Hold Me Today

by Maria Luis

Mina’s mouth purses. “I won’t lie about the fact that I’ve watched every season of The Bachelor, but still . . . that seems wrong to me.” And then, good soul that she is, Mina yanks off her gloves, puts her hands on her hips and says, “If that’s the case, I feel bad for her. TV or not, no one should be forced into something they don’t want. It’s not right.”

  Her righteous sense of justice has me crossing over to her, clamping my hands down at her side, and lowering my mouth to hers. She exhales into me, and I swallow the breath to keep as my own. My cock twitches in anticipation, the greedy bastard.

  “What was that for?” she whispers.

  I brush another kiss over her mouth, this one lighter. “For being you.” One more kiss because I can’t help myself. “But you’re right. It’s wrong. There’s only one time I can specifically recall Savannah putting her foot down and telling the producers to fuck off. It was the first night and we’d all just hauled ourselves out of the limo. What viewers don’t realize is that process takes nearly six hours. It’s brutal.”

  “It sounds awful.”

  “I never want to see the inside of another limo again—at least not when it’s jampacked with eight other dudes.” Narrowing my eyes, as though that’ll bring me back to that moment when all I could smell was cologne, booze, and B.O., I press my tongue to the roof of my mouth. “There was this one guy. Owen. He was all tatted up—you could see the ink at the collar of his dress shirt and down to his fingers. We sat in that limo for long enough that I could start reciting the guys’ family members by name, but he never said a single word.”

  Mina touches a finger to my loose T-shirt. “Maybe he was nervous.”

  “I think he was. I was already in the house by the time he met Savannah outside, but then shit hit the fan. I heard her talking to one of the producers in the bathroom. She was, ah”—I scratch my jaw—“demanding that he be sent home before the ring ceremony. She didn’t want him there and she made it known.”

  “That’s . . . uncomfortable.”

  It’d been the sort of TV drama producers only wish they could manufacture—and it’d been completely authentic. From the way Owen stood like a granite statue as Savannah asked him to go, to the way he’d reached for her, with a look on his face I’d understood instantly.

  He’d looked at her the way I’d stared at Brynn, right after she dropped the bomb of all truth bombs.

  I don’t know how Savannah Rose and Owen knew each other, but it was clear that they did. And it was clear to me, even if not to anyone else, that she wouldn’t change her mind about keeping him around. The sound of the door slamming shut behind Owen had reverberated through the house, shocking every contestant into silence.

  I clear my throat. “Maybe, subconsciously, I realized that they had some sort of unfinished business. She kept me around, and I kept hoping that this was it and I’d wake up one morning and realize I loved her.” Snorting derisively, I fold my arms over my chest. “That didn’t happen. I demanded to talk to the producers, then the director. I wanted to tell Savannah, privately, that I wasn’t the right guy for her. They wouldn’t let me. We were in different housing complexes and they kept her in this . . . bubble, almost, where they plucked her out for dates and ceremonies and put her back when she wasn’t needed. So I did what I had to do.”

  “Nick . . .”

  I look her in the eye. “It seemed cruel to dump her on TV when I was meant to be proposing. So, I let her reject me.”

  Mina’s expression shutters. “You shouldn’t have done that.”

  “Because it makes me too nice?”

  “No, you jerk, because you only made things worse for yourself. If people care about what’s going on between us, what’s going on with you, it’s only because you gave them the ammunition. People love a good underdog story and you, right now, are the quintessential underdog.”

  The feeling of my phone vibrating in my back pocket has me cursing under my breath. “I got to take this,” I mutter. “It might be one of the guys.” I answer without screening the Caller ID. “Stamos.”

  “How do you feel about clam chowder? Goes well enough with your Greek palette? I just landed and I’m fuckin’ starving.”

  Ah, gamóto.

  America’s other favorite underdog, Dominic DaSilva, has arrived.

  “Meet me at that restaurant at the top of the Prudential? Say, thirty minutes?”

  I glance over at Mina, then make a quick decision. “Yeah,” I tell Dom, “I’ll be there. And I’m bringing someone I want you to meet.”

  28

  Mina

  We meet Dominic DaSilva in the restaurant housed on the top floor of one of Boston’s tallest skyscrapers—and let me be the first to say . . . he’s a total hunk.

