Page 23 of Isolated (Harper Security Ops #21)

Iris

Good things come to those who wait.

Exercising patience had never been a problem for me.

Whether that was the result of a phrase I’d heard countless times throughout my life or merely the result of having experienced precisely that, I didn’t know.

But there hadn’t ever been a time in my life when I’d struggled to remain patient. All my life, I’d been confident that whatever was bound to come my way would do so when the time was right.

That didn’t mean I wasn’t eager for certain things to happen. Of course, I was. But I found ways to focus my energy on other things until the timing was right. It had never failed me.

Though I suspected the same could be the case now. The fact that I was standing here clutching my phone in my hand mere minutes after my sisters left to head home to Grouse indicated I might not have been as unflappable as I would have liked to believe.

Then again, Landen had entered the equation now.

And I’d been waiting a long time to have a guy like him show interest in me.

Granted, there were no guarantees as to where things would lead, but after all this time, didn’t I deserve to be just a touch greedy?

Was I not entitled to some moments of weakness?

Try as I might, I couldn’t seem to forget a single second of last night. More specifically, I continued to replay everything that had happened from the moment Landen had shown up at The Steel Pub until he left from the moment that I crawled into my bed.

The dancing, the touching, the whispers, the closeness….

I didn’t even have to close my eyes to try to remember it. Somehow, I swore I could still feel his touch lingering on my skin, still hear his voice murmuring in my ear.

It had barely been a half of a day since we’d said goodbye to one another last night, but it felt like full days had passed. I was craving one more conversation, one more swipe of his fingertips across my skin, one more comforting embrace.

If Eleni and Flora hadn’t left a few minutes ago, I didn’t doubt my ability to keep myself restrained, composed. I would have been distracted by conversation and spending time visiting with them. It wasn’t as though they hadn’t already given me the third degree once we left.

Well, Flora had.

In a surprising twist, Eleni hadn’t said a whole lot. And I found that to be strange. Because the oldest of my two younger sisters generally couldn’t hold herself back. And it was clear she’d been doing that last night, because the questions and thoughts were written all over her face.

I had no clue what had been going through her mind, but Flora was more than willing to share her own thoughts. She was ecstatic about what happened, even if she was befuddled by how it all went down.

“You’ve done that before, haven’t you?” She questioned me the moment we’d gotten into the car last night. I was driving, and she was riding in the front passenger’s seat.

“Done what?”

Flora scoffed. “Approached a guy like that.”

“I’ve never done that before, Flora.”

Silence filled the air, and though I could sense the questions Flora still had for me, it was the strange tension coming from Eleni in the back seat that had me feeling a touch uneasy. I was about to ask her what was going on, but Flora finally decided she wanted some answers.

“How is that possible?”

“I’m not sure I understand what you’re asking me. You want to know how it’s possible that I’ve never approached a guy like that in a bar before. Is that what you’re asking?”

I glanced over to see she’d turned in her seat to face me completely.

When our eyes locked, she nodded. “Yes. Yes, I want to know. I mean, you’ve always been so unbelievably confident, Iris.

It’s one thing I’ve always admired about you.

But what you did tonight was on another level of self-assurance. I could never do something like that.”

My attention was focused on the road again, but I couldn’t stop the smile from spreading across my face. “Of course, you can. That’s precisely the reason I did it. And look how it turned out.”

“That’s not the reason you did it.” At Eleni’s sudden interjection into the conversation, my body tensed. “You did it because you were so determined to prove me wrong.”

Technically, I’d done it because it was Landen who’d been standing there, but I wasn’t going to tell her that. Plus, I’d wanted them to believe the best was still ahead for the three of us.

When I spent too much time thinking about it, Eleni added, “Congratulations, Iris. You won.”

My eyes narrowed as I came to the last traffic light I’d hit before getting to my house. It was red, so I stopped and countered, “Are you angry with me?”

“What?”

I twisted my neck and looked back at her. “You’re angry. You’re mad because I did it, because I followed through on what I said I was going to do. Why?”

She pressed her lips together, clearly fighting the urge to say whatever was on her mind. “I’m not mad. I just congratulated you.”

