The Boyfriend List (21 page)

“Wait.” Reagan
shook her head a little. “What?”

“You know all
kinds of things about him, but remember, he’s never met you. Hasn’t really even
seen you as far as you know. Well,” she corrected, “except for that one time in
the weight room. But still.”

“Are you all right?”
The depth of Ian’s voice had a calming effect, and suddenly all she wanted to
do was curl into his arms, into the warmth of his chest.

“Yep. Fine.
Why?”

“You seem edgy.”

“Really?” It
wasn’t surprise that prompted the question, but denial. Then she forced herself
to shake it off. Everything was okay as long as she was with him. “No,
everything’s fine.” She smiled.

Or at least, everything
would’ve been fine, had Derek not turned to see who the girls were staring at.
Or had he not yelled a greeting to Brett over the music from across the room,
securing everyone’s attention in their general direction. Or had Brett not
started wandering over to join his friend.

No, Reagan was really
not okay now.

She moved
slightly, inching a little closer to Ian, who noted the movement and was only
too pleased to be able to slip a hand protectively against her waist and guide
her smoothly over. Derek and Brett passed casual phrases before the
introductions began, but when it came time to introduce Reagan, Brett stopped
him there. “I know you from somewhere.”

The comment was
so matter of fact, so blatantly certain that it caught Reagan off guard. Once
again, all the blood went rushing from her face straight to her heart, where it
thudded so hard she was sure the entire room could hear it over the music.
Which embarrassing situation was he about to
bring up? What possible excuse could she make up to justify the situation?

Panic had set
in. She opened her mouth to talk, but the words wouldn’t come out. Ian
strengthened his grip a little, a subtle reminder that he was still there,
still supporting her.

Petra, noticing
her friend was suddenly speechless, rushed to her side to intervene. Managing
to make a smooth entrance into the conversation before any true damage could be
done, she took it upon herself to continue the introductions.

“I’m Petra.” She
elbowed Derek as though he’d done something wrong by not introducing her first,
a diversion she’d explain to him later. “I don’t think we’ve been introduced
yet.”

“So you’re the
birthday girl. I’ve heard a lot about you.” He exchanged a quick look with
Derek, but Petra could read between the lines.

“I’m sure you
have.” She offered with a gracious eye-roll. “You have no idea how much I’ve
heard about you.”

“Is that right?”
Brett looked over to Derek with eyebrows raised, who merely shrugged and lifted
his glass to take a sip. But he wasn’t so easily diverted. “You do look very
familiar to me.”

“Do I?” The
phrase barely escaped Reagan’s lips, so busy was she reviewing all the many
ways she might have embarrassed herself over the course of the week –
the soccer field, the gym...

“Yeah. I’m
trying to think...” His eyes squinted, as though searching through the vast
bank of his memory.

...the sidewalk in front of the hot dog stand...

Then he snapped
his fingers as his mouth broke into a wide grin at the sudden recollection, and
Reagan’s eyes widened with nervous anticipation.

 
“The restaurant.”

The restaurant
, of course. It was the one place she hadn’t thought
of. The one place she couldn’t be embarrassed by - well, not too embarrassed
anyway. But it
was
where all the
insanity that week had started, and had eventually led her to back to Ian.
Wow, was it only a week ago?
It felt
like so much longer.

Managing to
regain her composure surprisingly quickly, she squinted her eyes as though
trying to recall. “The restaurant?”

Brett nodded his
head and a curl bounced out of place. “The Blue Nickel Café. Derek and I were
there last week, and I think we sat at the table behind you.”

“Is that right?”
She thought she was getting pretty good at pretending that she had no idea what
he was talking about.

“Yep. I never
forget a beautiful face.” He was smiling at her, then caught Ian’s expression.
“No offense.” He corrected himself.

If only you knew
, she thought as she stifled a nervous laugh
.

From another
corner of the room, Brett’s name was called. He turned to acknowledge his
friends, but quickly returned his attention to Reagan.

“Well, Reagan,
it was nice to finally put a name with the face.”

“Yeah. You too.”

“You’re a lucky
guy.” Brett reached out his hand to Ian to smooth over any lingering resentment,
and Ian took the opportunity to crush it in his grip. Then, after promising to
come back to talk with Petra again as he shook out the pain from his fingers,
he disappeared into the crowd.

“No problem.”
Petra encouraged the exit.

“I’m gonna grab
another.” Derek announced soon after Brett had left, lifting his empty glass in
the air to acknowledge his deficiency. “Want one?”

“Nope.” Petra
declined. “I want to dance.”

Derek shrugged
his shoulders, handed his glass off to Reagan and followed Petra into the
dancing crowd instead.

“Well, that
wasn’t so bad, was it?” Ian asked once they were out of earshot.

“A lot less
awkward than I’d expected.” She admitted.

“Think I scared
him away?”

Reagan laughed.
“Probably.”

Ian took her
hand, raising it to his lips. “Good.” He glanced sideways, watching their
friends moving to the high-energy music. “Want to join in?”

“I might need
another one of these first.” She indicated her empty glass.
 

“In that case,
I’ll be right back.” He grabbed her glass, and the one Derek had left her with,
and quickly went off.

It was less than
a second after he left that Reagan’s smile faded into a frown of indignation. She’d
spotted Justin crossing the dance floor, and though his steps seemed urgent,
determined almost, the mere sight of him caused her stomach to churn into a
sour ball of resentment.

Apparently he’d
spotted her too, because he’d changed direction and was moving directly toward
her now.

