When the entertainment and speeches were over, people started to get up to dance. I figured this was my chance. I don’t remember the last time I ever felt so proud as when I got to my feet and held out my hand to Nicole.
“Dance with me.” I actually meant to ask her if she’d like to dance, but it came out more as a command, my dragon feeling powerful and sure of himself. But I saw the fire in Nicole’s eyes.
I didn’t want to assume to much. This still might just be this moment or only attraction. But I was going to take full advantage of it. I couldn’t help myself.
“Okay,” Nicole said softly. On the floor, it was just as it had been at Leighton. Everyone else melted away. People were looking at us, I think. We made for a handsome couple, which was half the point. It should have been the whole point really.
It’s just for show.
The voice in my head reminding me that none of this was real was getting fainter and I took Nicole in my arms. The band was playing “Moonlight Serenade” and the two of us swayed together, dancing close enough for our breath to mingle. I had one arm wrapped around Nicole, my other hand in hers. We were staring at each other, silently. I ducked my head and nuzzled her nose with mine, ever so gently, only wanting more contact and to bask in the sexy scent of her dragon. She tipped her head up and her lips brushed mine and I kissed her again, utterly lost in her, the world a blur around us. I felt like I was floating. She was perfect in my arms, as if her every curve had been moulded to my embrace. We danced and kissed and my dragon’s fire wanted to reach out and touch hers.
I finally pulled back, if only because we were beginning to get heated and it was going beyond the bounds of appropriate behaviour at a formal event. We kept dancing, now staring at each other as if transfixed and even baffled. Where did we go from here? If Nicole didn’t know, I didn’t know either.
Nicole licked her lips, already swollen and pink, and the sight made my eyelids grow heavy. “I’m just going to the lady’s room,” she said softly.
I nodded, feeling a little stupid, and reluctantly let go of her. When she was gone, another woman quickly stepped into the void. She was harmless, just a lawyer Koinage had dealt with before as well as being the wife of a prominent New York Magazine columnist. If I’d been thinking straight, I would have engaged her immediately. But I wasn’t thinking at all. I could hardly even remember her name. I was pretty sure it was Alicia. Possible Alita. She was older, and elegant in a dark blue sheath.
“You two look together?”
Her name was Alicia. I was pretty sure. I was almost completely sure. Anyway, I was certain I could fake it. At least I remembered who she was and who her husband was.
“Thank you,” I said laughing, whirling her around the dance floor. “It hasn’t been long. But it’s going quite well.”
“Her name is Nicole Perkins, yes?” Alicia said.
“That’s right.” I nodded, grinning broadly. A proud boyfriend. “She’s a software engineer for Koinage. We met at the coffee cart and she swept me right off my feet.”
“I would think you’d be the one doing all the sweeping,” Alicia said, smirking.
You’d be wrong on that one, I thought, already wishing Nicole was with me again.
“No,” I said, looking right past Alicia, willing Nicole to appear again. “No, she’s… She’s something.”
“From what I’ve heard she could be very good for you.” Alicia looked a little mischievous now and I smiled, genuinely pleased. “Help you settle down?”
“I do feel a little more settled?” I thought my acting was exemplary. I said it as if I’d only just thought of it. As if it wasn’t at all the plan of my hyperactive publicist that everyone decide I was “more settled.” “More grounded, I guess? Does love do that?”
“Love can do anything, my boy.” She smiled warmly then. “Good luck to you.” She looked away then, her eyebrows raising and said, “Here’s your lady back for you then…” She stepped away just as Nicole took her place again, my blood already rippling inside me as she stepped in close and nodded her thanks at Alicia.
That was when I noticed the glitter of gold at her ears.
She’d put on gold earrings. They were just the tiniest plain gold studs, but the sight of them nestled there, visible when her silk, dark hair moved, and the knowledge that she’d put them there for me…
“Nicole,” I breathed. “God…”
“Do you like them?” She said, looking at me steadily. “I want you to like them.”
