Page 43 of Resisting the Running Back

I’m dreading the moment someone asks how I proposed because I realize only now we never drafted a story for that.

I should really have more faith in my fiancée, the storyteller.

“So how’d he propose?” that same woman asks Sophie.

Without missing a beat, she starts to gush.

“Oh my God, I was justwaitingfor someone to ask so I could share the amazing story,” Sophie says. “I was back home in Phoenix, and I’d just broken up with this guy who it had been over with for a long, long time. I called Miller because he’s just always who I turn to, and he flew in immediately to just be there for me. The next morning, he took me to the high school where we met, and he held my hand as he pulled me into the classroom where we first met. It was empty, and we sat in the desks we sat in sixteen years ago when we were in that freshman English class, and he said the sweetest, kindest words to me.”

She glances over at me, and I see the hearts in her eyes. Either she’s a really, really good actress…or Tanner is right.

She reaches over and squeezes my hand.

Kiss her.

I do it. I lean down and press a gentle kiss to her lips before she continues, and she looks just the slightest bit dazed as she pulls back to finish the story. “Then he said, ‘I don’t have a ring, but it’s always been you, Soph. Will you marry me?’” She lifts both shoulders. “How could I say no to that when I realized it had always been him for me, too?”

Jesus Christ.

I know it’s just a story. It’s just words for the benefit of these people at this table.

But she still said it. It’s always been me for her, just the way it’s always been her for me.

It’s fake. It’s a lie. It’s pretend.

And yet…it’s also the purest truth she’s spoken tonight.

I blow out a breath as I slide an arm around her shoulders. “She said yes.” I grin my goofy grin at the people at the table, and she leans in and lays her head on my shoulder.

“You two aresoperfect together,” the woman says. “You can justseethe love you have for each other.”

Really? Can you?

I mean, of course you can. It’s true—we love each other. But there are different categories of love, and I fear mine falls into a different one than hers does.

I respond by kissing her again, and she slides her chilly hand along my jawline. I think about deepening the kiss. I want to feel her tongue against mine again.

But it’s getting hot enough in here, and I can’t exactly get indecent with her in front of a bunch of fans.

A little more whiskey and a little more time, though, and maybe I can tonight when we’re back at home together.

Maybe tonight’s the night I finally admit the truth after sixteen long years.

CHAPTER 18: Sophie Summers

The Dynamic Shifts

He kissed me twice, and each time, a new set of butterflies took flight. The first was just a sweet punctuation to my story, but the second felt different.

It felt like he wanted to give me more, but he held himself back.

Surely it’s the wine talking, but maybe I want the wine to do a little more talking. I’m on my third glass now, and I think a fourth might give me the nerve to do something I never would’ve dreamed of doing a couple weeks ago with this man beside me.

Maybe I want to take this somewhere with him that we’ve never gone before, and maybe I want that to happen tonight.

I set my hand on that huge quadzilla thing he has, and a deep, dark ache has me clenching my own thighs together.

What the hell is going on with me? Is this because he’s in a tux?

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