“And there was a level of snark that I can’t ignore. You can deny it all you want, but I know you’re mad at me. And since you won’t say why, I guess I’ll have to make my own assumptions. Maybe it’s because now you won’t have any excuses when I say that there are good guys out there for each of us.”

I stared at her expectantly, but she only muttered, “The light’s green.”

Sighing with frustration, I turned around and started driving again .

Flora, being the one who always tried to diffuse the tension, returned the conversation to tonight’s specific events.

“He was so good-looking. You’re so lucky, Iris.

If I ever worked up the courage to do what you did tonight, I’d probably fail.

You did that, and the guy was so handsome.

And he was clearly into you. He gave you his number. ”

A hint of a smile played at my lips as a vision of Landen flashed in my mind.

Though it was nice to hear, I really didn’t need my sister’s confirmation that he’d been into me.

I experienced it when he looked at me the way he did all night.

Plus, there was the way his hands moved over my body and the way he whispered in my ear right before we left.

The only thing he hadn’t done, which I’d been hoping for, was kiss me.

And there’d been a few instances when I believed he was going to do just that.

But he didn’t.

And I wondered if that had been on purpose.

Because he had to know the effect that he’d had on me all night.

I was relatively certain I had done a good job of letting him know where I stood.

There wasn’t a chance he didn’t know that I was a very willing participant and that he could have easily gone in for the kiss.

Deciding to lean into those vibes while I was in the car with my sisters, I glanced over at Flora again and grinned. “He was so handsome, wasn’t he?”

She beamed at me.

And though she’d kept the conversation on the lighter side for the rest of the drive home, Eleni didn’t ever join in. When we got back to my place, she’d made it clear she was in no mood to be around us. “It’s late, and we’ve got to get out of here early tomorrow. I’m going to bed. ”

“Eleni?” I called after her.

She didn’t turn around, continuing to move toward the stairs. “It’s fine, Iris. I’m just tired after being out all day today.”

I rolled my eyes as Flora offered a sympathetic smile.

And this morning, things didn’t improve. The sleep hadn’t done anything to lift Eleni’s mood. She was just as irritated this morning as she’d been last night. But that didn’t stop me from trying to smooth things over with her after she’d spent the entire time at breakfast being silent.

“Eleni, I’m sorry about last night.”

“For what? You did exactly what you said you would.”

I arched a brow. “I did what you told me you didn’t think I would ever do. I don’t understand why you’re upset about it.”

She shook her head. “Are you kidding? I expected nothing less from you, Iris. When have you ever not gotten what you wanted?”

I jerked back at the harshness in her tone. “Is that a bad thing?”

There wasn’t any instance where I could ever see myself being upset that either one of my sisters had achieved whatever they’d wanted in their lives.

“It’s fine. Just let it go.”

“No, Eleni, it’s not. You’re being miserable for no reason.

Is it because I spent the night dancing with Landen instead of being with the two of you?

Because if it is, just tell me. But I’ll tell you this…

If it had been you or Flora that approached a guy last night and had gotten what I did, I would’ve been jumping for joy and celebrating with you.

I would’ve been excited for you. You always find a way to bring everyone’s mood down, and you always do it at my expense. I’m so sick of it.”

She held my stare for several beats. Then she set down her coffee mug, looked at Flora, and said, “We need to get going. I’ve got to get back to Grouse.”

Without giving either one of us a chance to respond, she stood and walked away, climbing the stairs to get her things. Flora did her best to apologize and smooth things over, but it wasn’t her battle to fight.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get the opportunity to work it out with Eleni before they left, because after she got her things from the spare bedroom, she walked out the front door and got in the car.

It was frustrating but, like always, I figured I’d give her the time she needed to cool off and reach out to her in a day or two.

For a little while after my sisters left, I thought back on the time I’d had with them. I really wanted to piece together what was going on with Eleni, but I realized it wasn’t just last night. I needed to consider how things had changed between us over the last couple of months.

It was far more than I was prepared to tackle this morning. And considering how wonderful last night had been, dwelling on the negativity today just wasn’t something I wanted to do.