Her eyes narrowed. I shoved the entire bite in my mouth and groaned. Molly picked up her own fork and stabbed her salad like it was a teeny tiny Isabel voodoo doll.
My sister’s fiance, Noah, rubbed her back and set a small piece of bread onto her plate. “You can have some carbs, Molly.”
“Yeah, Molly,” I said, “you can have carbs.”
She threw the bread at me, and I caught it with a laugh.
Paige sighed. “Isabel, don’t poke the carb-deprived bear.”
She set her jaw, my happy, kind, friendly sister who was so carb-deprived angry that she looked like she was plotting my death. “Easy for you to say, you work out for a living.” Then she glanced around the table. “Oh my gosh, half the people here work out for a living. This is bullshit,” she grumbled, spearing a piece of asparagus.
She wasn’t wrong.
Logan held up his hand. “Don’t include me in that. Coaches don’t have to be in shape.”
“You sure expect your players to be, though,” Noah grumbled between bites of his own pasta.
Logan exhaled happily. “Great conditioning today, wasn’t it, Griffin?”
Noah gave him a long look.
“Speaking of people working out for a living,” I said, “where’s Bauer?”
Claire sighed. “He’s up in Vancouver for some training thing that he couldn’t miss.”
I held my fist out across the table. “Hey, now I’m not the only single one at the family dinner.”
She bumped my fist. Our nephew, Logan and Paige’s ten-year-old son Emmett, scoffed. “I’m single too. Thanks a lot.”
Claire fist-bumped him, and I reached across to do the same.
Paige grinned over the rim of her wineglass. “This is the closest we’ve had to the whole zoo at one table in like … a year.”
“Is that why it’s so loud?” Logan asked.
“Yes,” Claire and I answered.
From the kitchen, Lia walked toward the table, balancing two plates in her hands. Behind her was her boyfriend, Jude, carrying a sound asleep Gabriel. He glanced around the table. “Anyone want a sleeping baby?”
Paige, Molly, and I all raised our hands.
Jude cast a skeptical look at all three of us, then lifted his chin at Molly. “You’re up, then.”
“Rude,” Paige muttered.
I frowned. “You’re just picking her because she’s got that look in her eye like she’ll cut you.”
Noah choked on his food. Molly sat back down in her chair, Gabriel tucked into the crook of her arm, with a beatific smile on her face. “I can’t wait until you get engaged someday, Iz, and we’ll see how you act when you’re a couple of months away from your wedding, and you don’t want bread making you puffy because you ordered your dress just a little bit too small on accident.”
Isabel Ward Hennessy. Isabel Hennessy. Isabel and Aiden 4-ever.
If I pinched my eyes closed, I could see the purple-inked doodles in my head. That damn diary might not be in the metal box, but it was probably still up in my old bedroom, and oh, my gosh, I wanted to go find it and burn it.
I may never send this letter, but would you come to my junior prom with me? I have a light purple dress that my brother bought I bought for myself. And I love daisies, if you’d want to get me a corsage made of those. Only if you want.
Shutting off my brain would’ve been lovely because my face immediately went flame hot. After that, Aiden’s face was what popped into my head like an asshole. And my older sister noticed immediately. “What’s that face?”
“Nothing.” I shoved another bite of pasta in my mouth. “Involuntary physical reaction at the idea of giving up carbs.”
She rolled her eyes.
I could feel the weight of Paige’s gaze on the side of my face, which was why I ignored her.
At some point, I’d always known that the right person would wedge their foot in the proverbial door before I could slam it shut.
But it would have to be a big foot. No pun intended. The thought of big feet and big hands and big … arms had me shoving food in my mouth again. It was just hard to imagine how everyone else seemed to have such an easy time letting that happen, opening up, and just being normal.
But because it was me, of course it wasn’t that easy.
The first guy to flip all the right switches was part fantasy, part forbidden reality, and all fricken perfect from what I could see.
“How’s the new boss, Iz?” Logan asked.
That delicious pasta turned to ash in my mouth because there was no way he could’ve been following my thoughts. It was my turn to glare now.
“What?” he asked. “Are we not talking about that?”
Paige stifled a laugh.
He sighed. “You’re supposed to tell me when I’m not allowed to ask things,” he said to his wife.
Molly laughed. “Iz is just touchy because she had such a raging crush on him when he first started to fight.”
“I did not,” I protested, but it was a weak one at best. I wouldn’t have believed me either.
Lia laughed. “You used to cut his picture out of Sports Illustrated and tape it up on the back of your door. You told us after he was at the gym the first time.”
Hands shaking as I gripped my plate, I stood from the table. I’d rather face a firing squad than that topic. “You know, I think I’m done eating.”
Paige smacked Lia. “Should we remind you of who you used to tape up on your wall?”
Her laughter faded. We all remembered the Bieber-with-the-long-hair phase Lia and Claire went through. It lasted a solid two years.
“My eardrums are still recovering from that block of time,” Logan muttered.
Jude hummed. “Kate Winslet for me. I met her at a dinner a few years ago, and I about passed out when she shook my hand.”
“See?” I gestured to Jude. “It’s not just me.”
Molly snuck a piece of bread from Noah’s plate, pointing a finger at me when she was done chewing. “He’s your boss, though. Your ability to separate your
