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She leans forward. Any farther, and she’ll do a belly flop on the desk. “Don’t think of it as lying. More like … you’re giving herpartof the truth. While easing her into theothertruth.”
“Still sounds like lying,” I say.
“Think of it this way—if you spend more time with her and realize this isn’t what you want or what she wants, you haven’t committed to more than the arrangement. You’ve lost nothing. But if youdostill want more …” Parker’s smile is slow. “You’ve already jumped the line, so to speak. And you both live happily ever after.”
This makes sense. Or a sort of sense. But only if you squint real hard.
“You’re going to woo your wife.” Parker clasps her hands under her chin, staring dreamily somewhere above my head. Probably daydreaming about Logan, marriage, and having a whole brood of hockey-playing babies.
I tip over a small container of pink paper clips on Parker’s desk and start to arrange them, nudging them into a perfectly straight line. “I don’t think I know how to do that.”
Parker is still for a few more seconds, clearly deep in thought. I’m about to walk out and tell her to forget it and I’ll figure something out when she grabs a fresh pad of sticky notes and gets to her feet.
“Pen,” she says, and I hand her one with a pink puffball on top.
She pulls a whole section of sticky notes with her neat handwriting on them down from one wall, setting the stack in a messy pile on her desk. Probably some new plan to take over the world, one TikTok video at a time. Pulling off one pink sticky note from a new pad, Parker slaps it on the wall and turns to me with a grin, pen poised over the paper square. “Let’s hash this out and come up with a plan.”
Andthisis why I came to Parker.
Half an hour, twenty-seven pink sticky notes, and three square feet of wall space later, Parker and I have talked our way through a semblance of a plan. We’re leaning into the whole Trojan horse feelings army thing—I totally knew Parker wouldn’t let that go—which essentially means me doing my best to win over Bailey like I would any other woman.
Only she’ll already be married to me.
“Feel better?” Parker asks, turning to me with a smile.
Yes? I mean, sort of. Maybe. I don’t know that I ever fully recovered after the meeting in Mr. Pebbles’s office when I found out about the visa issue. I’ve been off kilter ever since. So, trying to suss out my feelings is more like doing some kind of blind taste test.
Parker chews her lip. “Because we could always?—”
The door flies hard enough to bang into the wall, sending a few sticky notes fluttering to the floor. A pen rolls off Parker’s desk and lands by her shoe.
Logan stands there, dark eyes intense as he glares around the room. His gaze stops on my face, and his frown deepens. He slams the door and then looms over me. “Someone said Eli bodily dragged you into your office. With hishands on you.”
He’s speaking to Parker while burning holes through my shirt with laser beam eyes. I sometimes forget about Logan’s intensity because Parker has smoothed out so many of his sharp edges. But other than Nathan, Logan is probably the one guy I wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of. Especially not when it comes to Parker.
I hold up both hands. “Reports have been greatly exaggerated.”
“Easy, killer,” Parker says with a laugh, looping her arm through Logan’s and tugging him away from me. He allows it but doesn’t stop glaring, even when she stretches up, pressing a kiss to the corner of his mouth.
“Then what are you two doing in here?” Logan asks. “And why does Eli have a sticky note on his face?”
Do I?
I reach up, fingertips brushing against paper. I have a vague memory of Parker giving me a quick smack to the forehead. More of a pat, really. I guess it came with a sticky note, which is pink and readsWoo. Guess that’s my new word of the month.
“Oh, I’m just helping solve all Eli’s problems,” Parker says loftily, running her hands through Logan’s hair.
Finally, he stops looking like he wants to murder me. But now he’s looking at Parker like he wants to do things I should definitely not be present for.
I stand. “Thanks, Boss. I owe you one.”
“And I can’t wait to collect,” Parker says with a laugh that turns into a sigh as Logan leans forward and kisses her neck.
I escape into the hallway not a moment too soon, with a tiny bubble of hope rising in my chest. Right alongside the dread for whatever Parker’s going to make me do.
“Aw, my baby boy’s all grown up.”
“Mom!” I gently swat her hand away as she tries to wipe what I’m sure is a smudge of nothing from my cheek. “Stop. I’ve been on dates before.”