I was losing a little control. I gripped her waist and abruptly brought her close and she gasped a little pressing into me before I swallowed her breath with a kiss, a deep and heated kiss that brought whistles from a few onlookers and we pulled away again, flushed.
“Come with me,” I whispered in her ear, and because I couldn’t help myself, my tongue flicked out to taste that gold and the softness of her lobe. I was getting hard and I needed her. I didn’t know what we’d do exactly. We couldn’t leave yet. We’d hardly talked to anyone. Yet right now, it was hard to care at all about the very reason I was there with her.
She laughed, throatily and sexily and I groaned, clutching her shoulders, laying little kisses under her hair, nibbling on her ear. “We can’t just leave,” she said.
“What are you doing to me?” I said.
“You think it’s not driving me crazy?” She leaned back and I saw the desire in her eyes that seemed perhaps intense enough to match my own. “I want you so badly… Even if the rest is just pretend. I do want you. I wanted you to know. That’s why I put them on.”
Even if the rest is just pretend...
That gave me my answer. I didn’t realize until that moment how much I’d developed feelings for Nicole. I felt my heart breaking. Or at least, I assumed that was the sharp ache in my chest and the dull sense of emptiness growing in my mind. I’d never had my heart broken before. I was not a fan. I wondered if she had any idea how much those few words had hurt? But Nicole was a convincing fake girlfriend. That was all there was to it. To think it was anymore than that was self-delusion.
I wasn’t going to show her any of that though. I was too proud certainly, and I didn’t want to make her feel bad either. None of this was her fault. It was entirely my own fault for choosing a fake girlfriend I’d inevitably want to be real.
“Justin!” That was Joanie, appearing with a shrill cry. I hadn’t even known she was here. She was wearing a plain, black gown. That was her M.O. You could tell she wanted her clients to stand out in a crowd more than her. “And Nicole! My God, you look gorgeous.” We jumped apart. Joanie short, half a head shorter than even Nicole. But she has a big personality. She appears to take up more space than she actually does. She clutched each of our wrists and looked up at us with owlish eyes behind big, black framed glasses. “You’re doing wonderfully,” she whispered. “You’re the talk of the night. I just need you to do a quick walk around. Chat, get your pictures taken…”
My erection died immediately, wilting like a sad flower, as Joanie shoved us apart. We spent the rest of the night schmoozing and playing our relationship up to the press, but the fun canoodling part was over. I never managed to get another second alone with Nicole before the event was winding down.
“I have to get back to my babysitter,” she said worriedly in my ear, the two of us standing outside, as cameras flashed. It had been hours, and somehow she still looked just as put together as she had when she’d arrived; not a hair was out of place.
“Of course,” I said, nodding. “We’ll go right now.”
I thought I might at least get some moment of closeness on the ride home, but Joanie pulled me away, and I told my driver to take Nicole back to her place. She smiled gratefully, and when she squeezed my hand before she turned away to leave, my fingers tingled.
Chapter Nine: Nicole
I have blue balls.
I got the text the next morning which was Saturday. Justin had never sent anything so explicit before and I
shrieked a laugh, so loud that Tyler looked up at me with wide eyes as I was scrambling up some eggs in the kitchen, and I had to assure him nothing was wrong.
It was somehow both a relief yet also gutting to have everything out on the table. We were intensely attracted to each other. That much was clear. If sex was all I ever got from Justin, well that was fine. I put the thought of anything else in the back of my mind. It didn’t bear even fantasizing about. It would only break my heart, and I refused to get my heart broken by a gorgeous, dragon CEO even if he was sometimes unexpectedly sweet.
“Mom?” Tyler was looking up at me with his puppy dog eyes.
“It’s okay, sweetie,” I said, chuckling. “I was just laughing at something on my phone.” I pocketed the phone and scooped scrambled eggs onto a plate with waiting toast, but Tyler was still frowning up at me. “What’s the matter, baby?”
“I don’t feel good.”
Now that he said it, his voice sounded thick and he looked a little pale. I frowned and felt his forehead.”Oooh. You are warm.”
