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My phone rings on my way into the office, and an ache throbs between my legs as his name pops up on my screen.
“Good morning,” I answer.
“Hey,” he says, and his voice is all sexy and low. “What’s going on?”
“I’m heading into the office and just wanted to run something by you. Did I wake you?”
He chuckles. “No. I’ve been at the office two hours already.”
I glance at the clock. “Did you sleep at all last night?”
“Not well,” he admits. “It was cold and lonely without you there.”
Jeez. I’m in trouble here…in particular because I felt it, too. I clear my throat. “I, uh…” I don’t know what to say. We can’t exactly share a bed—even with Sam’s brilliant plan.
“Sorry. Was that too forward?” he asks. Before I get a chance to answer, he says, “What’s this idea of your friend’s?”
Now that I’m about to say it out loud, I’m afraid it sounds stupid.
But as I think about the call I just had with my father combined with the fear that Rivera is going to spread around those photos, I make a snap decision.
Even if it’s crazy.
“What if you date Sam?” I blurt.
Okay, that’s not exactly the plan.
“Uh…what?”
“I mean…publicly. You’re with Sam. My best friend. So when people see you and me together, they think nothing of it. It throws them off our scent, and you don’t have to deal with the throngs of women throwing themselves at you since you’re publicly in a relationship. We don’t have to worry about our families as we try to navigate whatever this is together. But privately, you come home to me. Or whatever that means since you can’t really come home to me since I have a seven-year-old son, but you know what I mean, you and me—”
“Jo,” he interrupts, and I stop short from my excessive rambling. After I’m quiet a beat and he mulls it over for a minute, he says, “I think…” He trails off, and I wait a little nervously. “I think it could actually work. Nobody would question why I’m going over to Sam’s place if I’m dating Sam. I take her with me to events I’m expected to bring a date to, events you’ll be at, too, and you’ll know you have nothing to worry about since I’m there with someone you trust. But whose ass do I need to kick if you bring a date?”
“I don’t bring dates with me when I attend events I’m covering. It’s too messy and I need to focus.”
“But you’ll have time for, you know, a quick and dirty fuck in a bathroom stall, right?”
Why does my pulse start racing at the thought? “Excuse me. I’m a lady. I’ll take a quick and dirty fuck in an alley behind an event, not in a bathroom stall.”
His laugh is music to my ears. I love eliciting any emotion from him, whether it’s the lust his eyes burned with as he looked at me in a hotel room or even when it was the anger he directed at me before that. We pulse things in each other nobody else has ever had the power to pulse, and it’s both rare and exquisite. Not to mention a little terrifying.
“Do you really think it could work?” I ask.
“What’s the worst that could happen?”
We’re both quiet as we contemplate that, and I really hope those aren’t just famous last words.
I pull into my parking spot. “I’m at the office. I better go.”
“I miss you,” he says softly, and quite frankly I’m shocked at the vulnerability he’s showing. I’m even more shocked that he just agreed to fake date Sam.
“Right back at you, Coach. Listen, can I drop word that you’re dating my bestie at my Monday morning meeting?” I ask.
“You think Rivera’s going to fall for it?” he asks.
I wrinkle my nose. “Yeah, maybe I better hold off and just let you be seen with her.”
“Can I come by and chat with her sometime before I start dating her?”
