by Zoey Parker
She grunted, pushing back slightly so she could look at him. “Well, if anyone kills me by orgasm, it’ll be you. So maybe I should be careful around you. We should have less sex.”
He caught her chin between his thumb and forefinger, sending her a stern look. “Don’t start that crazy talk.”
She giggled, and he leaned in, coaxing a soft kiss from her. The type of kiss that didn’t taste like short term or even coerced. The type of kiss that promised way, way more than what she’d bargained for.
Chapter Eighteen
Life continued as normally as Sam could expect, for being fake married to a mobster. A general buzz followed her around now, and it had everything to do with the rock on her finger. Her coworkers couldn’t stop asking questions. They wanted to meet Trent, and Krissi had looked up wedding reception themes on Pinterest – she’d even started a board on her behalf to gather party ideas.
Sam didn’t have the heart to tell Krissi the truth, even though she felt like she owed it to her. This whole situation had gone way deeper than Sam had expected, and now, she was more or less trapped in it alone. Until the whole thing played out. Maybe then she could come to Krissi with the truth.
But for now? She just had to ride it out. Stay the course. And hope like hell this meant her dad would make it out safe and sound.
“Oh my god. Sammy. Look.” Krissi waved her over when Sam came into the reception area to drop off some patient charts. “This is a wedding cake made entirely out of fake plastic engagement rings.”
Sam snorted. “Seems like it might be difficult to digest.”
Krissi swatted at her. “You should do something like, really outrageous.”
“I think I’d prefer to have an edible cake,” she said.
The truth was – she was trying not to think about these details at all. Part of her had been dreaming of a wedding since forever. Planning a sham reception to celebrate a marriage that hadn’t even happened – and was based on repaying her father’s dark debt – was not the beautiful fantasy she’d held since a little girl.
“I know you tied the knot already out in Vegas,” Krissi said, “but couldn’t we have, like, a mock ceremony for your reception? Just for those of us who want to hear the vows in person?”
Sam couldn’t help but smile. Krissi’s excitement was contagious. And she made it hard not to feel the same way.
“I’ll talk to Trent about it,” she said.
And she did. That evening at home, as they prepared for their weekly meet-up with Lucas, Sam said, “So my coworkers won’t stop bugging me about setting up a reception to celebrate our wedding.”
Trent sent her a look as he tugged on his dress shoes. “A reception?”
“Yeah. I mean, they think we got married in Vegas and all, but they kind of raise a good point. The wedding is one thing. It’s still common to have a reception afterward.”
Trent grunted as he stood, adjusting the cuffs of his slate gray button-up. “Well, what do you think?”
His deference to her happened more and more. Each time it did, it made a strange flutter pass through her. She was enjoying this too much. The whole thing was really starting to fuck with her head.
“I guess it depends on how long this thing with Lucas drags on. I mean, the marriage is to wrap up his business. If it’s over in three weeks, then planning a reception is pointless.”
“We should plan the reception then,” Trent said, adjusting his belt. “I don’t think this thing with Lucas is gonna be over anytime soon.”
Relief coursed through her. Ridiculous. What is wrong with you? How could she be happy that this stupid arrangement wasn’t going to be over soon? If she had any sense left, she’d be doing the bare minimum to get through it as quickly as possible, so that she could put it far behind her.
But part of her didn’t want it behind her. She wanted to be right where she was.
Drowning in the thick of it.
“Well then.” She flashed him a bright grin, stepping into her kitten heels. “Reception it is.”
Trent surged forward and kissed her lips, then headed out of the bedroom. “You ready? We need to leave.”
Sam gathered the rest of her things and met him in the kitchen. As she pushed in her earrings, she looked him up and down. “Damn. You look good in gray.”
He flashed her a wicked grin. “Not as good as you look naked.”
Sam snorted. “Way to bring that back to sexy town.”
“It’s my specialty.” He hooked her hip as she walked by, bringing her crashing against him.
Then he pressed a kiss to her lips. The unexpected tenderness she found there made some of the doubts return. Alongside the questions. What was this? What were they doing? And why did it feel so good?
When they broke apart, Sam pressed a palm to his chest. “So this fake marriage of ours, it doesn’t actually require us to be intimate behind closed doors, you know.”
His face darkened. “I know.”
“So why are we keeping up the façade?” Her heart started hammering in her chest, her whole being begging the answer that she was desperate to hear. “It’s not required, you know?”
“This isn’t a façade,” he murmured, running his thumb along her jawline. “Not even a little bit.”
She swallowed hard, feeling his words resonating deeply within her. He was right. And what she felt between them wasn’t fake. Not by a long stretch.
“What are you getting at?” he asked.
She shook her head, searching his face. “Nothing. Just wanted to make sure we were on the same page.” She tossed him a breezy smile and strutted toward the door. “Now, let’s get to dinner.”
