Page 36 of View With Your Heart

“I have no idea.” It isn’t the whole truth, though. Gavin did send me the invite, with a code as his plus one, for entry to the private dinner at a restaurant in Traverse City. The invitation read semi-formal, and I didn’t have anything I could wear. I couldn’t remember the last time I wore a fancy dress as I typically wear casual T-shirt ones or sweater dresses in the winter.

“Are you standing him up?” Henry questions before taking another sip of his beer. He’s here only to humor Jenna and me, who begged him to join us in a little Harbor Day celebration of our own. He’ll dump us soon enough to meet up with his real friends, as he refers to others in his life.

“I’m not standing him up. I’m just not going.”

“Isn’t that the same thing?” Henry asks, and I take another sip of my margarita. I’m not much of a drinker, but the icy lime flavor is going down smoothly while the guilt is slowly choking me.

“Again. He could be waiting for you.” Jenna pauses, then snaps her fingers, while excitement fills her voice when she says, “Oh my gosh, it’s like something in the movies. Like that one where the girl is supposed to meet the man at the top of the Empire State Building on Valentine’s Day.”

“Sleepless in Seattle,” Henry drones the title of the romantic comedy.

“No, the other one, where she’s struck by a car and doesn’t make it.” Jenna clarifies.

“An Affair to Remember,” Henry mutters, and my brows lift at his knowledge of classic movies.

“Yes!” Jenna cheers. “Or there’s that moment in some holiday movie when the single mom is supposed to meet the dashing stranger from a hot one-night stand at Times Square on New Year’s.”

“You mean, New Year’s Eve?” Henry tips up a brow, and I laugh again at his knowledge of another romantic comedy.

“How did you know that one?” Jenna asks, and Henry looks over at me like, is she serious?

“Lucky guess, since he had to meet her on New Year’s Eve where the ball drops.”

Jenna giggles, taking another long sip of her margarita while Henry eyes me. Sometimes it’s like he sees into me, knows my secrets when there’s no way he could know them. One secret is the main reason I shouldn’t get involved with Gavin, even on a temporary basis.

That secret is also one I should be telling Gavin.

“I love when he’s all disappointed, thinking she wasn’t going to show, and the street clears, and she’s there in the gold gown.” Jenna sits taller, swiping a hand along her body like it’s an elegant dress.

“That would suck to be standing there, waiting on a woman.” Henry’s eyes shift to Jenna, and he tips back his beer to take another pull as he drives the guilt deeper.

When Gavin sent me the invitation, a text accompanied it.

In case you’re no longer undecided.

“Imagine if that happened to you,” Henry defends, and I want to snap that it had happened. I’d woken alone in a hotel room. But did Gavin really leave you? It’d all been a misunderstanding, but I had no proof of what he said. Out to get us breakfast seemed like a likely story. However, Gavin has never lied to me.

“That would suck,” Jenna admits. “Standing there, hoping someone would show, then suddenly realizing they aren’t coming. It’s like that other movie, the one where the undercover reporter stands on the baseball mound waiting for her first real kiss.”

“How can you know all these movies but not remember their titles?” Henry mumbles before adding, “And that one’s Never Been Kissed.”

“Jesus, you’re like a walking encyclopedia of romantic chick flicks.” Jenna laughs but sobers a little. “I’m just saying, that would hurt, right? What’s the big deal? He’s an old friend. It’s a dinner party. It’s free food, and you said he told Gee it wouldn’t be a date.”

Maybe I am making a bigger deal of things once again. The kiss was nothing. Gavin even said so himself. It didn’t matter that I thought it was something. It didn’t matter that it happened again. Or that I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about how his tongue slipped into my mouth, and instantly, I was twenty-three, not able to get my fill of him. How his lips tasted exactly the same, and I can’t explain how I remembered the flavor of them. How his body pressed to mine sent currents of electricity to places I’d thought were dead circuits.

“Yeah, free food is exactly how I want a woman to think of going out with me,” Henry scoffs.

“That’s why you don’t date,” Jenna tells him, and I see the hurt in Henry’s face. He sticks out his tongue at her to deflect the pain, and she playfully responds the same way.

As we sit on the balcony, we see a couple climb the stairs to this second-floor location. Instantly, I recognize Gavin’s brother, Ethan, and his fiancée, Ella, the owner of the clothing store Fabulously Flawed. She uses the second-story apartment as her office.

“Hey guys,” Jenna calls out.

“Hey,” Ethan responds and does a double take at me when he sees me sitting here. “I thought you were having dinner with my brother tonight.” The accusation in his tone is sharp, but his expression doesn’t match. He smiles as if he knows something I don’t, and I’m reminded Gavin said he was spending the day with family at the beach.

“E,” Ella groans, looking nervously from him to me and back. It’s a warning not to be involved.

“I couldn’t make it,” I guiltily state, looking over at Jenna and Henry, who lowers his head. He’s disappointed in me, not so much that I won’t date, but that I’m legitimately standing up Gavin. I don’t really have a decent excuse not to have dinner with him as an old friend, and the guilt eats at me.