CHAPTER62
LARISA
Dinner with Tanner and his mother.The thought gave me a warm thrill. Although he’d never said it in so many words, I knew he was close to her. A lot of the stuff he’d said had indicated that she was the most important person in his life, and the fact that he wanted me to meet her spoke volumes.
Frankly, it was a huge step, especially since we were going to be taking it so soon after officially getting together, but it was one I was ready to take. Tanner and I seemed to be making our own rules as we went along.
Our relationship had started off on a weird foot after he’d stormed away from me at that charity auction when I’d been trying to tell him that bumping into me hadn’t been fully his fault. Ever since, it had seemed that was our thing. Odd timing and misunderstandings abounded between us, and yet we always managed to make our way back together to find each other again.
“You know what?” Brit said over the speaker, her voice coming from my phone which was on the dressing table next to my makeup. We were getting caught up after the last few days, but I had to get ready while we spoke or else I wouldn’t be able to go on time.
I blinked while holding my mascara wand to my lashes, and gave her a small nod even though she couldn’t see me. “What?”
“You two should just do you. It is soon to be meeting the parents, but who cares? Your entire relationship has been a little unconventional. I mean, your first date was an entire weekend together paid for by your best friend’s husband. It doesn’t get much weirder than that, but it works for you.”
“That’s exactly how I feel,” I said. “It’s like you took the words and plucked them right out of my head. To be honest with you, I know I should probably be freaked out that he asked me to meet her only a few weeks into our actual relationship, but I’m not. The truth is that I’m a little giddy about it.”
“Well, I’m thrilled for you,” she replied. “You deserve all this happiness you’re feeling. You are though, right? Happy?”
“I’m happy,” I confirmed without having to think about it. “It feels like everything is finally coming together for me, personally and professionally. I don’t think I could be much happier.”
I set the mascara wand down and looked at myself in the mirror. The woman staring back at me was an entirely different person than the empty-eyed being I’d seen in that bathroom just yesterday morning. Today, my eyes were shining like glowing orbs of joy and even my skin looked radiant.
The way I saw it, Tanner and I had faced a potentially relationship-defining or even ending situation and we’d come through it unscathed. Not only that, but we’d come through it ready to take things to a new level.
I was proud of us for having handled the whole thing so differently than we might’ve in the past. Just a few weeks ago, I would’ve accepted that he was back to his playboy ways and I would’ve gone out of my way to avoid him, and he wouldn’t have picked up the phone first thing to explain.
We’d evolved a lot in a short amount of time and I, for one, thought that it showed a lot of progress in our relationship that we’d handled it the way we had. Aside from my initial wobble, I’d managed to stay perfectly calm and he’d explained without me even needing to ask him to.
I grinned, declaring myself physically ready for the dinner with his mother, as well as emotionally for this new phase of being with him. Brit’s voice snapped irritably when I finally tuned back in.
“Hello? Earth to Larisa. What the hell happened to you?”
I blinked hard to shake myself out of my thoughts. “Sorry. You lost me for a minute. I was just thinking about something.”
“I bet.” She laughed, but she still sounded exasperated. “I hate newly in love people. They’re so distracted all the time.”
“I’m not in love,” I said. “Even if I was, you’d have to put up with me being that way because I put up with you when it was your turn.”
“You’re so in love,” she countered. “Don’t even try to deny it because I know it’s true even if you don’t.”
A knock at my door startled me and I jumped. I turned my wrist to check my watch. “Shit. I lost track of time. I think he’s here.”
“He’s there?” she squeaked. “Are you ready?”
I glanced at the mirror and nodded. “Basically. I still need to add a spritz of perfume and transfer my stuff to another purse, but other than that, yes, I think I’m ready.”
“Then go get him,” she cheered. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“Have a good night,” I called, already leaving my bedroom behind.
I opened the door, and seeing Tanner made my heart skip a beat. He was dressed casually in a pair of faded jeans and a fitted, long-sleeved Henley with sneakers on his feet, but he still looked delicious.
He smiled at me for a second when he first saw me, but then he snaked his arm around my waist and pulled me closer to greet me with a deep kiss. I was breathless and aching for him by the time he released my mouth, sorely tempted to let it progress to more, but I knew we’d be late if we let ourselves get distracted.
As soon as he ended the kiss, he held up a beautiful bouquet of wine-red roses and made a show of looking me over. “These are for you, but I forgot to give them to you when you opened the door because I was too desperate to kiss you. You look stunning, by the way.”
“Thank you.” I threaded my fingers through his and I pulled him into my apartment and closed the door behind us. “I just need a few more minutes to finish getting ready, and then we can head out.”