“So what if it is?” I shrugged. “Are you not having fun? Because it seems to me like you’re having a good time.”
“Sure, I am but why invite me? These people are all your friends, but I’m the odd one out. Surely, you could’ve had a games night without me.”
“Not really,” I said. “You’re my fiancée, remember? The only people who don’t think we’re engaged are Nash and Lennon, but they won’t say anything. It would’ve looked suspicious if you weren’t here.”
Seeing right through my excuses, she narrowed her eyes when I turned to face her. “I’m calling bullshit. You and I both know that you could’ve made up a reason for me not being here.”
“Can’t you just let it go? Just this once?” I implored her, but she shook her head.
“You know me better than that. I don’t blindly accept things that don’t make sense to me, and this doesn’t make any sense to me. Do you realize that all the others are couples? Am I here because you didn’t want to be ‘the single one’ again?” She made air-quotes with her fingers. “Because if thatisit, you can really just tell me. I’m happy to be here and to be included, but I’m not staying if it feels like there’s something going on I don’t know about.”
“Fine,” I said, giving in because I hadn’t done all this only to end up arguing with her again. She was by far the most inquisitive person I’d ever met, but it was in a way that made her seem almost obsessed with finding out every last shred of the truth. Almost like she didn’t trust anything or anyone until she’d argued, reasoned, and cross-examined it all until she understood it fully.
Planting my hands on the counter, I pressed into the hard top to brace myself for her reaction and looked straight into her eyes. “I wanted to get to know you better. That’s why I set up everything tonight. I wanted to learn more about you and I couldn’t think of a better way to do it.”
So surprised that her lips parted and her brows shot up, she didn’t respond immediately. When she did, her words were soft and she was frowning like she was still confused. “Oh, okay. I’ll just see you back out there, then.”
“Okay,” I said, but when she didn’t move, I lowered my chin. “Was there anything else?”
For a second, I thought she was going to say no and walk away, but she didn’t. Chest rising as she took in a deep breath, the next question rushed out of her. “Did you sleep with that bridesmaid in Maui?”
“What bridesmaid?” I frowned, then remembered the girl she was probably talking about. “No, I didn’t fucking sleep with her. Why would I?”
“You were bench-pressing her.”
“What?” I laughed. “Oh, yeah. I did. She works for a fitness magazine and she said she’d feature the gym if I could prove that my muscles weren’t just for show.”
Isabella stared at me, blinking as realization set in. “You did it for work? For the business to get free publicity?”
“Yes. Did you really think I fucked her while you were in the next room?”
“No, I, uh, okay. I’m just going to go now.” She pushed away from the cabinet she’d been leaning against, walking out of the room looking almost adrift. I seriously considered going after her and pulling her back in here to find out what was going on in her head, but I left it. I didn’t want to cause a scene, and more than that, I had a feeling she needed time to process everything.
Something about her expression when I’d admitted that I wanted to get to know her told me that this was new for her and that she didn’t quite know how to react. In the past, I’d often wondered about the people in her life and if she even had any, but if she did, I didn’t think anyone had ever gone out of their way to get to know her. Which was weird because, as infuriating as she could be, I couldn’t imagine that no one had made the effort for her before.
Hell, the guys and I still made a point of getting together just to catch up if life had kept us apart for a couple months. That was what people did when they cared for other people. They made an effort to see them and talk to them.
So I’ll just add all that to the list of things I want to know about her.I wasn’t even going to get into how ridiculous I thought it was that she might’ve thought I’d slept with that bridesmaid.
After I carried the tray of fresh drinks out, we got back to playingNever Have I Ever, but Isabella didn’t drink too much, which meant she was either lying or she really just hadn’t done much. As far as this game went, we kept it pretty tame. Most of the questions related to normal stuff and not the randomly sexual or embarrassing things that the game could sometimes fall into.
I pondered on that for the rest of the night, alternating between whether I thought she was lying because she was shy and honestly believing that she just hadn’t gotten around to doing a whole hell of a lot. Game after game, I learned a lot more from her silence than I did in outright facts about her.
Everyone left around the same time, but Colt hung back for another beer. Anna had rolled her eyes when he’d said he was staying for a while longer, but she was also used to us hanging out for a bit longer sometimes.
Colt was my closest friend and the one guy, aside from my brother, who knew me better than anyone else. He eyed me once I’d shut the door behind Anna and Isabella. Then he grabbed a new beer and jerked his head in a nod at the balcony.
“Outside?” he asked, picking up another beer and holding it out to me.
I took it, strode past him, and opened the sliding door before standing back to let him go out first. Once I joined him next to the railing, he glanced at me and tipped the open end of his bottle toward my chest.
“Something is up with you,” he said, not asking because he already knew he was right. “What is it? First you have a fiancée when I didn’t even know you were dating anyone, and now a game night with you watching her like a hawk. What’s going on?”
“How did you convince Anna to fall in love with you?” I asked instead of answering his questions. I’d circle back to them soon enough. “Is there some kind of secret to getting women to tell you shit about themselves that allows them to open up enough to actually love you?”
“You’ve gotten more women to open up and fall for you than I ever have.” He laughed, but the sound cut off abruptly when I didn’t join in. “Wait. Are you serious?”
“I am,” I said. “None of those women fell in love with me. We had a good time together and that was it. What you have with Anna, that’s real. That’s what I’m after.”