“Mmmm…” Tyler’s lip curled and abruptly he hunched over and threw up on the floor.
“Okay, sweetheart…”
Tyler revealed that he had already thrown up that morning in his room, which I would have eventually discovered. I still felt guilty somehow that I hadn’t immediately realized he was sick, except that he really did seem fine. Now I put him straight to bed. It appeared to be a simple flu. I hoped it was nothing worse. His temperature was high but not terrifying.
I’d planned to spend the day catching up on bills and house-cleaning. But sick kids are pretty demanding. Suddenly my day was thrown into a bit of chaos. I was so busy, I forgot about Justin’s text for hours, even as I kept remembering those scalding kisses while I mopped the floor.
The earrings had been a whim. I had them in my clutch purse from another night out a long time ago. I’d just wanted to see Justin so aroused again. It had absolutely been worth it, even though it had made me so riled up and with no relief. That night I’d come home, sent away the babysitter Joanie had hired for me, changed into pyjamas and gone straight to bed where I’d fingered myself again, thinking of Justin. This was getting ridiculous.
The weekend went by in a blur of taking care of Tyler and...everything else. Then I got emails from Joanie about two more events she wanted me to go to with Justin but I felt so stressed out, I nearly burst into tears just thinking about it on Sunday night. Things felt overwhelming and even worse, on Monday morning, Tyler woke up still sick. That meant I couldn’t take him to day-care. I’d have to stay home with him. Not that staying home from work was the worst thing in the world. Koinage had pretty good benefits. But it was easy to use those paid days off really quickly when you had a kid. I was always trying to save them for actual vacation time.
Monday turned out to be a bit of a disaster. Tyler wanted to camp out on the couch. That meant the living room I’d just cleaned on Sunday quickly became a mess. His flu made him sweat through his clothes like crazy and he threw up on his favorite pyjamas. I had a hamper full of laundry and a sink full of dishes, and no time to get through them because Tyler was upset. When my kid’s upset, I can’t just ignore him in favour of some chores. I’ve never been able to ignore Tyler when he’s crying. It was impossible.
On Tuesday, Tyler was still pretty sick. For a flu, it wasn’t unusual. But I was starting to panic. It could be another week of this. One more day and I was going to run out of paid time off and my supervisor wouldn’t be happy. I knew I could just direct her to Justin. Justin would take care of it all in five seconds, but my pride wouldn’t allow it. Instead, I pleaded with my supervisor to let me work from home for as long as Tyler was unwell. It was just coding anyway.
Are you okay?
I’d texted Justin a couple of times, just letting him know what was going on in case Tyler was sick enough that I might not get a chance to go out soon. He didn’t text back too much after that except to ask how Tyler was doing. I got the sense he was just trying not to bother me. Or maybe I just wanted to believe that.
But by Wednesday afternoon, I was furiously coding, the house was a disaster, and Tyler had finally fallen asleep. That was when Justin texted me for the third time that day to ask after me and not Tyler. I read the text and found myself eyes welling up with tears. I had an abrupt and overwhelming wish for Justin to be mine. I wanted Justin to be my mate, to come sweeping in and help me or at least help enough to give me a chance to relax for five seconds. Tyler had needed me so much, I’d hardly had time to do the work I’d promised I’d do from home. Yet I couldn’t imagine telling Justin all that. It was his company I was coding for after all.
More than anything, I had a keen desire for somebody to take care of me for once.
Not really.
I texted the message back to Justin quickly and against my better judgement. But I was feeling more emotional and frustrated than usual. I half wanted Justin to come over and save the day. I liked to think I could handle anything. I liked to think I was completely autonomous and I had been for a very long time. But with a kid, it wasn’t twice as hard, it was exponentially harder. Sometimes, I really just wanted a mate to come home and take care of things.
When the phone rang, I only felt anxiety, even seeing it was Justin. I was afraid he was going to ask me questions with good intentions. But it was only going to stress me out. Besides which, every time I thought of Justin, I couldn’t help thinking of how I’d pointed out that this whole thing between us was pretend and he hadn’t argued. He hadn’t even looked upset.
