My Ex Cheated, Then I Fell for the Wrong Man

Chapter 5: Mr. Callahan Has Secrets

(Avery POV)

"I'm out!" I call down the hallway, snapping the buckle on my heel.

Brooke materializes from her bedroom doorway like she's been stationed there. She looks me up and down—the emerald wrap dress, the heels, the clutch—and something in her expression does that proud, terrified thing that best friends do when they know you're walking toward something big.

"Get a kiss," she says.

I laugh and pull the door shut behind me.

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The October night hits me the second I step outside—sharp, clean, the kind of cold that makes everything feel more alive than it should. Fifteen minutes to Callao on foot. I pull my jacket tighter and walk, heels clicking against the sidewalk, my pulse running a full beat ahead of me.

My phone buzzes.

I'm here, waiting outside for you.

The butterflies in my stomach detonate.

I'm one minute away according to maps. I look up from my phone and scan ahead—and there he is. Standing outside Callao under

the amber wash of the entrance lights, one hand in his pocket, the other holding his phone. He hasn't seen me yet.

I let myself have five seconds.

His hair is combed back tonight, clean and deliberate, except for one strand that's fallen forward over his forehead like it refuses to

cooperate. White button-down with the top two buttons open, a jacket thrown over his arm, gray slacks that break perfectly over

polished black oxfords. He looks like someone who knows exactly what he's doing and never needs to say it out loud.

I'm actually going on a date with this man.

I type a single text.

Look up.

I slip my phone into my clutch and watch. He glances up immediately, scanning left, then right—then he finds me, and the grin that

breaks across his face is slow and devastating and absolutely not fair.

"Avery." He pockets his phone as I reach him. He leans in and presses a kiss to my cheek—warm, unhurried—and my heart does

something embarrassing and immediate. "You look incredible."

Not beautiful the way men say it when they're not paying attention. The way he says it—low, direct, like a statement of fact he's been

sitting with—lands somewhere it shouldn't be able to reach this early.

"Thank you." I feel the blush and refuse to acknowledge it. "You clean up pretty well yourself."

He shrugs it off and grabs the door. "Shall we?"

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The restaurant wraps around us the moment we step inside—warm light, the low hum of satisfied conversation, the smell of citrus

and cumin and something chargrilled that makes my stomach pull with wanting. It's intimate without being precious about it. Exactly the kind of place someone chooses when they're trying to impress but don't want you to know they're trying.

A waitress appears to seat us. Late twenties, dark hair, professional smile—a smile that shifts entirely when her eyes land on Eli.

She leads us to a corner table and hands us the menus. When Eli reaches for his, their fingers brush. She doesn't move her hand. Not immediately.

"So lovely to have you back, Mr. Callahan." Her voice drops half a register. "I'll give you a few minutes, but please—" a breath—

"let me know if you need anything."

She walks away.

I raise my eyebrows at Eli over the top of my menu.

He leans forward, expression already apologetic. "I genuinely don't remember her."

"She remembers you."

"I'm sorry." He looks genuinely uncomfortable, which I find more amusing than I should. "I come here maybe twice a year. I don't

know how she—"

"It's fine." I bite my lip against a smile. "You have a fan. We'll survive."

"Can I just—" He drags a hand over his jaw. "Can we talk about something else? Like what you're drinking?"

I tilt my head. "I thought you didn't come here very often."

"I don't."

"Then how do you know about the lime mojito?"

The look he gives me—caught, amused, a little undone—is the best thing I've seen all week. "I love it here, okay? I pay attention.

Are you having a drink or not?"

"Two lime mojitos," I tell him. "And don't ever let me forget this conversation."

The waitress materializes the second Eli smiles in her direction. It's almost supernatural. He orders our drinks and a jug of water

without looking at her, and I watch her process the polite dismissal with the specific expression of a woman recalibrating her

evening.

When she's gone, I lean across the table. "You are genuinely in trouble with her. I have no idea why you brought a date—you already

had someone lined up and willing to fulfill your every whim."

He grimaces. "She waved at me."

"She waved at you from across the restaurant, Eli. From across the room."

"I didn't see the wave—"

"I saw the wave."

He looks pained. "When she comes back—can I hold your hand? I know how that sounds, but I think it would—"

"Is that an excuse to hold my hand?"

His expression doesn't pretend. "Yes. But also genuinely tactical."

Something warm moves through my chest and I try not to let it show. "Fine. For tactical purposes only."

He grins. "Obviously."

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We order sharing plates—three each, enough to cover the table in small dishes of ceviche and ají de gallina and tender grilled things

I can't pronounce but photograph immediately so I can find them again. When the waitress brings our food, Eli reaches across and

takes my hand, easy and certain, and her smile goes professionally neutral.

She doesn't come back to linger.

He doesn't let go right away.

I don't ask him to.

We talk through two mojitos and every dish on the table. He talks me through the food with the specificity of someone who loves it

—the heat levels, the coastal versus highland differences, how the citrus in the ceviche works against the fish. He eats with real

appetite, no performance of restraint, and there's something disarming about it.

"I could eat an entire table of this," I tell him.

"I could eat an entire cow," he says. "I've got the appetite of a dragon."

I pause. Set down my fork. "Appetite of a dragon?"

He goes still for one fraction of a second—something moves behind his eyes, private and quick—before his mouth curves. "It's a

saying. Dragons eat whole villages. Big appetite."

"I've never heard that saying."

"More common than you'd think." He says it smoothly, easily, and holds my gaze just long enough to make me feel like I've bumped

up against an edge I can't see the shape of yet.

I let it go. But I notice it.

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By the end of the meal we're too full for dessert and easy with each other in the particular way that only happens when the nerves

have burned off and what's left is something realer. We split the check over his mild protests—I insist and he concedes, which I file

away as a point in his favor—and step back out into the cold.

"You walking?" he asks.

"It's fifteen minutes."

He frowns. Looks north, then back at me. "I live the other direction."

"I know."

"I'm walking you home."

Something in my chest pulls tight. "You don't have to—"

"Avery." His voice is quiet, but there's no room in it for argument. "Let me walk you home."

I look at him for a moment—the easy stance, the hand back in his jacket pocket, the strand of hair that has completely given up on

staying combed back—and decide I'm not fighting this one.

"Fine."

We fall into step together, shoulders close but not touching. The neighborhood is its usual Thursday-night self: a couple walking a

dog, someone's music bleeding out of a bar window, the El rattling somewhere overhead.

"So you really like Peruvian food now?" he asks.

"I have seventeen photos to prove it."

He laughs, low and real, and I feel it in my sternum.

His jacket pocket starts ringing.

"Sorry—" He pulls his phone out, glances at the screen, and something shifts. Not dramatic. Not obvious. But I'm watching him

closely enough to catch it—the set of his shoulders changing, his jaw tightening by a degree, the warm ease of the last two hours

draining out of his expression like water through a c***k.

"I need to take this. One second."

He steps a half pace ahead of me and answers. His voice drops. I can't make out words—just the register, clipped and controlled and

completely unlike the man who held my hand across a dinner table twenty minutes ago.

I keep walking beside him, watching the city, pretending I'm not hyperaware of every muscle in his body pulling taut.

Who are you, Eli Callahan?

And why does the answer feel like it might change everything?