Page 5 of Resisting the Handsome Doctor
Except I'm not eighteen anymore. And I know exactly why my chest feels tight.
"One drink," she says again, like she's trying to convince herself.
"One drink," I agree, even though I'm already planning to make it two. Maybe three if I can figure out how to be charming instead of the awkward idiot I apparently become around her.
She steps out of the car, and I have to stop myself from staring. She's wearing jeans and an oversized cardigan that looks soft and lived-in, her hair pulled back in a simple ponytail. No makeup that I can see. Glasses that keep slipping down her nose.
She looks exactly like herself, and she's beautiful. I realized that my senior year of high school, and I've been carrying it around ever since.
"I really am just in jeans," she says, pulling the cardigan tighter around herself. "Everyone else is going to be dressed up."
"So, we'll be the comfortable ones." I close her car door, then gesture toward the inn. "Come on. Before we both drown."
We make a run for it across the parking lot. Well, I run. Ivy does this half-jog thing that makes her laugh, breathless and surprised, and the sound hits me square in the chest. When was the last time I heard her laugh? Actually heard it, not just the memory of it?
Too long. Way too long.
The Blackwater Inn looks different than I remember. They renovated it a few years back, according to Granddad. Turned it from a rundown hotel into something worthy of the historical register. The lobby is warm and bright, all polished wood and vintage fixtures, and I can hear music and conversation coming from the event room down the hall.
Ivy stops just inside the door, water dripping from her cardigan. She's looking at the event room like it might bite her.
"Hey." I touch her elbow, gentle. "We don't have to go in there if you don't want to. We can just grab coffee somewhere."
She turns to me, and there's something in her hazel eyes I can't quite read. Uncertainty, maybe. Or fear. "You came here for the reunion. I don't want to—"
"I came here hoping to see you," I say, and it's out before I can think better of it. Before I can dress it up as something casual, something that doesn't make me sound like I've been thinking about her for fifteen years.
Her eyes go wide. "Owen."
"Too honest?"
"I just... I don't understand."
"What don't you understand?"
She makes a helpless gesture. "Why would you want to see me? We barely talked in high school."
That stops me cold. Because she actually believes it. She actually thinks she was invisible to me. God, I was even more of an idiot than I thought.
"Ivy." I take a breath, trying to figure out how to say this without sounding insane. "We talked plenty."
"At your house, maybe. Because I was friends with your brother."
"Is that really what you think?"
Before she can answer, someone calls my name from down the hall. I turn to see Marcus Webb heading toward us, beer in hand, wearing the same letterman jacket he wore in high school because of course he is. He was quarterback back then. Peaked in high school and has been reliving it ever since, from what I can tell from his Facebook posts.
"Owen Harper! Holy shit, man!" Marcus pulls me into one of those aggressive bro-hugs that I've never quite figured out how to reciprocate. "When did you get into town?"
"About an hour ago." I step back, trying to put some distance between us. "How've you been, Marcus?"
"Can't complain, can't complain. Still living here, working at my dad's dealership. You know how it is." He takes a long pull from his beer, then seems to notice Ivy for the first time. His eyes slide over her, past her, like she's part of the wallpaper. "Man, you've gotta come meet everyone. Half the team is here. We've been talking about the championship game. Remember when you caught that pass in the end zone?"
"I was wide receiver for one season, Marcus."
"Yeah, but what a season! Come on, let me buy you a drink." He's already pulling me toward the event room, and I'm torn between politeness and the overwhelming urge to tell him to fuck off.
I glance back at Ivy. She's already retreating toward the door, her face blank.
