5. we meet again
CHAPTER 5
WE MEET AGAIN
IVY
Even if I didn’t recognize the accent, I’d never forget that face.
“You,” I say calmly to the blond behemoth sitting a few stools away. Right now, my stomach is doing a Simone Biles impression, and I’ve learned to never let a man that looks this scorchingly hot know how nervous he makes me.
I try to douse the feeling with the G&T Manny serves me. It only half works.
“Ivy, you’re as exquisite as I remember.” His rich, rumbled English accent sends a shiver down my spine.
Ignoring him, I point at Manny, remembering why I came down in the first place. “I’m never letting you recommend a show again.”
He rocks back with a hand to his chest, and though he’s smiling (when is he not?), disagreeing with him always makes me feel terrible. “You didn’t like it? The games were brilliant.”
“Of course I liked it, but I’m traumatized. I cried myself to sleep last night after what happened to Joel.”
He nods, like he’s not the person who just emotionally ruined me. “Yeah, that was brutal.”
Seriously. Fuck Abby.
I turn back to Lincoln. Yep, still as ridiculously handsome as I remember. He’s wearing a short-sleeve white T-shirt over charcoal pants, looking like he’s trying to cosplay as Business Casual but mostly just hitting equal parts casual and devastating.
“What are you doing here, anyway?” I ask. “Aren’t you meant to be surfing or base jumping or something?” The tan lines he sported a year ago aren’t there anymore, but with the way the stitching in his pants is fighting for its life around his thighs, I’m going to assume he spends at least forty hours a week pumping something.
Something I’m trying very hard not to imagine at this moment. I’m failing, but at least I’m trying.
Manny barks out a laugh like I’ve just said something ridiculous, and considering the guy always has a grin at the ready, it strikes me that he’s more relaxed than I’ve ever seen him.
Honestly, calling the Scoundrel homely is like saying that Alex Newell can sing. Like, sure, technically it’s true, but way to completely undersell it.
There are scuff marks on the floor where chairs have been moved and rearranged. Water marks on the countertop. The memories of gatherings linger in the furniture the way I remember Nonna’s sofa sagging in the middle. It’s as welcoming as Manny’s smile, as joyous as his laugh.
Problems are nursed here.
Lincoln places his elbow on the bar, looking pleased. “Or something. Have you been checking up on me?”
Of course I have. The man plays at being mysterious so hard that my best friend has spent years attempting to guess his middle name.
“No.”
Lincoln’s smile deepens, his piercing gray eyes sparkling with interest, causing butterflies to skitter wildly in my chest.
His hair is longer. A dark blond lock is pushed behind one ear, and the rest curves and swoops over his head like artist’s strokes, drawing softness around the strong lines of his face, and there’s a day’s worth of stubble making him look like the bad boy I’ve always been attracted to.
“I didn’t realize you two were acquainted,” Manny says, sounding excited by the prospect. I’m going to blame recent life-changing events for not putting two and two together until now. Of course they know each other. The accents really should have tipped me off.
Lincoln doesn’t take his eyes off me. “I’ve only had the pleasure once before.”
My face heats.
There was no pleasure, unless you count Lincoln’s aggressive flirting (and also ignore how much I enjoyed it).
“Briefly,” I say. “We’re basically strangers.”
Lincoln rises out of his seat in an easy glide and carries his beer to the seat beside me. He smells like spice and sweat, and it’s everything I like in a man.
“Let’s change that, shall we?”
I would seriously love it if my insides could stop reacting to him. Even if he would be fun to sleep with— and, oh god, he’d probably be the best sex I’d ever have— I don’t have time to wallow in heartbreak after he inevitably ghosts me. I’m too busy having a life crisis.
Lincoln will just need to take that chiseled jawline and those incredible shoulders and find someone else.
It won’t be hard. His posture suggests he’s a man who’s been taught to push his way through the world, knowing it will move for him. Tall and broad shouldered, his strength is not a suggestion but a fact, present in his steely eyes, the curve of his biceps, the hug of his clothes.
I’ve dated his type before. Fast to desire and even quicker to disappear after they’re satisfied.
The usual “hey, sweet thing. I’ve got just what you need.” No hate to that vibe, but I like a little effort beforehand, you know? A little… pizzazz to my foreplay. And to me, everything is foreplay.
His T-shirt shifts as he lifts his glass, and bullseye— a tattoo. We have a tattoo. Oh god, I think my kneecaps just melted. Either that or I’m swooning. It’s not just any tat, either. No, no. Lincoln Reginald Reeves (oh, nice alliteration) has a snake peeking out from under his shirt. How much of his chest is painted? Where does it go? Can I taste it? That’s probably more of a second date question.
Christ, those thighs are obscene.
Come on, girl. He’s blond, for heaven’s sake. I should know better.
“Can you do something about him?” I ask Manny, whose only response is to chuckle from where he’s mixing a cocktail for someone else. “Sorry, love. I know my cousin better than most, and he’s a hopeless case.”
Just as I suspected.
“Fine,” I say. “Keep your secrets, Lincoln Lionel Reeves.”