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“Smile, please,” Blake said. “If not so I can enjoy your beautiful face, do it for everyone who came tonight. Otherwise I’ll be forced to do things to make you smile. Like pick my nose. Or sing to you.”
Ivy smiled, but he wasn’t sure whether it was just to keep him from singing. It seemed sincere enough.
“Don’t let her ruin tonight,” Blake said. “I wanted this dance to be special, like our first one was. I don’t want to spend tonight with you mad at me.”
Ivy looked up at him, her green eyes near black in the dim light of the dance. “I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at myself for being so easily manipulated by her even after all this time. She just . . .” Her voice faded away. “She knows how to go straight for my jugular. Lydia loves to exploit my every insecurity.”
Blake’s brow knit together in confusion. “You’re a gorgeous, talented, rich rock star. Half the men in America would kill to be me right now. What have you got to feel insecure about?”
“I’m human, Blake. That girl on the album covers and in the music videos isn’t real. I have as many insecurities as the next woman, especially when I come home to the place and the people that knew me before I was anybody special.”
“You were always someone special, Ivy. Maybe it took a platinum album to convince you, but you were always special to me.”
“Blake . . . ?” Ivy said quickly, and then seemed to lose her courage.
“What is it?”
Ivy sighed and looked at his bow tie instead of his eyes. “If that night at Auburn never happened and we didn’t break up when we did . . . would you have asked me to marry you one day?”
Blake was a little stunned by the question. It was something he hadn’t thought about in a long time. “Why on earth would you ask that now, after all these years? What did Lydia say to you?”
A tiny flush of pink embarrassment rushed to Ivy’s cheeks. “Lydia . . . Lydia said you thought I was good enough to sleep with, but that you never would’ve married me because I wasn’t good enough to be a Chamberlain.”
“Jesus,” Blake muttered, softly shaking his head. If there weren’t a hundred people watching and a spotlight highlighting their every move, Blake would’ve sought out Lydia and given her a piece of his mind.
“So . . . would you?” Ivy pressed.
“Yes,” he said simply. “I had every intention of marrying you and making a future together. Ivy, despite the fact that I was the one who ruined our relationship, I was already thinking about rings. I was planning to propose that Christmas.”
Ivy’s eyes grew wide as Berlin cranked out the last few notes and Gloria invited everyone onto the dance floor for the next song, Madonna’s “Crazy for You.” With the spotlight gone, they were once again blanketed in the dim multicolored lights. Dozens of couples crowded around them, forcing them closer together.
Blake crooked his finger beneath Ivy’s chin and lifted it so she had no choice but to look at him. “There’s no such thing as ‘good enough’ or ‘not good enough’ to be a Chamberlain. We’re just a family, not a pantheon. Don’t let anyone ever tell you you’re not good enough for me.”
Ivy’s eyes searched his face for a moment. He kept waiting for her to say something, but she didn’t. Instead, her palms gripped his lapels and pulled him down until their lips met. There was so much emotion in her kiss, so much behind every desperate caress and nibble of her lips and teeth and tongue. Appreciation, desire, relief.
There, on the darkened dance floor, it was easy to give in to it. He let his hands roam over the slick fabric of her dress. Here, they were public, yet somehow it felt like they were all alone in the crowd. It was just like their first prom all over again. Nervous bodies pressed against one another. Hormones racing with the thrill of the night’s possibilities.
Desire surged through his body, tensing his muscles and sending his blood furiously pumping through his extremities. The hardened ache of need strained against his ridiculously tight tuxedo pants, making him thankful it was very dark.
“Ivy,” Blake whispered against her lips as he pulled away. “I want you so badly. I’ve wanted you since I saw you naked outside your cabin that first day.”
“I was not naked.”
Blake smiled. Even now, she argued with him. “The memories of your mostly nude body have haunted me for a week. Holding you now, I can’t stop thinking about touching you again. About having you again.”
Ivy smiled, her body pressed into every obvious inch of his need for her. “It is prom night, after all.”
Chapter 14
It took longer than they wanted to finish out their duties for the evening, but eventually they were able to hand over their crowns and slink out of the dance unnoticed. There was a rush of adrenaline surging through Ivy’s veins as they slipped into his Corvette and peeled out of the parking lot. She felt seventeen again, her stomach a flutter with nerves about giving herself to Blake for the first time.
That night had been romantic and wonderful. She didn’t expect the same from tonight—they weren’t blissfully in teenage love like they had been then. Still, she hoped it would be an occasion to remember for all the right reasons.
If she’d thought kissing Blake was a bad idea a few days ago, going to his house with the intention of having sex with him was a horrible plan. But so much had changed since she came home, she couldn’t help herself. Obviously this wouldn’t turn into anything serious, but there was something cathartic in their reunion. The two of them making up and making love felt like it would somehow heal their old wounds.
Even hearing him say the things he’d said tonight had done a lot to help her put those past hurts behind her. Even after they’d apologized for what they’d both done, the doubts that Lydia planted in her head back in school had always bothered her on some level. Blake thought she was good enough. She had to believe he meant that.
She also had to believe that nothing had really happened between him and Lydia. It had taken time for her to get back to that mental place, but it made more sense. She’d watched Lydia chase him all through school without success. Blake had never been interested in her, even before he asked Ivy out. If at any point he’d wanted Lydia, he could’ve dropped Ivy and had her in a second. But he hadn’t. From the way he spoke about her now, nothing seemed to have changed.
