Under My Skin (Brantley Falls #1)

1. Lizzie

1

LIZZIE

“Wow, it hasn’t changed one bit, has it?”

“You mean he hasn’t changed one bit,” my painfully blunt best friend, Lia, corrects me.

“No, I mean it .” I eye her seriously. “Am I not supposed to look at a David Beckham-level ass? I mean, it just gets better and better with age. All of him does. It would be a crime not to look.” I make sure to move my hands wildly while explaining this so she understands just how serious I am.

“You do realize this is stalkerish behavior, right? Which is saying a lot coming from me since I don’t really have boundaries.” Lia flips her long blonde hair over her shoulder and gives me a look like she can’t believe I’m behaving this way.

She has a point. We have been staring at the man who has played the lead role in every fantasy I’ve had since I was twelve years old for quite a while.

It’s been twelve years, and it feels like it was yesterday.

It was the beginning of summer vacation. He had just graduated from college and came home looking like the epitome of an all-American boy. He was just starting to put some bulk on his otherwise lean body. His dark brown hair was shaggy and a little too long, and his skin was tanned from countless hours in the sun.

He always had a huge ear-to-ear smile for everyone he came across, and it always reached those warm brown eyes. Deep pools of chocolate with little flecks of gold. The kind you could get lost in if you’re not careful.

Even after being drafted into the NFL and on the verge of making it big, he still came home, spending as much time as possible with his dad and younger sisters before training camp started. He made a point of helping on the farm and driving his sisters around town. He’d stop to make small talk with my parents, and shoot me a wave whenever he caught me staring from my treehouse.

So, I fell headfirst into my—probably very unhealthy—crush on Cameron Dylan. My decade-older next-door neighbor. College football star. Future NFL pro.

Who is now back in town.

“Are you even listening to me?” Lia snaps me out of my trip down memory lane by bumping my shoulder. We’re both still huddled next to the front door window watching my perfect man move back into his childhood home after all these years.

“Yes, I am, and you’re right. It is creepy, but this is as close as I’ll ever get to enjoying him, so can you please let me have some fun?” It comes out a bit more defeated than I meant to.

“Lizzie, you would need to say more than Hi and Sorry for your loss for him to even know you’re interested in him. I mean, back in the day when it was a teenage crush, the hearts in your eyes when you looked at him might have given it away eventually, but men don’t always pick up on that stuff. You need to do something now.”

Lia moves in front of the window and starts waving her arms around excitedly, trying to draw his attention to us. I quickly snatch her away and contemplate wringing her neck and hiding her body in the backyard.

“What are you doing?”

“What? He’ll either think you’re totally creepy for lurking around or that your not-so-secret crush is still going strong after all these years. Which, if I’m being honest, Liz, he’ll probably think is also creepy, but maybe he’ll think it’s sweet and finally asks you out,” Lia remarks dryly.

I watch the window for a second as Cameron walks into his house, his muscles bulging from hauling boxes in from the moving truck.

“Lia…It’s like you don’t even know who you’re talking to right now.” I sigh. “He would never go for me. I mean, look at him and look at me.” I point at myself, and all I get in return from my best friend—maybe former best friend soon—is a dramatic eye roll and a huff of annoyance.

“One day, and hopefully soon for everyone’s sake, you’re going to see the beautiful, funny, smart, sassy, young woman everyone else sees.” Lia’s shoulders sag, almost as if she’s exhausted, like convincing me of my own self-worth is a full-time job she’s been working overtime at.

It’s not that my self-confidence is low. I’m cute, in a girl-next-door way. I choose comfort over fashion. People call me the town sweetheart, which goes to show I’m not exactly the kind of woman Cameron Dylan dates, based on the ones I’ve seen him with over the years on social media.

My brown hair is usually thrown up in a messy topknot or braided down my back, and I’m covered in freckles that no amount of makeup will cover up. I mostly wear overalls, baggy jeans, or leggings and tank tops. I’ve always felt like my look reflects what I do for a living.

I’m an artist. I make one-of-a-kind, handmade pottery. Dinnerware and decorative pieces, like vases, pots, and bowls. I’m pretty good at it, too.

A few years ago, an art collector discovered one of my pieces in a shop in downtown Des Moines, Iowa, which is about an hour and a half east of my small town of Brantley Falls. Now she’s my agent and commissions me to make custom pieces for her gallery in Chicago that go for more than I ever imagined.

I’m lucky to spend my days doing what I love and making a killing at it. Part of it goes toward funding my studio in town, where I offer free workshops to kids on the weekends and during the summer break to give parents a reprieve.

Most importantly, though, it allows me to stay in Brantley Falls. I love my hometown, and I’ve never once thought about leaving. It has all the charm and nostalgia that a small town should offer while still keeping up with modern times and continuing to grow.

A lot of the residents still farm, like my family, who has grown corn here for the past forty years, and the Dylan farm. But while we may have started out as a farm town, we’ve evolved into so much more, and I’m proud to be part of it.

Maybe I’m a girl with modest dreams, but all I’ve ever wanted was to create my pottery, fall in love, start a family, and live happily ever after. All in this town. So that’s what I’m doing.

