If she’s my wife, I might find out.
I already know she’s attracted to me. I know she’s not poisoned against the black sheep of Harmony Heights otherwise she would’ve heard my name and bolted. I know that there isn’t anything I won’t do to fuck her again and see if it was as magical as the first time.
And I know that, if she’s desperate enough to agree, she must be in such a shitty situation, she needs my help.
Call me a soft touch. Call me a manipulative bastard. I’m both, and I lift my hand, rubbing my thumb along the edge of her jaw.
“What do you say, love? You and me… we doing this?”
“Just for a year,” she says. “That’s all I need. After that…” Her eyes clear. She jerks her head away from my hand. “You do understand that I just want a marriage of convenience? I’ll do whatever it is you require of a wife, but this is more of a, like, business arrangement?”
If that’s what she wants to call it. “You need a husband. I don’t have a wife. You obviously need help. And me… what can I say? I’m a helpful guy.”
I’m going to burn in Hell, too, but I’ve already resigned myself to that.
“What do you think, Annaliese?” I try not to let my sudden eagerness show as I repeat the same four words that I said to her the first night we met: “Come home with me.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Funny, I think it’s an excellent idea. Unless you’re backing out?”
She shakes her head. “No. I… if you’ll do it, I accept. We’ll have to make an agreement… lay out the rules, the expectations… but I won’t mind marrying you.”
“Gee, thanks.”
Annaliese disregards my wry response. “There’s so much I have to do. I… okay. I didn’t expect this to be as easy as it was. Sorry. I’m a little shell-shocked.”
“I have a tendency to cause that reaction. That’s something you’ll have to get used to as my wife.”
She disregards that tease, too. “Tomorrow,” she blurts out. “We can meet tomorrow.”
And give her a chance to chicken out? I don’t think I like that idea.
However, when the alternative is picking her up, carrying her out of the Court, plopping her on my bike and whisking her away to my place, I can’t see what else I can do but hope like hell that she actually goes through with it.
Even if she doesn’t, I have a name now. I know that she’s from Harmony Heights, too.
She won’t escape me again.
Just in case, I hold out my hand to her. When she looks puzzled, I say, “Give me your phone. I’ll put my number in it. You call me and we make this thing happen. You got that, Annaliese?”
“Um. Yeah. Yes, of course. That’s a good idea. Thank you.” She reaches into the small clutch purse she has tucked under her arm. The club’s too dim to activate facial recognition to unlock her screen. Flustered, she enters in the six numbers to her passcode—3-4-0-1-2-6 because I’m a bastard and I sure as fuck commit that to memory instantly despite my minor buzz—before holding it out to me.
I enter my number and my name just like this:HUBBY. I show it to her, smirking when her pink cheeks go a little pale. She doesn’t say anything at first, simply slipping it back into her purse.
Only then does she tell me in a much softer, subdued tone, “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“I’ll be waiting, love.”
For a moment, she stands there, adorably awkward, almost like she doesn’t know what to do. That’s easy. I duck my head, stealing a quick kiss before I run my hand possessively over her shoulder.
That breaks the spell. With another royal shake and a straight back, she turns on her heel before walking away from me.
This time, I feel a whole lot better about letting her.
Now if only I can say the same about how to explain what just happened to Dallas.
FIVE
