Izzy
Her heart leapt into her throat and her traitorous body hummed as soon as she rounded the corner into the living room. Tanner, still every inch as gorgeous as he’d been in college, was sitting on the couch clad only in pajama pants, sound asleep with his head leaning on the back of the couch. His hand rested on the smartphone on his bare chest that, if it were possible, had only grown broader and stronger over the past dozen years.
His light brown hair was tousled, and her fingers itched to bury themselves in the thick mass. The lashes that were ridiculously long for any man rested against his tanned cheeks, and she groaned.
Izzy held onto the wall for support. She wanted to run her fingertips down his thick bicep. She wanted to plant soft kisses along his shoulders. She wanted to walk over and straddle his lap and…
Had she done that? The thought pummeled her heart and her mind at the same time. Had she run her hands across Tanner’s well-defined abdomen? Had she trailed her hands up his strong back? Izzy felt sick again.
Her gaze traveled down her own body. She had less than zero desire to run today, but nevertheless she pulled on spandex shorts and a knit tank top and ran five miles on the treadmill. She had managed to lose most of the weight after she had the kids, but her abdomen still wasn’t as tight as it had been. Her hips were still a little wider. She still wore clothes two sizes bigger than she had in college.
Was that why? Was that why Tanner had wanted someone else? She felt nauseated again.
She crossed the room and sat on the coffee table in front of him, biting her lower lip. She wanted to hate him so much right now, but it was still Tanner sitting in front of her. Reaching out, she tapped his knee lightly. She didn’t trust herself to touch his bare skin.
He slowly lifted his head, eyes growing wide when he saw her. He scrubbed a hand across his face and down his bearded cheek, offering her a sheepish smile. “Mornin’, Belle. Did you sleep, sweetheart?”
Belle. Sweetheart. Two names she’d always cherished now sliced through her heart, but she couldn’t bring herself to chastise him. It felt as good to hear as it hurt. “A little.” She looked down at her lap and nervously ran her hand up and down her mostly bare thighs. “The, um, the kids are going to be back in a little while, and I think we need to, um, I think we need to figure out…” She gestured between the two of them.
“You’re right.” He leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees and bringing his head close to hers. “Can I…can I hold your hand?”
Her heart constricted. Was this ever going to stop hurting? “I-I think I need space. I don’t think I can figure this out with you so close.”
Tanner nodded and moved to the other side of the couch. His face registered a brief flicker of hurt before he offered a weak smile. “Whatever you need, Belle.”
Izzy stood and walked over to the window, shaking her head. “That’s not what I meant, Tanner. I need…” Her throat closed around the next words, and she tried to find something, anything, outside she could focus on. “I-I need you to leave. A-and I need you to stay.”
She spun around, tears falling down her cheeks, and every ounce of the pain and anger she’d so carefully avoided last night began to bubble. “I can’t look at you! I can’t touch you, I can’t hear your voice, and I really can’t hear you call me Belle one more time. The guy who called me Belle? He promised he’d never hurt me. He walked around every underdressed, oversexed girl that threw themselves at him after each game to get to me. For weeks and weeks he was happy to lie next to me without anything more than a few kisses. That,” she spit out the word, “is the only person allowed to call me Belle.”
He stood from his seat on the couch, looking totally shell-shocked. Even though a small voice in her head told her to stop, once she began to voice her heartache, she couldn’t stop. “I don’t know what I did or what I didn’t do to make that guy leave.” She hiccuped and wound her arms tight around herself. “And I don’t know who you are.”
Before the last words had even left her mouth, he strode across the room until he stood in front of her and grasped the tops of her arms. “Don’t. Don’t say that. Don’t you dare believe any of that. You have been the best thing to happen to me since the first time I saw you. Don’t think for one minute that this, that any of this, is you. I’m the only one responsible for being here right now.”
He pressed his forehead hard against hers, his breathing as labored as if he had just finished a marathon. She had to close her eyes at the agony reflected in his. “This is your call. Whether I stay or whether I go. I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll even sign d-divorce papers if you can’t forgive me.” A tear streaked down his cheek as he stumbled over the words.
Izzy’s eyes flew open and her hands immediately went to his face and she held him close. “No, Tanner.” Words died on her lips, and she circled her arms around his neck as she dissolved into hysterical sobs against his chest. She couldn’t help it. She needed him as much as she hated him right now.
