by Bella Andre
She suddenly felt more wobbly on her feet than she had when she was drunk.
“Losing the grimace might help,” he suggested.
She worked to school her face into a smile. “How’s this?”
“If you want everyone to think you’re having a bad case of heartburn, it’s perfect.”
She made herself think of puppies and butterflies and every single person in the state of Maine wearing a pair of her glasses.
“Much more believable,” he said. “Although it would be better if you looked into my eyes, instead of at my shoulder.”
Shoot. She’d been hoping to get away with that. Because she really, really didn’t want to lift her gaze to his. Not when she was afraid he’d see the budding attraction that she was hell-bent on hiding.
Slowly, she raised her eyes to meet his, all the while chanting her mantra in her head. Feel nothing. Feel nothing. Feel nothing.
Of course, he had to choose that exact moment to smile at her. Between the crinkles at the sides of his mouth and the light in his eyes, she couldn’t have felt nothing if she’d been anesthetized.
“No problems here.” It took everything she had to sound unaffected. “Any issues for you?”
He held her gaze for a long moment. “Nope, everything’s good for me too.”
She lowered her hands and stepped back, relief coursing through her that she’d made it through one of the hardest tests of her life. “Great. Then we’re good to go for tomorrow.”
“Not quite.”
She frowned. “What now?”
“You’ve gotten used to touching me, but I still don’t know how it feels to touch you, beyond helping you off the couch.”
Plenty of sexier things had been said to her over the years. Rory’s sentence clearly wasn’t meant to be at all seductive. And yet, her body had never responded this way to a couple of sentences strung together. As though she were a firework, and he a match.
“You’re really taking this seriously, aren’t you?”
“If we’re going to do this, we should do it right,” he countered. “Flinching at my slightest touch would blow the whole thing.”
Darn it, he was right. Only, it had taken everything she had to stay stoic while touching him. She wasn’t sure she had anything left to fight her next reaction. Clearly, she was going to have to dig deep.
“Fine.” She scowled. “Whenever you’re ready, go ahead.”
But instead of moving closer, he suddenly stepped back. “You know what? I’m being an ass. I shouldn’t have forced your hand with any of this. If you don’t want me to go with you to the party, I need to respect that.” He was clearly upset with himself as he said, “I’m really sorry I’m trying to convince you to let me touch you. My mother would rake me over the coals for my behavior.” He was careful not to touch her as he took her mug over to the sink and rinsed it out, along with his.
Zara was surprised by how disappointed she suddenly felt at the thought of his not coming with her, especially when she’d belatedly realized that he was right about her making an I’m-not-a-doormat statement to Brittany and Cameron.
“You have nothing to apologize for,” she told him. “It’s just that I’ve never done something like pretending to be in a relationship. That’s why I’m a little prickly.” Normally, he would have made a cutting comment about how she was far more than a little prickly. The fact that he didn’t razz her was testament to his concern that he’d been acting inappropriately. “You’re in no way forcing me to do anything,” she insisted. “It might not have been my idea for you to come with me tomorrow night, but if I didn’t want you there, I wouldn’t have agreed. So…” She couldn’t believe how nervous she felt as she asked, “Are we still on?”
He dried his hands on a dish towel before replying. “We are. But I want you to promise me something from here on out. If I do or say anything that makes you uncomfortable—even if I’m just joking around like I was earlier—you need to tell me.”
“You won’t.”
“Promise me, Zara.”
His low, slightly demanding tone sent more thrill bumps racing over her skin. “I promise. But only if you promise me something too.”
“What’s that?”
“That you won’t worry I’m made of porcelain.” She held out her arms the way he had before. “I might have had a stumble this morning, but I’m tough.”
“I know you are.”
For the first time today, she felt like smiling. “In that case, why don’t you get that touching-me thing over with before we head back to the office?”
“Are you sure you want that?”
She raised an eyebrow. “Tough, remember? And,” she added in a teasing tone, “simply longing for your touch.”
He didn’t laugh, however. Instead, he stared at her for a moment, before reaching out to brush a wisp of hair back from her face and behind her ear. “How was that?”
She hoped he couldn’t tell she was practically gasping for oxygen. “Fine.”
“Good.” He brushed the backs of his knuckles over her cheek. “What about this?”
Praying her face hadn’t flushed red and given her away, she nodded. “Still fine. Should we move on to our get-to-know-each-other lists?”
His hand lingered on her skin a beat longer before he lowered it. “My favorite color is green.”
“Mine’s orange.”
“I’m one of seven kids,” he said. “My mother’s Irish, and my father met her in the town of Cong nearly forty years ago, then convinced her to marry him and move to Bar Harbor.”
“I grew up in Kennebunkport as an only child,” she said. “Then when my mother passed away, my dad married my stepmother when I was fifteen. We moved to Camden to live with her and Brittany, who is one month younger than me. I lived there until I moved here a year ago.”
He frowned. “After Brittany and your ex cheated.”
She’d been worried he would ask how her mother died. It was a relief that he’d focused, instead, on Brittany and Cameron. “Breakups in a small town are never good.”
