Page 27 of When We Meet Again

I pinch the bridge of my nose and let out a breath. Whiskey always makes my lips loose. Hendrix always warns me not to drink it in the company of others. Especially not during our poker nights with the guys. A light bump of turbulence causes Waverly’s eyes to go wide, and she grips my hand. Now I have to tell her, if only to take her mind off the flight. Or so I just keep telling myself this.

“Fine. Five-ish, maybe six years ago, Patrick and I were invited to our cousin’s bachelor party at that bar. I was only eighteen…and a half…” I smirk because that half still makes a difference. “I was in awe of you. I watched you.” I feel my face dance with heat, hoping she isn’t looking at me. But she is. She’s always looking at me. “Dancing like you didn’t have a care in the world with your arms in the air. I’m not sure who you were with because I never really looked. In the non-creepiest way possible,I watched your every move, completely captivated by everything you did.” I allow myself to find her glassy eyes peering at me with astonishment. That look alone empowers me to go on. I’ve come this far, might as well take the plunge. “The way your mouth curved when you smiled, and when you laughed, your whole face changed, just when I thought you couldn’t be any more beautiful…” She blinks rapidly, looking to the side and taking a deep breath of air.

“Please, that was probably just your teenage hormones,” she concludes.

“It wasn’t. Trust me. I know the difference. This was less about getting hard and more about how my heart was practically beating out of my chest. I was desperate to talk to you.” I set my whiskey down and turn to her, still belted. “I walked up to Patrick and told him I was going to use the restroom and after, if he couldn’t find me, I would be talking to you. I pointed you out to him. Maybe because I wanted him to be proud that for the first time, I wasn’t thinking with my dick? I’m not sure, but never in a million years did I think…” Another deep breath in. “When I came out of the bathroom, you were tapping your number into his phone. I walked up to him and slapped him on the shoulder a little harder than I should have. He played it off like he didn’t know it was you I was talking about.”

Waverly’s eyes widen and her mouth falls. This conversation wasn’t supposed to happen. Well, at least not right now. She chews on her lips and tears well in her eyes. I’m not sure what she’s feeling. Regret? Anger? Sadness because we’re talking about Patrick? Seconds later, tears finally fall down her cheeks.

“Shit. I’m sorry. This trip’s supposed to be a celebration, not me spilling my deepest, darkest secrets.” I rest my hand on her forearm that’s finally relaxed from take-off.

Her eyes fall to where we’re touching.

“Roman? Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

“Why would I? It wouldn’t have made a difference. And I wouldn’t do that to my brother. I may have seen you first, but he had the guts to walk up to you and beat me to the punch.”

“I saw you first, too,” she admits, whispering.

We sit there staring at each other for an eternity.

I have no words. I feel an identifiable heat taking over my body before she continues. “But Roman,” she says, resting her other hand on mine. “You were only eighteen. You had so much life to experience in your twenties. You still do. I’ve done all that, though.”

“You’re acting like you’re eighty and on your deathbed. Have you ever thought about it this way? So, you turn forty this week—if you live to be eighty-five, you still haven’t reached the halfway point in your life.”

“Roman, let me entertain this,” she gestures between us. “Just for a minute. Being a Huxley aside, if you were to walk up to your friends and tell them you were dating a forty-year-old, what would they say?”

My eyebrows fall. This conversation is starting to get under my skin. The fact that she thinks so little of herself because of her age. “First off, if I was dating a woman older than me, I wouldn’t start off by saying, ‘Guys, meet my forty-year-old girlfriend’...I’d introduceyouby name. If they knew you like I know you, they’d love you—your age be damned.”

CHAPTER 16

WAVERLY

Fortunate:I’m celebrating my 40th birthday.

Unfortunate:I’m celebrating my 40th birthday.

I don’t expect sucha deep conversation first thing in the morning. The bathroom seems to be a decent escape for me these days. At first, I thought he was going to come after me, just like men do in the books. My imagination runs wild with the way his hands would roam my body, especially after that dance at Two Balls and A Bull. The neck grabbing...Swoon. Would he be that rough in the bedroom?

I sit on a vanity stool next to the mirror in the bathroom.This plane is bigger than my apartment, I swear.

I allow my mind to drift to the last time Patrick and I were intimate. We’d just gotten home from a family dinner at his parents. I always enjoyed seeing them, and them, us, but especially Patrick. He’d been gone for a six-month stint in the Coast Guard, and it was his first night home. He was in an extremely affectionate mood, and Ilovedit. It was rare, even on our really good days.Does that count as a really good day?He told me to change into something sexy. That’d never happenedbefore, but I was ready for it. I had one outfit I’d planned on wearing if the opportunity ever presented itself, and the time had finally arrived. My red lace two-piece set was gifted to me by Victoria, who’d assured me that Patrick wouldn’t be able to resist me in it. And I was hoping she was correct. Wasting no time, I’d hurried into the bathroom, dressed, freshened my breath, and ran a brush through my hair. I remember how I’d strutted into the bedroom, waiting for his reaction. It wouldn’t have hurt so much if that earlier passion in his eyes had still been present in his stare, but it was far from it.

“What isthat?” he’d asked, words dripping with the same tone he’d used when we’d seen that flattened chipmunk on the side of the highway, an adequate reflection of my changed mood. I rubbed my hands nervously down the fabric. “You don’t like it?”

It was obvious he had felt some sort of remorse over his reaction because his face quickly fell and his eyes widened, “It’s not that, but I don’t like the color red. You know this, babe.”

My heart fell even further. I’d felt sick, like I was going to vomit. I no longer felt like the object of his desire. The fast flip of his emotions should have been a red flag. It should have been reason enough to realize that Patrick was a good man, but just not the man for me. But I was blind to the signs and blamed myself. And from then on, I started to become more of what he wanted me to be.

That was the night I started losing pieces of myself.

A light knock comes from the door. I glance in the mirror, shocked at the tears streaming down my face.

“Miss Kensington? Is everything okay in there? Mr. Hux—Roman wanted me to make sure you were okay,” Emily muttered, her voice just above a whisper. I open the door and see the brief shock break through her mask as she registers myappearance before she rights herself, steps in, and closes the door behind her. This is happening, I guess.

“Are you okay? Did he hurt you?” Emily winces.

“Mr. Huxley did hurt me, but it wasn’t Roman,” I admit, “His brother was my fiancé”. She gasps and her hand flies over her mouth.

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