I need her answer to be fast, without hesitation, even if she doesn’t have a name yet.
She sighs, and I hear her back slap against the leather as she sinks back into the chair. “I’ll find someone, Luciano. I’m not worried about it right now, and I guarantee someone on SparksFly will play a nice game of house with me for the right price.”
She’s going to resort to a fucking dating app to find someone to play house with her? Wonderful.
Signing my name and dating it at the bottom, I spin the paper and push it to her before placing the pen on top of it.
She doesn’t bother reading through the agreement before she signs and dates, her loopy signature a stark contrast from my messy scrawl.
“There is just oneteensything I should probably mention…” She trails off, biting her lip as she looks at me from under her lashes.
My cock stirs at the sight, wishing it was me biting her lip and learning what she tastes like. But my mind ricochets her words like the sound of a gong. My internal groan becomes audible as I watch her intently, waiting for the shoe to drop.
“Javier wasn’t taking no for an answer, and I may have given in and agreed to help him. He sent me two first-class tickets to Spain for this weekend, attached to an email that read: ‘I can’t wait to meet your significant other. See you in Spain.’ My plan is to just go and hone in on my acting skills. By the end of the trip, I’m hoping he’ll just leave me the hell alone and not needme for when he gains his title. I’m going to call it Operation Divorce Papers and see where it takes me.”
Clenching my jaw tightly, I exhale a breath so deep, my nostrils flare.
I should rip this agreement in half right now before she puts me in the hospital with cardiac arrest.
“Are you out of your mind?” My hands ball into fists on my lap.
“It’s fine.” She laughs unconvincingly. Standing, she grabs her small purse off the chair beside her and smiles. “I’ve got to run—Mickey-D needs to be let out soon. Send me a text and let me know when you’d like to meet next?—”
“Raina,” I try to interrupt.
I won’t even address the fact that she adopted the fleabag.
“—and in the meantime”—she starts to walk toward the door, clearly trying to flee—“I’ll find myself a fiancé and see if I can get Javier to back off. My SparksFly profile just needs to be reactivated again and?—”
“Raina.”
“Yeah?” She flicks her gaze over her shoulder, her hand hovering on the doorknob.
My heart is hammering in my chest cavity, on the verge of exploding. That heart attack seems closer to happening than it should for a man of my age, and it’s like I’m having an out-of-body experience when I hear myself say, “Delete that fucking profile. I’ll do it.”
CHAPTER NINE
“Delete that fucking profile. I’ll do it.”
My heart abruptly flutters at his words, eyes widening. It causes me to drop my hand and slowly turn back in his direction. “You’ll…do what?”
“I’ll be your fake fucking fiancé,” he growls, prowling toward me.
I shake my head in disbelief as he approaches, swallowing hard at the dark gleam in his irises.
His stare feels heavy, predatory.Possessive.
It makes my core clench. “I can’t ask you to do that.”
We’re inches apart now, and I’m forced to tip my head back to look at him fully. “You’re not asking me to. I’m volunteering.”
“Isn’t that a conflict of interest?” I ask, my voice far breathier than it should be, but the tingle in my throat matches the one between my legs, caused by his proximity. I want to reach out and clutch his pressed white button-down and draw him closer.
Reaching above my head, he presses his palm against the doorframe, caging me in. His head shakes slightly as he drops his head. “This entire thing is a conflict of interest,” he says, practically in a whisper.
As he slowly lifts his gaze, it connects with mine. I suck in a breath as I become witness to the turmoil reflected through the depth of his blue-grays, but also something else.
God, he’s so close. It’d take one sway of my body to crash my lips into his, and as his eyes dip to my mouth, every bone in my body knows he’s thinking the same.
