Page 88 of Wish You Were Mine
“Yep.” He chuckled, nodding. “That’s my little bro and his wife.”
“Oh my gosh,” I said, laughing now. “I’ve totally seen their reels on Instagram. They’re incredible. Like, next level. I didn’t know they wereyourfamily.”
“Well, they are.” He grinned, the kind of smile that softened every edge of his face. Genuine. Warm. Like just talking about his brother made something inside him relax. “Anyway, you never know when he’ll get a shot like this again. So, I gotta soak it all up while I can.” He paused, his voice dipping justslightly. “It’s just…it’s really awesome to see him having so much success after everything.”
My breath caught on the unspoken weight of those last two words:After everything.
What did that mean?
Was he talking about after their dad passed? He’d said he was five years older than his brother, which meant that if their dad died when Owen was eighteen, then Asher might have still been in middle school. Young enough that Owen might have felt like he needed to step into a bit of a fatherly role.
Which would have been a lot of pressure. Especially since that would have also been the age he would have been in college. At Yale.
Chasing after dreams of his own.
And suddenly, I was seeing him in a new light.
Knowing these little details—these hints of a life before we met—made Owen feel more real.
He wasn’t just the professor I’d accidentally kissed on New Year’s Eve.
Not just the guy from the bar who made my heart race on sight.
He was so much more.
“Anyway,” he said, his tone easy—like he had no clue my brain was currently spinning in circles over everything I was learning about him and everything I still wanted to know. “Do you know what you want from The Italian Amigos? Or do you want to scroll through the menu?”
He tilted his phone toward me, the glow of the screen casting soft light between us as I leaned in, acutely aware of how close we suddenly were.
“I’m definitely in the mood for something Italian tonight,” I said, tapping that section of the digital menu.
Though, if I was being honest, part of me was tempted by something with a little more Korean flair—him, specifically.
I remembered watching an interview clip where his brother—Broadway’s Asher Park—mentioned being half Korean. I’d gone down a whole rabbit hole over the summer, obsessing over his performances and, okay, maybe learning more about him than was entirely casual.
Since Asher was still in his early twenties, I’d initially assumed he was single. And the hopeless romantic in me—the one who’d just broken up with Josh and dreamed of finding a kind guy who wasn’t a hot-tempered jock—had totally daydreamed about meeting him someday and falling in love. Especially after Theo’s sister-in-law Bailee once mentioned she knew him from high school.
But then, I found out he was married to his co-star Elyse Cohen, and…well, that fantasy fizzled fast.
Now, though? Knowing he had a brother—an older, arguably even hotter brother with those same soulful brown eyes?
Yeah…a new crush was very much alive.
Owen scrolled a little further, and when a dish popped up that looked good, I pointed. “I’ll get that—the rigatoni carbonara with blackened chicken.”
“That actually sounds really good,” he said with a nod. “I’ll get the same.”
He placed the order, his fingers moving with the kind of practiced ease that told me he really had been a regular at the place when his brother had worked there.
When we pulled up in front of the restaurant a few minutes later, I instinctively reached for my seatbelt and the door handle. But Owen stopped me with a quick glance and a quiet, “I’ll get it. You can just wait here.”
I paused, hand halfway to the latch. “Don’t want to be caught grabbing food with a student?”
“Probably shouldn’t risk it.” He let out a low chuckle. “But also, it’s cold out. No need for both of us to freeze.”
My heart did a small, traitorous flutter.
Chivalry, it turned out, looked very good on him.