  Dark hair styled like a woman’s fingers have already run through it this morning. Dark, espresso eyes that exude warmth, but don’t quite manage to conceal a cynicism I suspect runs deeper than he’ll ever reveal. Unlike Nick, whose wholesome, model-good looks stop people in their tracks, the former NFL tight-end’s appeal is rough around the edges. At six-foot-six, he’s also a giant, standing even taller than Nick. And it doesn’t help that the man clearly has a penchant for black: from the leather jacket encasing his broad shoulders to the unlaced combat boots on his feet, he’s not wearing a single shade lighter than midnight.

  Hello, Dominic DaSilva—Lucifer will see you now.

  “And this,” Nick says warmly, pressing a flat palm to the small of my back, “is Mina.”

  I grin up at him. “Dominic, nice to meet you. I’ve heard . . . well, Celebrity Tea likes you a lot.”

  His chuckle is low and raspy. “Not as much as they like my man Stamos over here.” He claps Nick on the shoulder in brotherly camaraderie. “Celebrity Tea’s all up in your business the way Entertainment Tonight can’t bother to show a single segment without flashing a shot of my mug.” Dark eyes drop down to my face. “You can call me Dom, by the way. No one calls me Dominic unless I’ve fucked up.”

  “Well, we have that in common.” I poke Nick in his rock-hard bicep. “No one calls me Ermione—my full name—except this guy.”

  Nick’s fingers slip under the hem of my coat to graze my skin. “You like it when I do, koukla. No use denying it.”

  Dom arches a heavy brow, his gaze taking the both of us in. Then he breaks into a full-fledged grin. “Well, damn. So that prick at Celebrity Tea wasn’t lying through his teeth for once.” He points a finger, swiveling it between Nick and me. “You two together now?”

  “Um . . .”

  “About that—”

  “DaSilva, party of three?”

  Praise Sweet Baby Jesus. I whip around to face the host, who’s holding black leather menus in the cradle of his arm. “Sure, we’d love to take our seat!”

  The host doesn’t even bat an eye. I can only imagine the sorts of shenanigans he sees working at a restaurant like this—a place for tourists and locals alike who want to feast on good New England clam chowder and even better views. We’re led to a table positioned near the three-hundred-and-sixty-degree window. From every vantage point around the room, Boston is unveiled. Gorgeous Back Bay, the winding Charles River meandering through the city, the John Hancock building rivaling the Prudential’s height.

  Nick holds my chair for me—perfect Victorian gentleman, I’m telling you—before taking the seat next to mine. Unlike Dom’s all black getup, Nick’s in his trademark work jeans and a Stamos Restoration T-shirt, this one a navy blue that plays off the gray of his eyes. He leans forward, elbows on the table. “How’s the escape feeling so far?”

  Leaning back, Dom throws one arm casually over the chair beside him. “Holdin’ out the verdict on that for now.” The corner of his mouth tugs down, and it hits me in the gut that Dominic DaSilva must be having a really rough time if he actually flew all the way out to Boston just to get away from it all.

  I fiddle with the utensils before me. “Listen, Dom, if you want to talk to Nick about . . . whatever it
is that’s going on, you can. I’m not going to run to the media or to a friend with your laundry list of secrets.”

  Beside me, Nick stiffens. I only feel it because his knee presses against mine, and then he’s relaxing, letting out a breath before draping an arm on the back of my chair. It’s tough to tell if the touchy-feely bit is all an act, designed to keep up our ruse of fake dating. I don’t think it’s an act. I hope it’s not an act.

  Nick is a lot of things—reserved, stiff—but in the last few weeks he’s let down his walls. Even now, his fingers softly tug on the strands of my hair, as though he does it absentmindedly. That’s not the mindset of a fake boyfriend. Right?

  “You can trust her,” he says, still playing with my loose ponytail. “I do.”

  I do.

  Two little words with so much meaning behind them.

  Our server comes around to take our drink and appetizer order. Once she leaves, Dom palms the edge of the table and exhales roughly. “Living in L.A. comes with its merits. Good weather, a quick ride to work. Except that means I’m in the cesspool of vultures.” He drums his fingers on the table. “I went to see Savannah Rose after the show ended.”