“Shit, sweetheart, I can’t imagine my world without you beside me.” He choked out the words, tightening his arms around her waist. “But I can’t hurt you anymore. If you want me gone, I’ll go.”
She pulled back a little from him. “I just need space to think. That’s all. I d-don’t w-want a d-d-d…” She fell against him again, unable to even say the word.
The sound of a car traveling up their driveway registered to both of them at the same time, and their arms fell as they jumped apart. He jerked his chin toward the small half-bathroom just outside the living room. “I’ll let them in if you want to wash your face off or something.”
Izzy nodded and caught him grabbing his t-shirt off the back of the couch and sliding it on. Why couldn’t he have slept in the stupid shirt? she wondered bitterly, as irritated with her body for craving his as she was at the man himself.
She regarded herself carefully in the mirror above the pedestal sink in the small half-bath. Dousing her face with three handfuls of cold water had almost erased the red rims and bags. She practiced the carefree smile a few times before greeting her kids.
After several hugs and simultaneous chatter about all the things they had done with their grandparents, Izzy noticed a strange look pass between her in-laws.
“Ava, Noah, come show Grandma that new slide Uncle Connor added to your playground.” Tanner’s mother grabbed each child by the hand and let them lead her.
Before Izzy could say anything, they disappeared out the back door. She turned around and swallowed when she saw the furious expression on her father-in-law’s face as his gaze moved from one to the other before landing on Tanner.
“What the hell did you do, son?”
***
The third time Tanner laughed at her, Izzy dropped his hand and smacked his arm. “It’s not funny!”
“Aww Belle, it’s damn near hysterical.” He continued to chuckle as they took the exit off Interstate 40 for Asheville. “Just when I thought you couldn’t get any more adorable, you get all worked up over meeting my parents.”
She laced her fingers through his again and turned to look out the window in an effort to hide her flushed cheeks. She wondered absently when she’d get used to his charm and stop blushing with each compliment. “It’s important, baby. I just…I just want them to like me.”
“Not a chance in hell they’re gonna like you, Belle.”
Her eyes widened, and she whipped her head around to face him. “You’ve spent the past three days telling me not to worry and assuring me everything would be okay, and now, now you feel the need to tell me there is no way they are going to like me?”
Tanner lifted her hand to his lips and brushed a kiss across her knuckles. “They aren’t going to like you, sweetheart. They are going to love you.” He flashed her a cocky grin. “Not as much as I love you, of course, but they are going to love you nonetheless.”
Izzy settled back in the leather seat of Tanner’s Jeep with a small smile tugging at her lips. “You’re a jerk, you know that?” Only to herself could she admit that his encouraging words did, indeed, boost her confidence.
And that confidence disappeared as soon as they pulled into the driveway of his parents’ house. Her dad had always been very successful and, even after the divorce, she’d lived in comfort, but nothing had prepared her for Tanner’s home.
“Tanner…” She couldn’t even utter more than his name, suddenly sick to her stomach.
“What’s wrong, Belle?” He guided the Jeep around the curve in the long, cement driveway. His tone was completely nonchalant and completely irritating.
She blinked a few times as they crested the top of the drive and the house came into view. Her mouth was dry and her voice hoarse when she finally spoke. “You live in a mansion.”
He threw the car into park in front of the wide stone steps leading to the front door. Tanner’s brows drew together. He leaned over the center console and regarded the two-story red brick house sprawled out in front of the passenger’s window. “Nah, it’s not a mansion.”
Izzy turned in her seat and pinned him with a look full of disbelief. “We drove through a wrought iron gate, up a two-mile long driveway, and I’m fairly certain somebody named Jeeves is going to be opening the front door any second to welcome the young master home from university.”
After several beats of silence, Tanner erupted with laughter. He grabbed both sides of Izzy’s face and pulled her in for a warm, sweet kiss. “Not a mansion. No staff. No pretentious family. Just a bunch of people who have spent the past two months hearing about my amazing girlfriend and can’t wait to meet her. Even more tomorrow, when the rest of them show up for Thanksgiving.”
She smiled against his mouth and linked her hands behind his neck. “You’ve been talkin’ bout me?”
He hummed in the affirmative as she deepened the kiss before pulling back slightly. “You may want to stop there, sweetheart. Even though there aren’t any servants waiting in the wings, I can almost guarantee there are half a dozen people gathered around those windows.”
Her cheeks burned, and she buried her face against his chest. “You could have said something sooner,” she mumbled against his blue-checkered button-down shirt.
