Tell Me True

by Ally Blake

  He watched her walk away, a drum beat thumping against the back of his skull at the sway of her hips – ba-da-boom, ba-da-boom. And a thousand truths closed in on him like a trap.

  He could tell himself it was wrong till the cows came home. Didn’t stop him wanting her with a ferocity that slayed him. And he was a man who knew what it was to want. To yearn. To covet. But he’d had never known anything like this. This dragging desire to seek out her warmth. Her energy. Her kooky, free-spirited, endearing simplicity.

  Okay. So, he’d admitted how much she affected him but it didn’t change anything.

  Did it?

  Fifteen minutes later, April peeked around the corner of the change rooms. Finn had a supernatural way of showing up places she least expected him.

  Not that it should have mattered that her hair hung lankly down her back. That her sundress clung to the bits of her the towel hadn’t been able to quite dry. Or that her freckles had darkened in the unforgiving sun. Finn was only her fake boyfriend. Meaning the fact that her crush ratcheted up a dozen levels every time she saw him was all on her.

  And she knew better! At fourteen she’d been officially included in a study on facial recognition—furrowed brow meant fake thinking, looking up and to the left meant lie. Always one for efficiency, her mother had killed two birds with one stone – procure research fodder and educate daughter as to the ways and means of big, bad, tricksy men.

  And Finn sure was a tricksy one. Something about him got her signals seriously scrambled.

  She talked a good talk, telling herself his closed off nature, his uber cool, made him excellent practice for dealing with challenging men. That she’d been able to segue their strange non-relationship onto a more steady footing, what with the “business meeting” the other day.

  But the night at The Burrow had actually been fun. He’d been funny and charming. He’d been really nice to her friends. And he’d been a total gentleman.

  Until he’d kissed her.

  That had not been the kiss of a gentleman. He’d taken her places dark and hot. Slippery and dangerous. He’d kissed her like he meant it, even though he claimed – with actual words and sentences – that he didn’t.

  And now he was here. Quietly putting himself where she was. Again.

  Growling, she dragged the huge garment bag containing her costume out into the pool area proper. Checking the lap lanes. Checking the pool side. And—

  Crapola!

  Erica sat on top of the picnic table, playing with a loose frill on her tutu, birthday kids running amok as parents tried to round them up and collect them. Finn stood beside her, a shirt draped over one shoulder, sneakers held together by the laces dangling over the other, his sweaty hair swept off his face by raking fingers.

  All broad shoulders, golden skin, muscles upon muscles – he looked less like a businessman and more like some kind of ancient god come to life.

  Dragging the heavy bag over her shoulder, she hastened over to the picnic table. “Finn?”

  He looked up. His blue eyes against the warm brown skin with the cerulean blue background stopped her in her tracks. God, but the guy was pretty.

  Sometimes life was plain mean.

  When she looked back at Erica, it was to find her sister all eagle-eyed. “You didn’t tell me lover boy was going to join us today.”

  April gawped, clueless as to where to even begin. What had Erica said to him before April had caught up? What had Finn said to Erica? Would Finn imagine Erica – being her sister and all – was in on the “fake boyfriend” ruse? How to find out without giving herself away?

  “It was a surprise,” Finn drawled, smiling.

  It took every ounce of April’s self-protective instincts not to go all warm and fuzzy.

  “Here,” Finn said, moving to her side in one long step.

  His hand brushed hers as he took the handle on the heavy bag and electricity zinged up to her funny bone. He smiled into her eyes... and winked. Of course he knew. He saw through her like she was made of cellophane.

  Helpless under the draw of his intense blue eyes she smiled back. Because... how could she not?

  His voice lowered to the exact right note that made her insides twang as he said, “Let go, April. I’ve got this.”

  And suddenly she was back in the Chaser bar, the only thing stopping her from falling on her head, Finn’s strong arms and a promise – I’ve got you.

  Yeah, right in the palm of your big, beautiful hand.