“You’re right, they’re not,” he agreed. An expression that looked like a combination of guilt and remorse crossed his face, then disappeared so quickly she almost wasn’t sure she’d seen it. “Anything else I should know?”
“I’m allergic to cats. I’ll swim in any body of water I can get into, even if it’s freezing. And I have a borderline unhealthy obsession with your sister’s candy—and chocolate cake. What about you?”
“I was never going to let you know this,” he said, “but I’ve bought a half dozen of your frames over the past several months to ship off to my cousins on the West Coast and New York.”
“Seriously?”
“You’re great at what you do, Zara. You and I might not see eye to eye on many things, but you don’t need me to tell you that your frames are brilliant.”
“Thank you.” She met his olive branch with one of her own. “I might secretly covet your furniture once my financial ship comes in and I can afford it.”
“I won’t tell anyone if you won’t,” he said.
She grinned. “Who would have thought the two of us would ever agree on anything?”
“I’m just as amazed as you are,” he said, grinning right back. “What do you think? Will we be able to convince your stepsister and ex that we’re the real deal?”
“You know what?” Rory was the least-likely co-conspirator she could ever have imagined. And yet… “I think we just might.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Making furniture was the kind of work that gave you a lot of time to think. Which was precisely why, during the past year, Rory kept heavy metal music blaring in his workshop. Anything that could bash away his dark thoughts was welcome.
For the first time in a long time, however, it wasn’t guilty memories of the aftermath of his breakup with Chelsea that plagued him. Instead, as he worked to finish a custom table on Friday afternoon and Saturday morning, Zara occupied the bulk
of his thoughts. He’d even bowed out of his usual Friday night dinner with his family. If they found out that he and Zara were attending her stepsister’s engagement party together, his siblings and parents were bound to ask questions. Questions he had no desire whatsoever to answer.
What’s more, he kept circling back to how Zara had almost breezily dropped into the conversation the fact that her mother had died. When a friend in high school had lost his mom, the guy had gone off the rails—drinking, drugs, unsafe sex. While Rory couldn’t imagine Zara reacting in any of those ways, he also didn’t think she could have come away without scars. And though the two of them hadn’t had the greatest start this past year, he hoped she’d feel that she could talk openly to him about her mother if the conversation ever went that way again.
Now, as he stood outside Zara’s front door at a few minutes before four in the afternoon, his heart was pounding harder than usual. Not because he was nervous—on the contrary, he was looking forward to tonight more than he’d expected to.
He was simply acting the part of Zara’s date so that her stepsister and ex wouldn’t think they’d crushed her spirit. Nothing more.
And yet…
When he’d touched her yesterday morning, with just the barest sweep of his fingertips over her skin as he’d brushed back her hair, it had felt like more.
Which was crazy. Rory couldn’t imagine actually being with Zara any more than she could imagine being with him. They would do each other in within the hour.
All the more reason to have fun with tonight’s charade. Pretending something so wrong was right was bound to be a kick for both of them.
He was smiling as he rang her doorbell, and when she opened it, a sassy comment immediately fell from her tongue, as expected.
“You’re grinning like a dog who just snuck a bag of treats out from under his owner’s nose.”
“And you look like…” He stopped to take in her outfit. Head-to-toe black. Voluminous fabric without a hint of a shape beneath. Even her glasses were framed in black, which was odd when she normally wore vibrant hues on her face. “You’re headed to a funeral.”
She sighed as she let him inside. “Everything else I tried on seemed like I was trying too hard.”
“You are.” Her eyes widened at his blunt statement. He knew firsthand how bad pity felt when it was directed at you. He would help her, but he wouldn’t coddle her. “It’s like you’ve wrapped yourself in an I-don’t-care flag, which only shows how much you do care.”
“Tell it like it is, why don’t you?” she muttered. “I suppose you think I should change?”
“Only if you want to.” Having grown up with three sisters, he knew better than to tell a woman what she should do with her clothing. “I’m cool with standing beside you holding a hanky for you to weep into all night, if that’s the look you’re aiming for.”
“Fine,” she said with a roll of her eyes. “I’ll go change. But just in case I forget to tell you this later, I had a really annoying time with you tonight.”
“Right back at you,” he called as she headed into her bedroom.
Alone in the living room, he took in her space. She’d made the cottage her own with bright colors across every surface, from the artwork on the walls, to the throws over the couch, to the rugs on the hardwood floor. Her home felt eclectic, yet perfectly representative of the colorful, bold, fascinating woman who lived there. For as much grief as he’d given her over the past year, the truth was that she’d impressed him from the start with her determination, focus, and talent.
“Okay, let’s go.” She marched across the room to grab her purse and overnight bag. “And whatever you’ve got to say about my new outfit, I don’t want to hear it.”
She had changed into a flowing, semi-translucent purple top with a lace-up V-neck and black bra underneath, black leather pants, dark boots with thick soles, and bright purple glasses. The outfit wouldn’t have worked on anyone else, but on Zara, it looked exactly right.
“Okay,” he said as they headed out to his car. “I’m perfectly happy not telling you that I think you look great.”