Ian’s not so
brilliant sense of timing was occurring to him again as he stopped short before
he could even make it to the bar. Instead, he found himself hijacked by the
same slinky black dress that had been so desperate for his attention only a few
minutes before. He’d seen her work her way around the room, and fail in her
attempts to latch on to a new guy. Apparently it was time to start round number
two.

“Can we talk?”
Isabella’s slur was more prominent now, and the whine in her voice had increased
exponentially.

“Depends.” Ian’s
grip on his irritation was slipping. Quickly. Setting his jaw, he clenched the
glass in his hand until his knuckles turned white, barely glancing in her
direction as he spoke. “What do you want?”

“Besides you?” If
attention was what she was after, Ian was going to give it to her. But instead
of the flirtation she desired, he turned a dark glare on her.
 
“Don’t be mad.” Though she pushed her
bottom lip out into a playful pout, there was a hesitancy in her voice that
suggested his meaning had been well conveyed.

“Don’t be mad?”
Exasperation filled his throat and bubbled out into his words. “I told you very
plainly that I was with someone.
With
someone
, Isabella. That means I don’t want to be with you. Which is exactly
what I told you at Mojitos too.”

Tilting
her hip, she took a step back while resentment washed over her expression. “That
was her over there, wasn’t it? In the red dress? I saw the way you put your arm
around her.” It was the first time he noticed she had a hint of an accent,
something exotic that seemed more prominent now that she was upset.

Ian
began counting under his breath, a tactic to control his quickly rising temper.
His goal was to get to five, as the usual ten seemed unrealistic considering
the circumstances. Three was as far as he got, and even at that he was
surprised. “Yeah, it is.”

“What
does she have that I don’t?”

“This is
ridiculous.” He shook his head, and turned to walk away. “The conversation’s
over.”

But Isabella
wasn’t finished yet. She caught his elbow and pulled him back. “Why don’t you
answer the question?” Ian reconsidered pulling away again. Her eyes seemed to
be pleading with him, begging him to tell her what he was absolutely certain
she wouldn’t want to hear. But if it would end the discussion and allow him to
get on with the night, so be it.

“My heart.” He
stated it calmly, unwaveringly. As though it was the only thing in the world he
was certain of. “She has my heart.”

“What are you
doing here?” If Reagan could’ve breathed fire and turned him completely to ash,
in that moment, she absolutely would have. There was no one,
no one
, she wanted to bump into less
than her ex-boyfriend. And while sure, the breakup had been more of a blow to
her ego than her heart, it’d still been a brutal and unnecessary play on her
insecurities.

“Hi there.” It
was clear by the hesitant smile he offered that he was going to try to draw
this out. That he wasn’t going away any time soon. A sigh of disgust escaped
from her lungs, she couldn’t have stopped it even if she’d wanted to. And truth
be told, she hadn’t really wanted to.

“You aren’t
welcomed here.” Reagan had crossed her hands over her chest to solidify the
statement.

“Yeah.” He
nodded his head sheepishly. “I sort of got that memo already.”

“So leave then.
What are you hanging around for?”

Instead of
waiting for him to act on her demand, Reagan herself turned to walk away. To
get as far away from him as physically possible given the confines of her
space. She wanted to disappear into the crowd, forget about him and the week
she’d had. In fact, she wanted to forget everything except the end result: She’d
discovered she was in love with Ian, and there was much more to their friendship
than she’d ever realized.

But Justin
grabbed her wrist to stop her. “Wait a minute.”

Twisting her arm
until she was free again, she spun around and stalked toward him, forcing him
to back up or suffer her obvious fury. “Don’t you ever,
ever
touch me again. That’s the last warning you’ll get.” The
finger she pointed into his chest was sharp and emphatic.

“Don’t be like
that. Can we just talk for a minute?”

“I have nothing
to say to you that I haven’t already said.”

“Yeah, you’ve
made that clear all week. But I have something I want to say to you.” He was
straitening his stance now, and the expression around his eyes had softened
just enough to make Reagan curious.

 
“You have five seconds.” She stated after
several minutes of contemplation. Then she crossed her arms again and glared. “I’m
timing you.”

“I want to get
back together.”

Reagan’s jaw
instantly fell open. “Have you completely lost your mind?” She certainly hadn’t
seen that one coming. A ‘let’s move past this’ speech, ‘can we be friends’
moment...maybe even an apology. But this?

“Yeah. I think
we should just forget that whole…spring break
thing
and get back together. We were good together, right?”

Reagan couldn’t
believe what she was hearing. So what, suddenly it didn’t work out with the
boyfriend stealing slut and he thinks he can come running back?
Frankly, even the suggestion was more
than insulting. Not only had he still not properly
apologized for the “spring break thing” yet, but he actually
expected her to just get over it and move forward and forget it ever happened.
Clearly, he didn’t know her as well as he thought he did. That wasn’t how this
was going to work, especially since she’d already moved on to better things.
She couldn’t wait to drop that little bomb on him...

 
“Let me tell you what I think.” She said
as a calm, sly smile spread over her face. “I think you’re a coward, a moron
and a pathetic excuse for a boyfriend. I think I was stupid to have dated you
to begin with, but I’d be even stupider to give you a second chance. And I
think the only reason you’re asking me out now is because you got dumped flat
on your face by your little slutty spring fling.”

“Are you
finished?” His expression had visibly darkened and he was glaring at her
through squinted eyes.

“No.” The word
popped out sharply. “I’ve moved on with my life. I’ve met someone
way
better than you could ever hope to
be. And I’m happy with him. So don’t try to mess with that.”