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Yesterday, he was right when he’d said he thought I’d been into kissing him. I wasverymuch into kissing him, and if it weren’t for the way he’d gone about it, who knows what might have happened. Maybe I would’ve thrown my legs around his waist and pointed him to the back room, where we could have defiled the stock cabinets.
I liked a firm kiss and to be manhandled every once in a while, but I needed a say in the matter, particularly for the first time a guy touched me. Not that I ever felt in danger with Jason. He’d always been gentle—his verbal sparring notwithstanding—but I hadn’t expected him to kiss me, and I was thrown off-balance.
I couldn’t help the reaction I’d had, my mind spiraling backward. Though, I was glad to have my college experience out in the open, and happy he took it all in stride. He even seemed really emotional about it. The fact that he so easily understood my response confirmed he was a good guy and nothing like the one who still lingered at the back of my memories to pop up at the worst times.
And after our time together today, I could say I liked Jason.
When he parked the cart back at the clubhouse, I pouted. “That’s it?”
He laughed. “We played eighteen holes.”
“We did?”
“Well,wedid. You slept through some.” He nodded toward the restaurant deck, where my mom and Frank were finding a table. “Come on.”
Then Ireallyliked his hand on my lower back, palm pressing along my spine and his long fingers extending toward my hip possessively. I tended to prefer shorter guys, ones who had goofy smiles and played Scrabble, but there was something to be said about a tall man. One whose smile threatened a good time. I’m sure Jason would play Scrabble with me, though it might end with the pieces on the floor and me in his lap while we argued over a point score.
Once seated, he plucked something from my hair.
“I picked this just for you,” he drawled, handing me a tiny leaf. I twirled it between my fingers, biting back a smile. How could I keep him at arm’s length when he could be so cute?
“Oh my god, Jason!”
Oh, right. That’s why.
Without seeing where the squeal came from, I could guess who it belonged to.
The statuesque woman strutted right up to our table, placing her hand on Jason’s back. “I didn’t know you’d be here,” she said, massaging his shoulder in a demonstration of familiarity. “You never returned my texts from the other day.”
With a fleeting look at me, Jason sat forward so that the woman’s hand slipped off him.
“Aren’t you going to introduce me?” She smiled, her teeth gleaming white against her honey-brown skin. She wore a pink-and-green sports dress and matching visor. Her straight black hair framed the petite features on her pretty face.
I didn’t need an introduction. I already knew who she was.
Jason’s shoulders rose when he took a deep breath, and I had to hand it to him. He had me fooled.
“Bridget, this is Frank Santos, my godfather, and his fiancée, Caroline, and her daughter, Gemma. Everyone, this is Bridget Pozo.”
The infamous Bridget. Well, she was beautiful in that blindingly perfect way. If you liked that sort of thing. Jason apparently did.
“It’s a pleasure,” Bridget said.
“Pozo? As in Nelson Pozo?”
Bridget beamed. “Yes, that’s my father.”
Frank slapped his knee. “How about that! You tell him I said hello. I owe him a drink one of these days. Caroline, Nelson’s the one who hosts once-a-month poker. He’s married to Eileen Simpson.”
“Oh. Oh!” My mother flicked her manicured hand at Bridget. “Yes, of course! Eileen and I have had a few drinks together. She’s so wonderful. And, Bridget, doesn’t your smile look just like hers. I wish I had her genes. She could pass for your sister.”
Bridget lifted a slender shoulder, so put together I felt like a bridge troll next to her. “I think it’s that lifetime’s worth of skincare products she won from becoming Miss Illinois way back when.”
“Well, whatever it is she’s using, I’d like some.”
My mother wasn’t even fifty years old yet and already worried about becoming mummified. I flagged down a waiter, attempting to reign in my agitation. “Something with alcohol, please.”
Bridget turned to Jason. “What dumb luck that you’re here today, huh?”