Well, what I’m trying to do. The pottery side is done. I’m just working on the other stuff.

I’m happy, though. Even with no romance or male companionship, my life brings me joy. I have great parents, great friends, and I get to do what I love.

So what if I never catch the attention of Cameron Dylan? I’m fine.

Even if I could make him see me as more than his next-door neighbor, he has been through a lot lately. The last couple of years—months, especially—have not been kind to him. And what he needs most right now is the support of his family and friends and the town.

“Seriously, though, you need to stop thinking of yourself as some ogre. You’re so much more than what you give yourself credit for.” Lia turns to me, hands on her hips, giving me the sternest look she can muster. “He would be lucky to have you, Lizzie Montgomery.”

“I’m not an ogre—thank you for that comparison, by the way. I’m a little self-conscious, like everyone out there. And the women he’s photographed with are nothing like me.” I break eye contact with her and walk away from the front door and our loitering behavior. “You can’t deny that.”

Lia huffs out a breath before she grabs my shoulders to stop me from retreating.

“You’re right, Lizzie. They are nothing like you. You live life as it is—unfiltered.” I start to turn around, but Lia stops me again, this time taking on a gentler tone when she speaks. “I’m not trying to sound too much like your mom right now, but you’re beautiful inside and out. I honestly think you fail to realize how much attention you get because you’ve only had eyes for one person since you were twelve.”

I muster up my most comforting smile so my best friend doesn’t realize I’m about to cry my eyes out over what she just said. She really is the best.

“I don’t think he and I are going to end up together. I’m not holding out for him or anything.” She continues to hold my gaze with a concerned look, so I continue in my quest to ease her worry. “It’s just…No one has caught my eye or made me wish for more, and I don’t want to waste my time with somebody I can’t see a future with. You know?”

“I don’t feel like you give anyone a chance. What about Brian the firefighter?” Before I can reply, she continues, “He’s handsome and funny and has a great body, and he’s asked you out twice already.”

“There’s no spark. He’s good-looking, especially with all those muscles, and he’s a great guy, but I feel absolutely nothing for him when we interact.” I move deeper into the house toward the kitchen as I talk. “I’m just not attracted to him like that. I don’t have the urge to jump his bones. He doesn’t make me want to climb him like a tree.”

Once we get to the kitchen, I turn around to make sure Lia is still following me because she’s not one to keep quiet for long, and that’s when I notice her resigned facial expression.

“What? Shouldn’t I be sexually attracted to someone if I’m thinking about dating them? What happens when it comes time to do the deed and I’m not into it? I mean, that would be crazy awkward. Can you imagine?” I try and fail to lighten the mood.

“I just think you have to give people a chance sometimes. See if something starts to brew. You don’t want to be a virgin forever, Liz.” Lia says the last part under her breath, hoping to get a rise out of me.

“For the record, I am not a virgin, and you know it,” I whisper-shout in case my parents are suddenly within hearing distance.

“That one sexual encounter you had doesn’t count. You told me how bad it was, and he didn’t even make you come,” she whisper-shouts in return.

Fine, he didn’t make me come, but I did technically lose my virginity, i.e., he was in there. The whole thing was so embarrassing and awkward, though. He asked me if I came too—who asks that?—and I just muttered yes and left as quickly as I could.

I never spoke to him again.

That experience alone, four years ago, shows my need for a spark. If I’m being honest, I didn’t really like Derek, but I was hellbent on cashing in my V-card. I was visiting Lia at college for a weekend during her sophomore year, and he was a friend of one of her friends. He was nice enough, I guess, but I should have known he would be selfish in bed. He barely even kissed me.

So yeah, that cannot happen again. I want the lust and the butterflies and the urge to rip his clothes off. And I won’t settle for less.

“Honestly, why are we even talking about this?” I throw my head back, tired from this conversation. “I’m sure I will meet the right person some day and have amazing sex in some over-the-top, romance-novel fashion, but until then, I’m not wasting my time on guys who don’t do it for me.”

“Fine.” Lia barely gets the word through her teeth with how hard she’s grinding them in annoyance.

“Fine,” I volley back just so I can have the last word, knowing that will annoy her even more.

We mumble goodbyes and go our separate ways. I’m glad Lia is back home for the summer before she starts her master’s degree in the fall, but I can already tell she is going to want to push me out of my comfort zone even more now.

I decide to skip dinner and instead grab a few snacks from my parents’ pantry before heading next door to my apartment, which was converted from our old barn and turned into the most luxurious space for me to live and work. It may not seem like much, but it’s everything I need and want.

It’s my safe place. My retreat. And it allows me to stay close to my parents and be on the farm. Exactly where I love to be.

I try to decompress with a little reading, hoping it will take my mind off my crappy love life and dead-end crush. Maybe it’s time to move on from my Cameron Dylan fantasy and put myself out there. Maybe a spark does take time, and I need to give other guys a chance.

Before sleep takes me, I decide that I’m going to do just that.

Unfortunately, my mind plagues me all night with the possibly foreshadowing dream about dying an old spinster with twenty cats and surrounded by pottery.