“Hey.” Even hearing Justin’s voice on the phone actually made me feel calmer. I didn’t want to think too hard about why that was. “What’s up? Is Tyler okay?”
I held the phone to my ear and sat back on the couch, ignoring my laptop for the first time in a few hours.
“I think he’s getting better now,” I said, rubbing my eyes. “I should be back to work soon, just-”
“Whoa, hey. Don’t worry about work,” Justin said. “In fact I talked to your supervisor to get her to back off. I don’t want you to have to worry. You have so much on your plate already with a sick kid and being on your own. You shouldn’t have to worry about work. In fact, we haven’t done a good enough job looking after our struggling parent employees-”
“Justin,” I whispered. I had a huge lump in my throat. If I said another word, I was going to cry.
“Hey…I’m worried about you.” His voice was so soft, softer than I’d ever heard it before. It was soft as in volume, but he sounded so sweet on the other end. I closed my eyes and drank it in like water in a desert. “What can I do?”
I’d been so wrong about him. I couldn’t believe how wrong I’d been. I’d never imagined that Justin King would be this type of guy.
“N-nothing,” I said tightly, close to tears I could hardly speak. “It’s, I’m…” I didn’t make it. My voice cracked and I gasped, I started sobbing so loudly.
“I’m coming over there,” Justin said. “I’m coming over right now. And I’m bringing help.”
He might as well have said he was going to Jupiter. It sounded crazy to me. It was the middle of the day. It wasn’t even one in the afternoon yet, although I felt like the day had been forty-eight hours long so far.
“Justin, you can’t-”
“It’s done.”
He hung up before I could argue any further and when I tried to call back, he didn’t answer. The thought that Justin was coming over didn’t calm me at all though, as much as I wanted to see him. Instead, I looked around and all I could see was my catastrophe of an apartment. There were piles of laundry on the floor, dishes heaped in the sink, used tissues heaped on the coffee table, toys and clutter everywhere, stacks of bills and papers to be dealt with. It was all so much. Yet I’d promised my supervisor that I would work a few more hours. I sat, frozen, trying to decide whether to continue working or scramble to somehow make the place at least appear presentable. But it
all seemed so hopeless. I took the third option, which was to check on Tyler. I found him sleeping peacefully albeit breathing with a sniffling snort. He looked so cute, even sick, peacefully asleep in his bed and I kissed his forehead.
I tidied up his room then, at least that was something. If nothing else, Tyler’s room was the easiest to clean. Everything had its spot and there were no bills. I was hanging some clothes that had fallen off hangers and feeling all at once a kind of all encompassing exhaustion, when my doorbell rang.
Oh God…
I caught a look at my own reflection in a small wall mirror on the way to the front door and my stomach twisted. I looked awful. I couldn’t remember the last time I looked so bad. I was haggard, my hair was a mess, and my skin was greasy. I was wearing a set of sweats I’d been wearing since the day before. Just perfect, I thought.
So much for Justin King falling madly in love with me.
But when I opened the door, I was bowled over not by Justin, but by a man and a woman I’d never seen before in my life. They were young and cute and wearing polo shirts.
I said, “Oh, what-”
“Nicole!” That was Justin, appearing behind them, as the two of them barged into my apartment and looked around as if appraising the place. I wiped my eyes, but they were likely still swollen and red and I saw Justin’s expression of concern as he ran up to me. “Hey! Okay, don’t argue-”
“Justin…” I spun around, frowning at the man who was already shoving laundry into a basket. “What is happening.”
“I hired you some help,” Justin said, shrugging. He threw his arm around me and I swallowed, still feeling gross about my shabby appearance. “That’s Jay.” Justin pointed to the guy, who spun around and waved as he sorted laundry. “That’s Linda.” Linda was standing in the middle of the room, smiling expectantly. “Linda is a registered nurse! She’s here to look after Tyler for a while.”
Dragon's Fake Mate Page 8
