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Which was why I was now going up the elevator at the hotel in a hip-hugging cami dress. It was tight with spaghetti straps, and I wasn’t sure if it was taupe or light brown but it looked good against my fresh tan.
And it had the type of comfy built-in bra that I loved.
The same type that Iain found insufficient.
I had that thought in mind when I put my hair up in a ponytail at the top of my head, which I could feel whipping around right now as I looked all over the bar to find Adam and Iain.
The place was packed, teeming with men in dress shirts, women in their sexiest summer outfits and booty-shorted bottle girls weaving through the groups of friends and sections of tables.
It wasn’t till I heard a familiarly raucous round of laughter that I turned and looked at the back corner of the terrace, where I saw the group.
Finally.
They were in a semi-shrouded area right next to the pool with plants and greenery providing privacy. But from where I was, I could see Adam in a light blue button-up with his neatly styled brown hair, looking his usual deceptively clean-cut and all-American despite being a warpath of walking chaos. As I got closer, I could tell it was the typical scene: him being the center of attention, making some impassioned-but-probably-not-that-serious declarative point to an eye-rolling A.J, who clearly disagreed, while everyone sat around watching, laughing and chiming in.
But from across the roof, I couldn’t make out everyone—in particular, Iain or the girl I’d seen in A.J’s video, so I paced faster toward them, grateful for my sneakers as they brought me quickly through the crowd to that area.
I was three tables away when I finally spotted him.
Iain.
Still next to her.
My steady heartbeat was back to racing and I could feel the hurt and fury in my eyes as I took him in.
He sat close to her on the low white couch that circled the table of magnums and mixers stuck in a big tub of ice. His muscled chest and thighs were on display as he leaned back in his seat, wearing a white V-neck T-shirt and dark wash jeans, which somehow made me that much more livid, because aside from the fact that he looked outrageously good, I never got to see him dressing casual—which was my favorite or him—and it was just another reminder of the day we were supposed to be having right now.
The birthday weekend I’d planned.
Which he wanted to have. Which he insisted we have. As recently as this morning, I reminded myself, so I couldn’t get mad at that.
What I could get mad at, however, was the way that woman kept touching his leg when she laughed.
The way he let her. He was still talking to his friend, so he wasn’t looking at her, but he certainly wasn’t trying to remove her hand as she let it linger for longer and longer with every touch.
My heart was pounding, my blood rushing in my ears by the time I got to the table.
Because by now, the woman was fully resting her hand on Iain’s leg, just above his knee.
And he seemed perfectly happy to let her.
Seriously—what the fuck?
In my fury, it was all I could think. All I had in my brain. But as I stepped into anyone’s eye line, I forced myself to take a page from Iain’s book and put on my best poker face, putting on a placid smile, acting cool and collected despite the fact that under my chest, my heart was screaming at him.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. That’s not little Hollie Bear, is it?”
The question came to my left from a grinning Caleb Weston, who I remembered from my FaceTimes with Adam, because he was Adam’s law school roommate before Adam bailed to take the last bedroom at Iain’s house.
I took the excuse to recoil at the nickname because I desperately needed something to react to that wasn’t Iain.
“That’s not even a real nickname, Caleb. Adam called me that like, once to piss me off,” I snorted.
And with that, I’d alerted everyone to my presence.
“Hey! Look who it is!” Adam announced, holding his arms up and prompting everyone to cheer loudly.
I laughed and gave a wave to everyone, doing my best to look natural, unfazed despite the fact I was barely breathing under my smile, because to my right, in the very corner of my vision, Iain was watching me.