The pleased smile she couldn’t contain had him grinning again. At times like this, he could almost forget he’d spent so many months gritting his teeth around her. As long as she didn’t start whistling, which she knew drove him crazy, they might be able to rub along okay for the next few hours.
“So,” she said once they were in the car and off to Camden, “I was thinking—”
“Uh-oh.” He couldn’t resist. Just as she couldn’t resist thwacking him on the arm.
“As I was saying, we should make sure we have our story straight before we get to the party. I know we’ve got favorite colors figured out, but people are probably going to want to know how we met.”
He could barely keep a straight face as he said, “You should tell them that you took one look at me and fell head over heels in love.”
“That would be a great story if we wanted them all to think I’ve gone insane.” She barely let the dig land before continuing. “In any case, since I haven’t lost my mind, I’m thinking that keeping our story as close to the truth as possible will be the best way to stave off getting caught out in a lie.”
“No problem,” he agreed. “I’ll tell anyone who wants to know how much your whistling drives me crazy.”
She whistled a few bars of his favorite Metallica song, sending his teeth back into grinding mode. “And I’ll tell them that one day I’m going to take the speakers you’re always blaring heavy metal on in your woodshop and toss them into the river to sink into the mud.”
He didn’t let on that he’d seen her rocking out to his music when she hadn’t thought he was looking. “Telling them it was mutual dislike at first sight is a smart move. Everyone loves an enemies-turned-lovers story, don’t they?” The lovers part shouldn’t have sounded nearly so appealing.
“Exactly. Hating-you-to-dating-you can be our schtick.”
“Instead of a meet-cute, we had a meet-puke.”
The laugh that burst from her made him feel like he’d just won a prize. “Maybe keep that one to yourself,” she suggested, but she was grinning. “The only issue I can see is that someone at the party might want details on how we came to stop being so irritated by each other and fell in looooove.” The word love dripped with sarcasm from her lips. Lips that looked far too tempting for his peace of mind.
“Hmmm,” he said, playing the moment for all it was worth. “That is a hard one. Good thing we have the whole drive to Camden to think of reasons they’ll believe.”
“I’m going to punch you again, if you’re not careful.”
Despite her bravado, he detected a hint of self-deprecation in her tone that he didn’t care for. For all their teasing, his intention was never to make her feel bad. It was more that he hadn’t had this much fun sparring with someone in a very long time. Particularly during the past year, when everyone had been walking on eggshells around him.
Zara didn’t know his damage, so the only eggshells that would come from her were the ones she might decide to throw at him. Whatever happened tonight, he didn’t like the thought of losing their zing-y relationship. It would be far less fun to come into work if he couldn’t go a few verbal rounds with her.
“Just to be clear,” he said in a serious voice, “despite the fact that we’re always bantering and teasing each other, I’ve never felt we were actually enemies, or that we hated each other, or that you in any way have ever made me want to puke.”
“I haven’t either.” But before they could get too gooey, she added, “Although you do really irritate me sometimes.”
“Likewise.”
Perhaps it shouldn’t have made sense that they were grinning at each other after declaring their mutual irritation. But it did.
“Now that we’ve got that clear,” she said in her back-to-business voice, “let’s make a list of the things we can’t resist about each other. I’d say three reasons each should suf
fice. I’ll go first. You’re really talented, and I love your furniture. Reason two is that you obviously care about your family a great deal. And for my third reason…”
She scrunched up her face, clearly thinking hard. He might have felt a little insulted by how long it was taking her to come up with a third reason, if she didn’t constantly make him want to laugh out loud. He’d never met anyone like her, female or male. Zara said exactly what was on her mind, no matter the consequences. Plus, he wasn’t going to deny that he was pleased by her first two reasons for fake-falling for him—his work and his family were two of the most important things in his life.
“I’ve got it!” She snapped her fingers. “Your lightning-quick comebacks during our bantering sessions prove how quickly your mind works. What woman doesn’t love a man with a brain who isn’t afraid to use it?” She looked extremely pleased with herself for filling out her list. “Your turn.”
“You stole my first reason—that you’re a hell of a designer and manufacturer.”
“Mutual respect for each other’s work sounds good to me, as long as your next two reasons stand apart from mine.”
Rory was surprised to realize it wasn’t at all difficult to come up with his second reason for fake-falling for her. “I didn’t know anything about your family until yesterday, so I can’t copy you on that one. But I have noticed how supportive you are of other artists. You’re the loudest to cheer another maker’s success, the first to volunteer to help, and the last to leave their side when there is still work to be done.”
She looked surprised by his comment. “We all know how hard it can be to get a business off the ground, especially in the arts. Of course I’m happy to help.”
“Not everyone is.”
Though his eyes were still on the road, he could feel her gaze trained on him. “Did something bad happen to you when you were starting out?”
“It’s not something I talk about much.”
“It won’t leave this car,” she promised.
Though they hadn’t exactly been friends up until now, he realized he trusted her not to break her promise. “It was a few years back. Another furniture maker, a guy I really respected, accused me of copying his work.”