  He broke eye contact as he hooked the garment bag over his arm as if it weighed nothing and the spell was broken. But not the warm hum that had enveloped her. It hummed so hard she was sure the whole world could hear it.

  “So you were saying you met at The Chaser,” Erica said, spidey-senses on full alert.

  “We did,” Finn said, sliding a hand to April’s back.

  “Funny that, because I’d bet my tutu April’s never been there before.”

  “Then perhaps it was fate.”

  Erica rolled her eyes. “You have been drinking the Kool-Aid.”

  Finn smiled, his thumb making lazy runs up and down April’s lower spine making it seriously hard to keep her cool.

  “How old are you, Finn?” Erica again. Little Miss Blunt.

  “Thirty-two.”

  “April’s twenty-six. Fair gap. Makes sense though. Girl’s got daddy issues.”

  “Pfft,” April scoffed. “Pot meet kettle.”

  “At least I admit I hate Dad. If you admitted the bastard broke you, even in some small way, you’d be much better off.”

  “He didn’t break me.” April gritted out. Then turned to Finn. “He didn’t. Yes, my father left when I was pretty young. Now he drives a sports car and pretends he has no kids, which is pretty pissy really. But he had his reasons and I’m fine. I do not have ‘daddy issues’.”

  “Glad to hear it,” Finn said, smiling down into her eyes.

  Seemed Erica wasn’t finished yet. “Also, you’re not April’s usual type.”

  “Erica. Stop it.”

  “I’m your big sister. It’s my job to sort the men from the boys.”

  April sighed. Now Erica chose to act like a big sister.

  “I’m right, aren’t I?” Erica said.

  “Fine. You’re right. Finn’s not my type at all.”

  “So she’s told me,” Finn murmured.

  “Too tall,” Erica said, on a roll now. “Way too handsome. I mean, those cheekbones. That jaw. Those abs.”

  “Totally too handsome,” April agreed, lifting her face to run her eyes over said cheekbones, said jaw.

  Having a good close look at his perfectly imperfect nose. His eye crinkles. His dark lashes.

  “And clean cut. Just way too ‘together’, don’t you think? With the perfectly finger-raked hair and the matchy-matchy shoes and running shorts.”

  Finn frowned at the shoes hanging over his shoulder. “They’re black.”

  “Exactly.” Erica nodded, agreeing wholeheartedly.

  Finn turned slowly and pinned April with a look. “Yet I also seem to remember you also telling me I’m everyone’s type.”

  Erica choked on a surprised laugh.

  Feeling a little lightheaded now that Finn’s fingers had slid to a sweet spot at the base of her spine, April said, “I don’t know what I was thinking. You hardly need your ego stroked.”

  “But you stroke it so well.”

  “This from the man who told me I looked incandescent. Look at me.” April lifted a swath of bedraggled hair, letting it flop down her back with a splat.

  “Truth,” he said, looking down into her eyes. “Always.”

  April searched his face for another secret wink-wink. But all she found was humour and warmth and fathomless depth that drew her in like a hypnotist’s watch. Her toes turned numb as the blood rushed to her head.

  “Well,” Erica muttered, “what do you know?”

  What was that now? Oh, that was right. Erica was there too. And she looke
d suspiciously like she actually believed they were for real.

  “Anyway,” Erica said, bored now that she hadn’t won the game, “we have to get going. Costumes need to be back at the shop by two or April’ll have to pay double.”

  “Why me?”

  “You’re the one holding me up, kid.” Erica heaved her own zebra-print bag over her shoulder, gave Finn a nod, and said, “When you two have stopped making goo-goo eyes at one another, can you shove her in the direction of the car park?” Then she was off.

  Finn and April watched. Silence pinging between them, taut as a telephone wire.

  “She’s a barrel of laughs,” Finn drawled, his voice low, close, all for her.

  “You don’t say.” April wriggled free, ostensibly to wring some more water out of her hair while she took the chance to tug at her dress in order to dissipate the feeling of Finn’s hand still burned into her skin. “Thank you for going along with Erica’s assumption that we were...” She waved a hand between them, unable to put it into words. It felt unreal, and all too real all at once. “But it really wasn’t necessary.”

