Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 65304 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 327(@200wpm)___ 261(@250wpm)___ 218(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 65304 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 327(@200wpm)___ 261(@250wpm)___ 218(@300wpm)
I should just ask him. What’s the worst that can happen?
He says no.
He laughs at you and says no.
He doesn’t laugh, suggests you should seek professional help, and decides kissing you again would be a bad idea because kissing mentally deranged women is wrong.
I’m clinging to the scrap of sanity I have left, reminding myself of all the reasons this would be a terrible, doomed idea, when Derrick brushes his finger over the back of my hand and says, “You need to let go, Bossy, or I can’t put your bag in the trunk. Just…let go.”
I know he isn’t talking about anything but my bag—he has no idea my head is full of madcap schemes that are mere seconds from spilling from my lips—but it feels like a sign.
And it turns out I believe in signs, after all.
“I need you to be my boyfriend,” I whisper as my heart punches at my ribs and my pride screams that we’re going to regret this for the rest of our lives. “My fake boyfriend,” I hurry to add when his expression goes stunned with a side of horror. “For my gram. You promised me a favor in September, to make up for hauling me out of that bar without permission, and I’m ready to call it in.” I pull my hand from under his and wave impatiently toward the trunk. “I’ll explain on the way, once we’re out of city traffic. And if you don’t want to do it, it’s not a big deal. I just figured it couldn’t hurt to ask since you’re going to be at Shufflebottoms’ anyway. And you know…you’re decent fake boyfriend material. All things considered.”
“You flatter me,” he says, still seeming a little stunned, but he doesn’t shove my suitcase back into my hands or zoom off without me.
He loads my bag into the trunk and opens the passenger’s door before offering me a hand.
I take it as I step over a pile of filthy, melting snow, my body sizzling hotter as his fingers close around mine. If this is what holding his hand for just a few seconds can do to me, I have no idea how I would handle fake kisses and hugs and lingering embraces in front of my family.
I should be hoping he says no. Or, better yet, “hell no.”
But I’m not.
As he settles into the driver’s seat and pulls out into the light-for-a-Saturday morning traffic, headed north, I can’t help crossing my fingers inside the sleeve of my coat.
Faking it with Derrick may very well end in disaster, but right now disaster seems a small price to pay for a week of unfettered access to his sexy mouth.
Chapter Four
Derrick
Fake boyfriend. Fake.
That’s the most important part of what she just said, but you wouldn’t know it by the very real semi I’m sporting as we leave the city snarl behind and hit the open road heading into the mountains upstate. The road crews have done an excellent job of cleaning up last night’s storm and the salted and scraped pavement stretches out in front of us like a gray ribbon surrounded by miles of snowy landscape.
It’s beautiful out there, but my focus isn’t on the scenery.
It’s on the sexy-as-fuck brunette swiping on a coat of lip balm before setting her purse back at her feet.
Oh, to be that little peppermint stick and on intimate terms with Harlow’s plush mouth…
She glances my way, and I quickly rearrange my features to look as disinterested as possible, considering how…aroused my curiosity is right now.
Way too aroused. Get a grip, man.
Fake is the operative word here. Even if you decide helping Harlow lie to her family is a good idea, it will all be fake, which means that situation in your pants is fucking inappropriate.
“Sorry,” I say, then realize she has no idea what I’m apologizing for—thank God—and add, “I’m a little confused. Want to fill me in on exactly why you need a fake boyfriend?”
She pulls in a bracing breath. “My gram’s a romantic. Big-time. And I guess…” She rolls her eyes. “As a younger person, I gave her the idea that I was, too. She’s so proud of how well I’m doing in school, but she wants more for me. She wants to know my personal life is as fabulous as my professional one, and all my dreams are coming true, before…” She threads her fingers together into a fist and squints at the road ahead. “I want to believe she’ll get better, and that I have plenty of time to find a guy we’ll both love. But the past few years, it’s been one thing after another. She barely gets over one health crisis or broken bone before there’s another one around the corner. She’s just not as strong as she used to be. After her last bout with pneumonia, her doctors said she probably wouldn’t survive another one, so…”