  Nick curses beneath his breath.

  I reach for my glass of water and pretend I don’t exist.

  “It was . . . a bad idea.”

  “DaSilva, man.” Nick’s free hand motions frantically through the air like he’s trying to find the right words. “Why the hell would you go to her after she turned you down?”

  “Because I liked her.” He says it so simply, so easily, that I nod along with him, like I’ve known him for years and not just ten minutes. “I wanted to know why she rejected me, without all the cameras and shit in our faces. I’m not going to go into detail about what went down—clearly, I’m sure you can put two and two together—but someone caught me leaving her hotel room at almost four in the morning.”

  “Gamóto.”

  I reach for Nick’s thigh under the table. “There’s good news!” I tilt my head toward the scenery out the window. “You’re in Boston, which is great! And, oh yeah, no one’s reported anything about you and Savannah being in some hotel. I’ve been”—I slide my gaze over to Nick—“checking the gossip sites daily after the first time we ended up on one.”

  Dom shifts his weight, elbows moving to the table so he can drop his head into his upturned hands. “I paid the asshole off,” he mutters, so low that I almost can’t hear him. Like honey, misery coats every syllable. “Ten-grand just to make sure he didn’t go blabbing to his boss. Savannah didn’t ask for me to go over there. I did it. And even though all we did was sit and talk, I couldn’t let him run his smear campaign in the press.”

  I home in on his choice of words: liked not loved.

  “Have either of you talked to her since?” I ask.

  Both men shake their heads, Nick looking unperturbed by the thought, even as Dom grimaces in what I imagine is embarrassment for throwing his heart on the line and being rejected—twice.

  “Jeez, reality TV sounds absolutely insane.”

  “You have no idea,” Dom says, a trace of a smile finally ticking up one corner of his mouth. “There was this one night, the producers asked us all to come outside in nothing but our boxers. How many of us were there at that point, Stamos? Ten?”

  “Thirteen, I think.” Nick laughs. “It wasn’t even raining, but they wanted to host a wet abs contest.”

  “They hooked up hoses to this tram type thing,” Dom tells me, his hands referencing the build of it for me. “It was taller than all of us, and we stood beneath it, waiting for that moment where we all knew what was coming . . . dick shrinkage.”

  I can’t stop myself from cringing, or from mumbling, “Oh, no.”

  “Oh, yes.” Nick’s arm leaves my back as he reaches for his glass. “We were wet. No one was packing any heat south of the equator, if you catch my drift. And then they brought out Savannah Rose and told her the challenge would be with her blindfolded. The first person she could correctly identify from their abs would win a date the next day.”

  “That’s . . .” Two pairs of eyes fix on me. Oh, boy. “Is this where I plead the fifth?” When neither of them say anything, I place one hand down on the table, the other up, palm facing Dom, and open my mouth. “I solemnly swear that I would have correctly identified each one of you. No man would be left behind, and that’s a promise.”

  Dom barely lasts a second before he’s clutching his stomach and laughing hard enough that the glasses shimmy on the table.

  I turn to Nick and mock-whisper, “I’m banking on the fact that you’d be first in the lineup.”

  His gray eyes glitter with laughter. “I was first that night too. Savannah did not match me correctly.”

  “Who did she think you were?”

  It’s Dom who answers, and he does so with a wry grin. “This body builder from Miami. But nothing beats this guy, Josh, an accountant from Idaho.”

  “An accountant. He sounds . . . sweet.”

  “Until it turned R-rated,” Nick says, leaning back in his chair. “We were on full display, total shit storm in the making with fake rain pelting our backs, and Savannah went to touch his abs and miscalculated his height.”

  My shoulders hunch and I bracket my mouth with my hands because I already know where this is going. “Please,” I whisper, trying not to laugh, “please tell me she didn’t.”

  Nick nods sagely, offering a quick mark of the cross over his heart. “She did. Punched him right in the dick.”

  Lips parting, I gasp, “She punched him?”

  “First-time offender. I think she went to, I don’t know, feel him with her knuckles or something?” Dom lifts a shoulder, then drops his hand to his thigh. “Josh is six-eight. I played against him in college ball. Not a bad dude, except he always was a little handsy when it came to women. I like to think of this as . . . divine justice.”

