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Cal shook his head. “If it’s the same crazy idea I just had, it’s not a good one.”
A shiver of anticipation rippled through her. She loved Cal’s crazy ideas; they were usually incredibly effective, so if his mind had gone to the same place, maybe it would work. “We could sign up for the retreat. It starts on Monday.”
“Dammit, Ellie. Don’t make me be the voice of reason here. It’s too risky.”
“But it’s an opportunity for us to get inside. If my sister and niece are there, I owe it to them to do everything in my power to get them out. And the girl reached out to you. She wanted you to help her.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “If we do this, we can’t stay strictly professional.”
Right. Shit. She hadn’t thought of that.
“We can... pretend to be a couple for a few days.” Her cheeks flushed hot, and she looked back down at the screen, scrolling through the pictures of couples with weirdly ecstatic expressions. Her heart sank. “No, you’re right. That’s stupid. Nobody will believe us.”
He scowled and closed the distance between them. “Why the hell not? We were a couple once.”
“Barely.” He was too close, and he smelled too good. She swallowed hard as memories washed over her and tried to back away, only to find herself trapped by the side of her car. Yes, they had been a couple. But that was a lifetime ago, and despite the occasional lapse in judgment, like after the wedding, she wasn’t about to jump back into that part of their past. “But that was different. We were real then.”
Cal’s scowl softened as his hands skimmed from her shoulders down her arms. His gaze lowered to her lips before returning to hers. “What I feel for you is still real, Ellie. You may deny it, but it is.”
The words hit her like a punch, knocking all the air out of her lungs. She squeezed her eyes closed. As if shutting out the sight of his serious expression would make the feelings he stirred inside her less potent. “This is not the time to?—”
“To what? To remind you that I love you?” His voice was a soft caress. “There’s always time for that.”
“No.” She took a determined step back from him, straightening her spine. “This is about Hope. Not us.”
“It doesn’t have to be one or the other.” There was a vulnerability in his gaze that she’d rarely seen in him. It unnerved her, making her feel raw and exposed.
Ugh. Why had she suggested they pretend to be a couple? Since moving to California, Cal had always been a constant in her life in one way or another, but she’d always been able to push him away when things got too deep, too real. But if they were stuck together for a week in a potentially dangerous situation, she’d have no defenses against him.
What a stupid idea.
“Cal,” she warned, but her voice sounded weak even to herself. “Just forget I mentioned it. I’ll find someone else to?—”
“Oh, hell no. If you think you’re going up there with anyone else, you’re mistaken.” He closed the distance between them. “You can’t fake it convincingly with anyone else. You’re not that good of a liar, sweetheart. You wear all of your emotion on this beautiful face.” He cupped her cheeks in his hands, his thumb stroking lightly over her lips, sending shivers up her spine. “We can be a couple having troubles, which we technically are.”
She rolled her eyes, trying to push down the warmth that was spreading through her at his touch. “No, we’re not.”
“But we could be if you weren’t so damn stubborn.”
“Cal...” She couldn’t think clearly when he touched her and took a step to the side, breaking their contact. He let her go, dropping his hands to his sides, but he didn’t back away. His gaze remained steady on hers, an intensity in his eyes that she didn’t care to interpret.
She cleared her throat and looked back down at her phone again to avoid his gaze. “Okay,” she said reluctantly. She could do this. She had to do this if she had any chance of finding Hope and her niece.
Cal nodded and let out a breath as if he’d been holding it in. “So we agree? We book the retreat as a couple and use that time to snoop around while we’re there.”
Ellie shot him a sharp look. “I just want a look inside the commune. We’re not spies, Cal.”
He grinned, and she hated how much she loved that mischievous glint in his eyes. “Speak for yourself, Summers. I always fancied myself as Bond. James Bond.”
Despite herself, Ellie laughed. And just like that, the tension between them eased. Only Cal could make her laugh in the face of danger—albeit danger they were willingly walking into. “Be that as it may, if it starts to get dangerous, we leave.”
“Agreed. I’ll handle the registration,” he said, taking her phone to enter their details into the online form. “We’ll be… Calvin and…”
“Elena,” she suggested. “It’s what people always think Ellie is short for. I don’t know why it has to be short for anything. It’s just my name.”
He sent her a quick grin and typed it in. “Elena. Perfect. Calvin and Elena Smith—no, that’s too obvious.” He deleted the surname and considered it for a moment. “Miller. It’s common enough but not so common that it sounds fake. Cal and Ellie Miller from… Eureka.”
Ellie watched him, her heart thumping in her chest. Part of her was thrilled at their plan, and another part was terrified of what it might mean for them. “But what if they check our IDs?”
