“Yes, really. You messed me up. I had no idea what the hell was going on, which is probably what you saw when I looked at you. You were so beautiful with that pixie haircut and big hazel eyes, scared as a mouse but tough as nails. I couldn’t look away. I wanted to wrap you up and protect you from everyone and everything. Then Red asked if I could keep an eye on you, and man, as time went on, I wanted more than my eyes on you. I thought I was losing my mind. You were this tiny flick of a woman, nothing like the chicks I knew, and you were what? Twenty-four then? I was thirty, and that didn’t sit so well with me, either. But then I got to know you, and none of that mattered. Then that wedding changed everything. Watching you in that slinky little dress, thinking about how screwed I was, but at least I was keeping it under control.”

“Not really,” she teased. “Izzy and Dix and everyone else kept telling me you wanted to bend me over the pool table.”

He laughed. “Well, they weren’t wrong.”

“I know that now. But remember at Thanksgiving when you cornered me and asked if I had a date for the wedding, I was so confused.”

“That makes two of us.”

“And then at the wedding, I thought you were going to ask me to dance.”

“That night changed everything. I was keeping my distance until Rhys set his sights on you from across the dance floor. Jesus. Suddenly I realized you were everything I wanted and all that mattered.”