***
Trent wasn’t sure at what point this gig had stopped being work and had become his only true pleasure.
It was only after their second weekly meetup with “Dad” that he realized he should pay a visit to his apartment. Food was probably spoiling in his fridge by now – not that there had been a ton of it – and mail should be collected. The perfect task for a lazy Saturday off.
With Sam.
He nudged her on the bed beside him. They’d spent the morning fucking and resting and fucking and resting. It was almost noon, and they still hadn’t gotten out of bed.
“Hey. You alive?”
She giggled weakly, smoothing her hand over his chest. “Alive and breathing.”
“Wanna come to my apartment with me?”
She nodded into the side of his arm.
“I just realized I haven’t been there in over a week.” He shifted beside her, pulling her into his arms. “I should probably go toss all the shit that went bad, huh.”
“Oh yeah. I bet you’ll have a few surprises there.”
She burrowed into him, sending a warm wave of contentment through him. The more he got of Sam, the more he wanted. It was nuts. Somedays, he felt like he might never get enough of her.
They rolled around in bed for another half hour until they finally dragged themselves out. Trent suggested brunch to-go, which they snagged from a diner on the way across town. Sam got biscuit crumbs all over his seat as she ate.
“Watch yourself, messy,” he scolded, shaking his head.
She laughed, mouth full of biscuit. More crumbs tumbled out. “Sorry. It’s just so flaky.”
He looked down at the mess, tutting. “Come on.”
“Are you a neat freak?” She brushed over the lap of her leggings, sending crumbs to the floor.
He sighed, tapping his finger against the steering wheel. “No. But I do keep my car clean.”
She sent him a mischievous smile. “I’ll vacuum later. I promise.”
He grumbled. He doubted that, but he’d let it slide. For now. “You gonna do the same to my apartment when you see it?”
“Uh, no.” She wiped at her mouth. “I’m not your maid.”
“But you’re my wife…” he teased.
She let a sharp laugh. “Sure I am. Anyway, if you’re so clean, why do you h
ave a messy apartment?”
“I don’t. It was just a test.” He smirked. “You failed.”
“Failed!” Her grin was ear to ear with her fake outrage. “How did I fail?”
It was too fun to tease her, so he made sure he didn’t stop the whole way back to his place.
Once they pulled up to his rundown apartment complex and he cut the engine, he led her inside by the hand.
“Welcome to my palace,” he joked, unlocking the front door. He pushed it open, revealing the underwhelming interior in shades of brown and neglect. She stepped inside, looking around. “Make sure not to touch anything. It’s all expensive and fragile.”
She laughed softly, but it faded quickly. “So this is a bachelor pad.”
And it was. Hell, the lamest bachelor pad he’d ever seen – one folding chair at a card table which served as his dining room set, a threadbare couch facing a television set from the mid-nineties, and inside the bedroom, which she couldn’t see yet, his queen mattress tossed ingloriously on the floor, not even a nightstand to accompany it.
It was kinda pathetic. He saw that now, with Sam sizing it all up. Taking it all in. Probably wondering what the fuck kind of home this was.
Sam lived in luxury compared to him. And coming back here reminded him why it had been so easy to fall into a routine with her. She was a warm person, and she made a warm home. Trent used to think those things didn’t really matter… but he was wrong.
It mattered more than he wanted to admit.
“You weren’t kidding about not having much,” she commented after tugging open the refrigerator door. Inside was a block of molding cheese, a half gallon of whole milk that was definitely past its expiration date, a takeout box that held leftovers he couldn’t even remember bringing back, a squeeze bottle of ketchup, and a box of cereal. “But why do you keep your cereal in the fridge?”
He laughed, swiping it out. “Don’t you do that?”
“Uh, no. That’s why they make flaps, slick. So you can shut it, and it doesn’t go bad.”
He peered inside the open cereal box. The fact that he couldn’t remember ever buying it told him it was probably way past its prime. “Yeah, I better toss this.”
“And everything else in here.” She bent over, scooping out the rest of the pitiful contents.
He smiled, admiring her ass in the jean shorts. This was a stark sight for this sad apartment. In fact, Sam was the only woman who had ever graced the inside. The thought thundered through him.
And not just in this apartment. She was the only woman she’d brought back to his place in a long damn time.
That said something. Much more than this sham marriage and the bid to get Lucas’ insurance money out of his wife’s hands. He didn’t have to be playing this game with Sam. He didn’t need to let her into his life, figuratively and literally.
Yet somehow… here they were.
Balls deep in each other.
“You okay?” Sam sent him a quizzical look as she tossed the food in the garbage can.
He blinked, shaking himself out of his thoughts.
