Page 83 of Authentically, Izzy
Izzy’s attention lingered on his profile, his lips eased into a gentle smile she’d come to expect over the past week. She’d read about soul mates and always categorized the notion with glass slippers and talking frogs, but something inextricably linked her to him. She’d felt hints of it during their online communication, but now, in the flesh, the awareness strengthened into an almost tangible connection. Oh, how she wanted this to be true. Authentic. Hers.
He’d pretty easily slipped right into life with her crazy cousins, joining Luke on a few hiking excursions while Izzy had worked, even helping him with a construction job or two. He’d spent an entire two hours on a video call listening to Penelope talk movies and musicals followed by a thorough and dramatic interrogation about Skymar. And then three evenings ago, they’d joined Josie and Patrick for dinner, incurring Josie’s not-so-subtle dislike. Josephine had never been one to guard her feelings. She basically cross-examined Brodie—even asking him of a possible criminal background—to such a degree Patrick intervened. But by the end of the meal, Izzy could tell Josiewas softening. All Brodie had had to do was help with the dishes, ask about the twins, and compliment Josie’s snow globe collection. He’d been positively perfect.
Her gaze dropped to his smile.
His kiss would probably be perfect too.
“Anytime, MissEdgewood.”
The comment, tinged with humor, brewed in the air between them and sent heat stinging her cheeks. Her breath squeezed in her chest, holding to emotions so big she barely knew what to call them... or perhaps she was afraid to give them a name because shedidknow what to call them. One was gratitude. The other?
Even saying it in her mind seemed too much.
She pinched the book between her hands and drew in a quivering breath. Her gaze dropped to a page and an idea pearled into action. She opened the book to her favorite sonnet, the one she’d listened to Richard Armitage read about three hundred times. There would be no going back if she read this one to him. It was one of the most famous, and not confusing at all. Brodie would understand and she’d lay bare her heart in the most vulnerable of ways.“It is my spirit that addresses your spirit,”as Jane Eyre declared to Rochester.
Izzy swallowed through her dry throat and began. “‘Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediment. Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds, or bends with the remover to remove.’” Heat invaded her vision, but she didn’t really need to see the words. Brodie’s eyes were still closed. His lips at a fascinating tilt, almost... almost beckoning her forward. “‘O no! it is an ever-fixed mark that looks on tempests and is never shaken.’”
The paper bouquet on the shelf near them caught her attention and reality clicked into place. Brodie had sent her the bouquet. He’dknownher, even then.
How?
Her nose tingled as she shifted a few inches closer to him, thewords shivering from her. “‘It is the star to every wand’ring bark, Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.’”
Her breath pulsed shallow. He was now so close she could almost touch him, continuing the next few lines. “‘Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom.’”
Could this be love? Did she even know how to trust her heart anymore?
“‘If this be error and upon me prov’d, I never writ, nor no man ever lov’d.’”
His eyes opened then, and he stared back at her, unmoving. She laid down the book, moving nearer still, and with a timid hand she cupped his cheek, inching closer, and then she did something she never thought her wounded heart would have the courage to do.
Sheinitiated a first kiss.
***
Isabelle’s voice had grown closer, her words softer. Brodie soaked in the sound, the feeling within each syllable. Her storybook reading to the children oozed with emotion and animation, but now a vibrato of tenderness swelled over each passage, almost as if she said them... to him.
He attempted to control his breaths. The couch shifted next to him, but her recitation continued. Should he move? Open his eyes? He’d never been a confident lover, not that he’d experienced a great many romantic relationships, but his past had been more fumbling and reluctant than bold and debonair. Traveling across the world to meet her had been the most courageous romantic gesture he’d ever initiated. And now? He’d called her the one endearment that meant more than love—acceptance and admiration and tenderness—and to which he’d not been able to find an accurate English translation.
Then she shifted again. Something brushed against his arm. The soft scent of her fragrance swept as close as the sound of her voice.
“‘I never writ, nor no man ever lov’d.’”
He raised his head and opened his eyes at the sudden silence and found she’d closed the small distance between them. Those large, fathomless eyes of hers stared into his. Uncertainty and something much sweeter softened those brown hues to amber. Her hair spilled around her face, brushing against his shoulder. With the slightest hitch of a breath, she placed her palm against his cheek and in achingly slow motion brought her lips to his. Her mouth barely grazed his, the ridges of her lips sliding over his to fit into place. Her fingers caressed his cheek and his breath trembled release.
He knew the cost of her initiation. Felt it to his core, but even more than that he recognized what she was admitting in this kiss. What she was offering.
When she pulled back enough to open her eyes, he sat up, bringing her with him, and in a gentle motion he cradled her cheeks with his palms and continued, with much... much less trepidation. In fact, uncertainty became the very last thing on his mind. Her lips softened beneath his, her fingers fisting into his shirt. The last hint of a question about her feelings disappeared, and he promised himself he’d do whatever it took to create a future with Isabelle Edgewood.
***
Text from Izzy to Penelope:The right kiss with the right man is worth it all, Penelope. Oh my, is it worth it!
Penelope:SQUEE!!!!!! Oh, Izzy! How wonderful! Though I do wish I hadn’t been in the middle of the movie theater when I read your text. I disrupted my entire section with my response. Oh well, it was a silly man-movie anyway. I don’t understand why men like to watch movies that have very little talking in them. And NO singing. Where is their imagination?! Anyway, I’m so tickled for you. Ishould be home tomorrow evening for a quick visit so I can approve of your dashing islander and his sweater-vests . . . or open-collared shirts, as the case may be. In person!
Penelope:I do like open-collared shirts as long as they’re not open down to a man's navel. There’s something about that look that either makes me think “drunk pirate” or “loose Spaniard.” I blame operas.
Izzy:Sorry for the interruption but not the remarks. I can’t wait to introduce you to him. As far as operas? I have no comment.
