduced us? Also, fuck yeah. But I’d never act on it. For one, she’d never go for it; she’s aware of my reputation even though it’s been blown completely out of proportion. Not to mention, “She’s Patrick’s girl, you asshole,” I say out loud as I grip the steering wheel a little tighter and push the gas a little harder.

Even if I did act on it,which I won’t,it wouldn’t just be because she’s older and I could have the honor of saying I was with an older woman. She doesn’t act older. She barely looks older. She’s fucking gorgeous. So much so that it’s painful to see her sometimes.

I’m on my way to her apartment now to smooth things over. I ditched Hendrix and left him with our tab. My logical self is telling me it would be best to let Waverly cool down since she just up and left the bar twenty minutes ago, but I refuse to let her simmer. Calling her phone would be pointless. I know for a fact that she never has the ringer on. Not sure why she even has a phone. I never see her check it, although it’s always on her. For a generation that used to buy ringtones, they are dead set on keeping their phones on silent these days.

I pull into the parking lot of her complex and see her living room light on. That’s a good sign. Now if I could just find the right thing to say. Probably should’ve practiced, but instead, I’d apparently rather chatter internally about phones.

Taking two steps at a time brings me to her door, wasting no time. I raise my hand to knock but the door opens before my fist hits the wood.

“Roman,” Waverly whispers. “Come in.”

I must look like a deer caught in headlights because she takes my hand and leads me in the door before I return to my senses.I take my coat off and rest it on the back of the chair.

“Look…” I say at the same time as she says, “I’m sorry.”

Her lips curl up at the ends. A beautiful sight. “Go ahead.”

This woman has me tongue-tied in the best way. Her hair is in a messy bun and she’s wearing my shirt. It’s my Shamrock 5K shirt. It says Huxley on the back. It makes sense why she thinks it’s his. When they were away in the Philippines, Patrick let me stay here so my drive to work wouldn’t be as long. Not sure he told her about it. He was a man who lived by the motto, “What she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.” I’d made sure my mess was cleaned up before I left. But I must’ve missed that shirt. And my assumption was correct; he mustn’t have told her.

“I, umm…I never thought…I don’t want to sleep with you. I mean, you aren’t a cougar to me.”

This all sounds terrible. Her brows fall like she’s mad. “What Hendrix said was wrong. Despite what you may think about my…sex life, I don’t have sex with women just to ‘tick them off my list.’”

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