Tanner did nothing more than laugh and plant a final kiss on her temple before tugging her into the house behind him. Despite the nerves leading up to meeting the Carlisle family, Mike and Tracy quickly made Izzy feel like more than a welcome guest—they made her feel like she was exactly where she belonged.
As Tanner assured her, there were no servants waiting in the wings. Other than Tanner himself, who made a point to make sure Izzy did nothing. When he carried her bag to her room, she was grateful. When she wanted a drink of water and he practically knocked over the chair he was sitting in to get it, she thought it was sweet. But when he tried to fill her plate for her at dinner, she flashed a sweet smile to the rest of his family and begged to be excused before pulling him from the table.
She dragged him down one of the long halls before ducking into an alcove beneath the stairs, confident they were out of earshot. “Tanner. What was that?”
A look of utter confusion descended on his face. “Dinner? With you and my family?” He shook his head but took the opportunity of their secluded space to pull her close and bury his face in her neck. “I mean if you want to do something else…”
Izzy smacked his shoulder and pushed him away, unable to stop the laughter that accompanied it. “No! And I mean with the waiting on me hand and foot thing. I appreciate that you like doing stuff for me, but baby, your family is going to think I’m some sort of spoiled princess.”
“Too much?” He winced before flashing her the sad puppy dog eyes that wormed their way straight into her heart.
She held her thumb and forefinger a half an inch apart. “Just a little.” Not wanting to hurt his feelings, she wrapped her arms around his waist and stood on her tip toes to offer a kiss. “How about after dinner we go into one of the other million rooms in this place not occupied by various members of your family and watch a movie?”
The look of chagrin disappeared at the suggestion, replaced quickly with a mischievous smile. “Have you been reading my business textbooks, sweetheart? Because you are getting pretty damn good at this negotiating thing. Maybe you’ll have to join Dad’s company with me after graduation.”
Izzy clamped down on her bottom lip. Was he really planning on still being with her in four years? Sure, he said he loved her, and she loved him more than she thought it was possible to love another human, but…
Her thoughts contorted her face into a mixture of concern and disbelief. She could tell the exact moment Tanner read her expression. “Belle, what’s wrong?”
“You still want to be with me?” The words tumbled out before she could cover with an excuse. She found it nearly impossible to keep anything from Tanner. “I mean, when we graduate. And after. You still want to be with me?”
Every feature on his face from his strong brow line to his square jaw softened. A small smile she had never seen before lit his lips and his eyes. “Sweetheart, I don’t know how to tell you this without scaring you.” He shook his head slightly. “Belle, I love you and I just don’t see a life for me without you in it. Forever. I know this seems too soon—”
Before he could finish his thought, she leapt into his arms, wrapping her own around his neck and her legs around his waist. She wanted to tell him how much that meant. How she had been uncertain in every area of her life and in every relationship other than theirs. How every dream she had always held for her future suddenly included him in it. But she couldn’t. “Me too,” she whispered in his ear.
He sighed softly in reply and just held her until a loud growl made them both pull back. Pink appeared on Izzy’s cheeks once more, and she glanced down at her abdomen. “Sorry?” She wrinkled her nose.
Never letting go, Tanner held her close and walked them both back to the dining room with a chuckle, only releasing her just outside of the entryway. “All right, all right, go fix your own plate, Princess Belle.”
She winked before turning into the dining room. “Princess? That would make you Prince Charming, eh?”
After a cheerful family dinner the likes of which Izzy had never experienced before, she shooed him out of the kitchen, assuring him she could help his mother put everything away and load the dishwasher by herself while he chose a movie. She couldn’t help that her eyes tracked him as he left the room. Or that the entire evening had left a grin on her face she couldn’t lose.
“You’re good for him,” a voice behind her commented softly.
Izzy straightened from her position stacking the plates in the dishwasher. “I’m sorry?” She certainly couldn’t have heard Mrs. Carlisle right. Tanner was the perfect boyfriend. He didn’t need any improvement.
A warm smile graced her lips, and she tucked a stray curl of light brown hair identical to Tanner’s behind her ear. “You’re good for Tanner. He’s never been this excited to come home. He’s never brought anyone here, even when he was in high school, and he has never looked so peaceful and relaxed. I swear that child was born to carry all the responsibility on his shoulders.” She tilted her head and looked at Izzy thoughtfully. “Yeah, you’re good for him.”
As her words sank in, warmth spread through her chest. He really did love her. He really did think she was special. They were special.
“We’re good for each other.”