Then he sees me, and he goes still.
He does that around me. I noticed it during the weekend I spent torturing him and told myself it meant nothing. The man is constant motion, all day, every day, drumming his fingers and talking with his hands—a storm of kinetic energy barely caged inside his all-too-gorgeous body. Then he looks at me and all of it stops. It stops now, right there in the doorway, long enough that Colton has to step around him.
I am suddenly, painfully aware that I'm wearing my favorite old cardigan and a pair of comfortably baggy jeans. Ten minutes ago my outfit was perfectly fine for a night of trivia at the pub. Now, I wish I'd taken a little time to put on some mascara or to wear the dark denim that hugs my curves a bit more.
Though why I should care what Finn Bardot thinks of me, I don't know.
Except I do know, and all I'm doing right now is pretending the man has no effect on me.
"Champions!" Evan arrives at our table, giving Annie a mysterious smile I'm tempted to call conspiratorial. "We've heard the legends. We're here to challenge the reigning trivia dynasty."
"It's more of a dictatorship," Cathy says. "Darcy doesn't allow wrong answers."
"Even better." Evan grins around the table and his smile lands on Annie again. "Are you ladies up for the challenge?"
"You'd like to formally lose to us, is what you're saying." Annie is trying to sound bored and failing, because she's smiling too much for boredom, and she's aiming all of it at Evan. I notice it, and I fully intend to revisit it with her later, because right now Finn has crossed the room toward us. He stops at the edge of our table, and every thought I was having scatters.
"Ms. Gable."
"Finn." I'm relieved to hear my voice come out steady. "What are you doing still in town? I assumed you were back in Manhattan."
"Manhattan's overrated." He shrugs, easy as anything. "The trivia scene there is totally soft. No dynasties worth toppling."
Why did you stay?The question is right there, pressing against my teeth. But it's not something I can ask in a crowded bar with an audience. He knows it, and I know it, so instead we just look at each other for a second too long, the way we've been doing around each other since the auction. Two weeks ago I would have called it hostility. I no longer have any idea what to call it.
He pulls a chair out from the next table, spins it around, and sits facing us with his forearms stacked across the back of it. My gaze drifts to his left forearm. The one I touched in the library parking lot on Sunday. I can still feel his warmth, his pulse jumping under my hand.
I came here tonight carrying a lot of guilt and an apology I'm still not sure how to deliver. Part of me wants to say something about all of it now, to break the ice between us. Instead I hear myself say, "Loser buys the table's round."
His expression lifts in surprise. His grin changes. It's real, and I hate that I can tell the difference now, and I hate even more how much I like being the one who causes it. Especially after the way we left things between us.
"Both rounds," he says. "And the winner gets the crown."
"You're going to regret the coronation ceremony," I warn.
"Not if we win."
I laugh at his overblown confidence. He clearly has no idea who he's dealing with. Not that I should be surprised. Finn Bardot has always underestimated me.
Even though I still feel bad about how I've treated him since he's been back in Mattichogue—not the least of which being myunwitting role in what happened Sunday—I'm going to enjoy knocking him on his ass tonight.
The early rounds go in our favor, just like always. We take literature, obviously, and history, and Cathy carries science while the Bardot table—now known as their chosen team name, The Long Shots—argues in whispers loud enough to hear across the room. But when the host reads the scores, they're right behind us, and they stay there.
We hit the geography round, and my stomach sinks a little. One of my few weak subjects.
"What's the highest mountain outside of Asia?" the host asks.
Cathy guesses Denali for our table, but I know it's just a guess.
When the host reads the answer,Aconcagua, Finn holds his sheet up for the whole bar to see. "Lovely this time of year," he announces. "Terrible place to lose a glove, though. I speak from experience."
I roll my eyes, happy to see him having fun. "Nobody asked," I call over.
He shoots a grin at me. "The people deserve context."
The people laugh, damn them. The whole pub is warming to him, table by table, the way rooms always warm to him.
Two weeks ago I would have watched it happen with my arms crossed, thinking, there he goes, performing again. I know better now. I know what the performance was built to cover, and how much work it takes, and how long he's been doing that work alone.