  “Still, it felt like it was.”

  Finn took his time, folding her garment bag over the picnic table before leaning his backside against the edge, facing April. His face level with hers for once.

  “I’m clocking up the favours left and right today.”

  “Not that you’re counting.”

  He sniffed out a laugh, his striking blue eyes locked onto hers.

  April’s imagination went a little wild, envisaging how she might repay him. Not particularly keen on him seeing such thoughts play out across her face, she scooted up onto the table beside him. Not too close. She wasn’t a complete sadomasochist.

  He still managed to nudge her with his shoulder. “I’ll take one back now, if I may.”

  “Okaaaay.”

  “A truth.”

  “That I can do.”

  Finn nodded, believing her. A small thing that, a tiny symbol of faith. Yet April’s heart fluttered hopefully against her ribs.

  “The other day, when me met to talk over your contract, why did you tell me where you’d be today?”

  April might have found an unsuspected knack for skirting the edges of reality the past couple of weeks, but, in the end, honesty was always less complicated than the alternative. “It was – in fact – my pathetic way of asking you to come.”

  His cheek lifted in a half smile. But those eyes didn’t let her go.

  Not entirely sure she was ready for the answer, April asked, “Why did you come?”

  “Because I knew you’d be here.” Not even a moment’s hesitation.

  Finn’s truth felt far more like a dare.

  He pressed up onto his feet, moving to stand in front of her. Shifting so his shadow blocked the sun. April’s mouth went dry as she took in the backlit Adonis before her.

  “So this ‘fake boyfriend’ thing,” he said.

  “Mmm?” April nibbled on a thumbnail—the skin around it all cool and pruney.

  “By your sister’s reaction, I’m assuming interest hasn’t died down as yet.”

  “Not... exactly. Though intra-office stats – otherwise known as Smith’s observations over the water cooler – showed we were out-trended by the new baby princess photos. So it’s heading in the right direction.”

  Finn’s smile was a slow release. “Okay. And has it worked as your friend envisaged? Has your being... wanted, made you more wanted? Are your promotion prospects on the rise?”

  Finn’s slight pause on the word “wanted” made April’s breath turn choppy, as if her lungs had forgotten how to expand. She nodded.

  “Go us.” He pumped a subtle fist in the air.

  Despite the tension swirling about inside of her, April laughed.

  She liked this man.

  No. She didn’t. She had a crush. Survival of the hottest—no, fittest, that was it—meant a man like Finn made an impact simply getting out of bed in the morning. But liking him was out of the question.

  Finn was too self-contained for the likes of her. Too self-sufficient. Getting him to share the smallest morsel of himself was like digging for dragon bones. While she shared every innermost thought whether anyone wanted her to or not.

  Nothing good could come from liking him. Nothing real. And fantasies weren’t her thing.

  Try as she might, she couldn’t conjure up an image of him doing anything as simple as lying in bed, reading on a Sunday morning. Or as willing as letting her pick the movie because he didn’t really mind what he watched. Or asking her opinion when picking out a tie. Those were the kinds of men she liked. They were, for wont of a better word, easy.

  Finn was anything but easy. He was exacting, enigmatic, hard-headed.

  Yet she’d never wanted a man more.

  Sitting there, she had to physically restrain herself from sticking a finger in his shorts and tugging him towards her so she could run her hands over the undulations of his big, warm chest. From rubbing her cheek against his weekend stubble. Dragging her fingers through his hair and planting a kiss on his gorgeous mouth and making out till the pool police tossed them out for lewd behaviour.

  April gripped the edge of the table as hard as she could. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll have us break up on Monday. Pretend to break up. I’ll probably get pity points, which will work even better in my favour than dating-a-hot-Viking points. And life will go on.”

  His mouth quirked at the hot Viking bit. See, over-sharer.

  “It tends to do that.”

  “Mmm.”

