Page 17 of The Truth of Us

“That was terrible,” she said, the corners of her mouth still tipped up.

“But effective.”

She placed her hand in mine. “One dance.”

“Liar,” I said as I pulled her up to me.

“Elliot.”

Fuck me… my name on her lips.

I focused on leading her to the dance floor before she could change her mind, or I might have gotten the wrong idea and tried to drag her into some dark corner. The second my hand settled at her waist, the noise in the room dulled. She fit against me in a way that felt suspiciously like memory. Like New York, silk sheets and skyline lights, and her hair tangled through my fingers. Except tonight, she wasn’t some nameless woman I could pretend didn’t matter after morning.

She was Harper Lane. PR manager and a professional pain in my ass.

The woman who lived in a Gold Coast townhouse and had a Thomas.

The woman who watched too closely and saw too much.

The woman I could not stop thinking about.

“You’re quiet,” she said.

“Am I?” I asked, and pulled her ‌a little ‌closer.

“Suspiciously,” she whispered.

“I’m trying not to say something inappropriate.”

“That has never stopped you before.”

“True.”

Her mouth curved, and she turned her face away from me. We moved easily, as if her body knew mine, or maybe mine remembered hers. Either way, it was inconvenient.

I lowered my voice. “You’re very good at this.”

“Dancing?” She laughed.

“Everything.”

Her eyes lifted to mine, and something flickered there. Surprise, perhaps, or caution.

“That almost sounded genuine,” she said.

“It was.” The words came out before I could polish them into something safer. Her expression softened for half a second, and I felt it like a hand around my throat. Then she looked away.

Good. No, not good. Fuck, I didn’t know anymore.

We turned, and I caught sight of us reflected in the dark glass beyond the ballroom. Me in black, her in cream, my hand at her waist, her hand in mine.

We looked…

Real.

That was the word that came to mind before I could stop it. Which was ridiculous; we weren’t anything. We were a one-night stand with bad timing and unresolved chemistry, a PR issue waiting to happen, and we were probably going to end up naked before the week was out if I had anything to say about it. But we looked like a genuine couple, and worse, I liked it.

Theo passed us with Lucy, grinning as if he knew too much. “Careful, Vale,” he called, low enough that only we could hear. “You almost look domesticated.”