More Than Words - Jerry Cole Page 0,37

in relief when she turned to answer something one of her brothers, who sat on her other side, said to her and glanced around the table.

His eyes landed almost unerringly on Jordan, looking too fucking hot for his own damned good —and why the hell was he suddenly cursing like a sailor? — and laughing at whatever comment the guy next to him had made. He was stunning in his dark dress pants, pale yellow shirt, and blazer, his thick hair neatly combed, the gray at his temples making him look quite distinguished and utterly sexy. Bennett had been on tenterhooks ever since that awkward meeting at the front door, and it had been easy to avoid him since then. His relief that they hadn’t been seated next to each other was profound and he hated how being around the older man was disturbing him.

He had decided to let it go. Jordan wasn’t interested. If he had been, he’d have called. It didn’t matter that he was interested. He wasn’t going to put himself out there for someone who was clearly skittish, to say the least. It wasn’t as though they had even been together. All they’d done was go on one date and kiss each other one time. His body heated at the memory of that kiss, and he looked away just before Jordan’s eyes could meet with his.

Now he’d never know if the man was still interested, because he couldn’t look at him without reacting. The last thing he needed was to pop a boner at his best friend’s dad’s birthday party. Aside from the utter humiliation if anyone were to see it, he knew he’d have to deal with Ry’s and Chandler’s nosiness, and he wasn’t in the right frame of mind to handle that level of inquisitive intervention.

He tried to be sociable, answering questions directed at him, listening to the general conversation around the table and responding appropriately, smiling…everything to give the impression that his mind was wholly centered on what was happening around him. And yet, as they were leaving the dining room to go back out to the sunroom, this time prepared for dancing and hanging out, he knew he hadn’t succeeded when Ry and Chandler approached him.

“Hey, Ry,” he said, endeavoring to pre-empt any conversation about anything to do with Jordan. “How’s it going, buddy?”

That's lame, Benny! No doubt both men could see though his thin disguise to the disquiet roiling inside him.

Ry ignored his question. “Chan tells me you’ve still not spoken to Jordan. You’ve got the perfect opportunity to do it now, and I’d take it, if I were you.”

Bennett cocked his head to the side, a frown on his face. “Why’s that?’ he asked, curious.

“Well, if you don’t clear the air now,” Ry put up a hand to stop his denial, “the next time you see him at dinner on Wednesday evening will be really awkward. We’re going over to the McKenzie household and we’ve invited him. You’ll be there and things will be awkward if you both don’t fix whatever went wrong on that date.”

Bennett grimaced. “What if he doesn’t think there’s anything to fix?”

Because if he weren’t interested, if that kiss had been a one off, a test of some kind and he had failed, Jordan wasn’t going to call again and there’d be no fixing anything. Bennett was smart enough to know that.

“Then there shouldn’t be any awkwardness or ill feelings.”

Point taken. “Can we drop it now? This isn’t the time or place for this conversation.”

Thankfully, Ry agreed and they all turned when Mrs. Turner called for everyone’s attention and said,

“We decided to open the gifts while you all are here so we can see all the things people think will make a sixty-five-year-old man happy.”

While Mr. Tucker chuckled as he opened his gifts, most of them gift cards for shopping and tickets to events, Bennett kept casting glances Jordan’s way. He was on the opposite side of the room, standing on the outer edge of the group, and something about that made Bennett’s chest hurt. Was he as lonely as he looked, standing there with a wine glass in his hand, watching the birthday boy laugh out loud at the romance novel that Chantal had gifted him with. None of the Tuckers seemed surprised by that.

“It’s about a guy who is almost sixty finding love the second time around with a younger woman,” Chantal explained when he asked her to tell him about the book.

“How much