  “Who was the winner?”

  Slowly, as though he’s savoring the moment and wanting it to last, Dom smirks. “You’re sittin’ with him.” That smirk pulls just a little wider as he inclines his head with the grace of the victorious. “Not that I can blame her—I’m a pretty memorable guy.”

  Uh-huh. Cocky, is more like it. I open my mouth, prepared to deliver a stinging retort . . . except, wait. I’m a pretty memorable guy. Without reservation, I stare Dom down. Dark, edgy appeal mixed with a smooth confidence that lends toward humor and not total arrogance—oh, he’s perfect.

  Striving for nonchalance, I drop my chin onto my balled fist, elbow digging into the table. “What are you up to next weekend, Dominic?” There we go: perfect tone. Light, airy, unassuming.

  “Next weekend?” Dom reiterates, cocking his head in curiosity. “I’ve got no plans.”

  “Ermione.”

  Oh, no. This is not something Nick will be able to talk me out of.

  A familiar, masculine hand circles my bicep and tugs me in close. His breath coasts over my ear as he growls, “Óxi.”

  Actually, yes.

  I pluck his fingers off my arm, one by one. “Dom, I’d love to extend an invitation to you, if you’re still in town next weekend when we head up to Maine.” Deliberately, I pause, prolonging the moment. “For a singles’ retreat.”

  Should there have been a pin dropping, no one would know because Dom throws his head back with a sharp laugh. “A singles’ retreat? Why the fuck would I want to go that? I just had my heart broken.”

  Ah, there we go. Liked versus loved—looks like Dominic DaSilva tipped the scale for the latter. “It’s perfect, actually. That part of Maine? There’s not much cell service, which means you, my friend, will have an entire weekend of your trip completely media-free.”

  “Jesus, you’re laying it on thick.”

  I ignore Nick’s grumbling. Men. They don’t even see when someone is trying to help them. Swiveling my chin on my palm, I glance over to the man who rocked my world just two nights ago, who planned a tattoo for m
e that carries such beautiful weight and significance. “It’s a singles’ retreat. Think about it, Nick. What was the one thing both our parents tried to ship us off to back in high school?”

  His grimace twists his handsome features. “Let’s not talk about it, naí?”

  No can do, Mr. Stamos. No. Can. Do. I didn’t want to go on this damn trip in the first place. “Dating camp for Greeks,” I go on blithely, “also known as hell on earth.”

  “It sounds like a cult.”

  “Oh, no,” I tell Dom, “it’s definitely not that. Chaperones everywhere. Lots of awkward speed-dating rounds to try and find your perfect Greek match. Couple compatibility quizzes. Loads of fun, if you’re into theoretical self-flagellation.” I sip from my almost empty water glass, then scan the restaurant for our host. “I don’t think we have anything to worry about with the Maine trip, but I’m pretty sure Sophia—who’s putting it together—is on the hunt for another husband.”

  Dom’s brows draw together. “And I would sign up for this willingly . . . why?”

  “Because it’s as far away from civilization as you can get on this side of Canada. No mention of Savannah Rose. Hanging out with your best bud, Nick. Possibly meeting a girl who might make you feel less like a stick in the mud—though, word for the wise, I’d leave Sophia alone.” Carefully, I take note of his reactions. His features remain passive, but his eyes never lose that cynical gleam that’s buried deep. “Plus, and I say this with total kindness, you look like you need to cut the cord to the public for a while. You can thank me after the trip when you feel like a new man.”

  Dom’s attention shifts to my left. “Your girl should work in marketing. She’s a bulldog.”

  Your girl. Nick’s girl.

  It’s so wrong how very right that feels.

  Nick lets out a choked laugh. “She’s very persuasive when she wants to be.” He says it like a compliment, and I fight the inane urge to preen under his praise. “Screw it. If we’re doing this Maine trip, might as well live it up.”

  “Live it up” is not the catch-phrase of Bethel, Maine. Stunning, picturesque views? Yes. Gorgeous, little boutiques dotting the one major street the town has to offer? Absolutely. But when there’s a will, there’s a way—and I foresee more staring at the town’s Things-To-Do website in my future, so long as I can keep Sophia from making a weekend adventure into some thirst trap for husbands.