  Mouth still quirked into a half smile, Finn looked at her in that way of his, like he could see right to the bottom of her soul. She hoped it was a clear soul. Pure. True. Or at least that her slightly shady bits, the scars left by her occasional “little rebellions”, were small enough not to really count.

  “To think you were sitting there, trying to have a quiet drink, when I landed on you, like a piano dropped from the sky. I’m truly sorry to have mixed you up in my crazy.”

  His gaze was steady. Considering. So many thoughts going on behind those deep blue eyes that she had no chance at fathoming.

  Colour her surprised when he said, “You’re forgiven.”

  “That simple?”

  “That simple.”

  April felt a weight fall off her shoulders.

  Then Finn went and said, “Now I hope you’ll forgive me.”

  “For?”

  He leaned toward her, placed his hands on the table either side of hers, his mouth hovering mere millimetres from hers. Her breath caught before a small shuddering sigh escaped her mouth. Then, with a knowing smile, he kissed her.

  From the outside it was a PG kiss. A gentle touch of lips. There were families present after all. On the inside, she was a volcano; all roiling heat and spitting fire.

  When he pulled away she whimpered. Out loud. And as she blinked back into the sunlight, the heat inside of her did what heat does and rose to the top, filling her cheeks, her ears, her scalp. Till her brain boiled over.

  She smacked him in the chest. Her palm bounced off a wall of hard, hot muscle. When the urge to feel it again – slower this time, more thoroughly – took a hold, she curled her fingers into a fist. “You have to stop kissing me, Finn!”

  “Then stop kissing me back.”

  She threw her hands in the air. “You are driving me crazy!”

  Finn stood back, pressed his hands into the pockets of his running shorts, drawing them across his...

  April closed her eyes. Tight. Gripped the picnic table hard enough to get a splinter.

  Through gritted teeth she said, “You are aware that you are sending major mixed signals, right?”

  “Right back at you, kid.”

  When she opened one eye it was to find him driving a hand through his hair. She felt a little better knowing he wasn’t as cool as he made out.

  “I never give mixed signals. I’m honest to a fault.” That was her inte
ntion at least, which had to count for something. She put out her hands to steady herself. “What I mean is, I’m not into playing games, Finn. I’m straight up. What you see is what you get. Now what about you?”

  She waved a hand at the guy, head to toe to find he was doing his statue impression. All gilded muscle and patrician beauty. It was lovely to look at, but it was hell on the nerves.

  She threw her hands in the air and roared at the sky, scaring a child whose mother drew him close as they scurried past.

  Finn, meanwhile, shot a hard breath through his nostrils. Like a thoroughbred forced into a stall.

  It was one of God’s cruel jokes that the man was so damn sexy. Because he was also kind of messed up. His utter refusal to open up when she pried plus all that internet-silence... Something was going on. Something secret. Something big.

  But despite all that he’d come to the pool knowing she’d be there. Why? If they were so very different, what about her kept drawing him back?

  Her skin prickled from the slow burn of the sun as she tried to figure it out. Her back curled as a droplet trickled from her hair. She heard the squeal of a child. The gentle lapping of water against the side of the pool. A small plane flying a long way overhead.

  Figuring him out was like trying to find an answer inside labyrinth without even knowing the question. But he was also a man. Which meant the best way to understand him was by going in a straight line.

  And boom! In a blinding flash it hit her.

  “You like me.”

  He gave her his patented “keep off the grass” look. But she wasn’t buying it. Finally, all those body language studies her mother forced her to sit through were paying off.

  “You weren’t just putting on a show for Erica. And you weren’t putting on a show for Jase. You have a little thing for me, Finn. Admit it!”

  “April...” He growled.

  “Listen to yourself! The way you say my name,” she said, shivering as his deep, silken drawl made her go all gooey. “Do you mean it – all that longing and lust? Or is it a genetic accident? One that makes my brain short circuit and my will dissolve.”

  He glared at her, a muscle working in his jaw. Then he ran his hand through his hair again before bringing his palm down over his face. She saw frustration in his gaze. Frustration she’d put there. A heady bit of knowledge that.