“Yeah. Just thinking about how I better take this trash out today or else we’ll have more problems down the road.” He squeezed her waist as he walked past, heading for the bathroom to grab what little trash was there.
As he tied the bags shut and took a final glance around the apartment, it felt to him a lot like he was saying goodbye to it. Forever. Even though that was ludicrous… nobody had ever mentioned moving in together, much less permanently.
But his thoughts still weighed heavily on him as they walked back to his car, hand in hand.
They both knew this wasn’t a façade anymore.
It was so much more than that.
But what, exactly, was it?
Chapter Nineteen
Sam was at work later that week in something of a foul mood.
It wasn’t that she was upset. All things considered, life was okay. Her father was safe, she had an explosive sex life, and this sham marriage was unexpectedly enjoyable.
It’s just that the last few days, she’d been irritable. Like, way irritable.
There was no discernable reason. Not that she could see, at least. No bad news had come in. Nothing unsettling, or even scary.
She just… didn’t feel great. She was tired, and irritable, and had about three seconds worth of patience anymore.
The door to the clinic opened and then shut loudly.
She sighed tersely. “When are they gonna fix that door?”
Krissi sent her a sidelong glance. “It just started acting up yesterday.”
Sam shook her head. She was being ridiculous. But knowing how unreasonable and agitated she was didn’t make it better.
“Well, it’s so annoying.” Sam sighed again, working on filing her patient reports while Krissi slid open the glass window separating the reception area from the waiting room.
“Hello, how can I help you?” Krissi asked in her best I’m-being-friendly-and-professional voice.
“I need to speak to her.”
The feminine voice was lined with daggers, and so intense that it made Sam turn involuntarily. As soon as she saw who stood in the waiting room, her eyes narrowed.
Darla. Her new, plasticized, blonde stepmother-in-law. Fear pumped through Sam’s veins as she struggled to take the pulse of this situation. Darla showing up here was decidedly not good. So many questions were raised: namely, how the fuck had she found out her workplace? And if she could find out her workplace, what else could she find out?
Maybe the fact that she and Trent had never even married?
A thousand thoughts flashed through her head in the seconds that dragged between Darla’s razor-sharp greeting and Sam’s response. She cleared her throat, setting down the folders she’d been filing.
“I’ll take this,” Sam said to Krissi, trying to keep her voice level to make sure the handful of patients in the waiting room didn’t get a salacious earful. And that, most of all, none of this office drama made it back to the ears of her supervisor.
She could get into as much mischief as she wanted off the clock but in here? She needed to protect her job. This was one of the most important parts of her life, this career that she’d fought for, first because she was desperate to have something of meaning in her life – growing up privileged meant it was hard to ever care about anything – and now, because her family was destitute. None of that privilege remained as a backup plan. So it was more vital than ever that she continue her passion, which meant continuing her paychecks.
“What can I do for you?” Sam attempted a smile like the last possible nod to the fact that every Friday she saw this woman under the guise of family. Even if this woman was the farthest thing from that definition possible. “I didn’t expect to see you until this Friday for our next dinner.”
“Yeah. Our stupid, pointless dinners that we all know are just a waste of time.” Her words were so caustic they practically left char marks. “Listen, I know you’re a fake. It’s time to drop the act.”
Sam’s world shrunk to a dense nut as she struggled to process this unexpected turn of events. Of all the things she and Trent had rehearsed, they’d never practiced this: Little Miss Stepmom figuring them out on her own, and showing up at Sam’s work.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Sam said slowly while she raked through about a hundred different ways this could go. Every inch of her wanted to reach out to Trent, to seek his counsel. This was his territory after all. His world.
Trent, what do I do now?
“That little husband of yours? Cute story, but let’s be real – you two never married.” Darla’s voice was the vocal embodiment of a sneer, and the very sound of it sent adrenaline racing through Sam’s veins. How dare she. How fucking dare she. And here, in front of everyone.
Of course, that had to be what Darla wanted.
Too bad for her; Sam wouldn’t be intimidated. Darla wouldn’t be leaving with any oun
ce of satisfaction today.
Krissi looked at Sam with wide, worried eyes. A few people in the waiting room had sat up, taking note. And it all collided inside her. The embarrassment. The anger. Oh, the fucking anger.
“You have some fucking nerve,” Sam started in a low, trembling voice, but as she spoke, her courage found her. It’d shown up in spades, racing through her veins, pushing her to take this as far as she could.
Because this wasn’t just about a ruse with Trent. This was about her dad, and his gambling addiction, and all the uncertainty and instability of the past few months. This was about getting the bottom pulled out from her world, about struggling to make ends meet while sending her dad extra cash so he could pay off thugs. This was about doing whatever she could to protect her father, even if she hated him right now, and even if she hated his addiction more.
