Her eyebrows hit her hairline. Panic flitted over her face, followed by something I thought might be fear, before she shut down again. Every single emotion disappeared, and I was left with the bland Maisey I wanted to banish.
“You’re an idiot.” There was no heat to the words. No passion or frustration or anger. And that sort of pissed me off because sheshouldbe angry with me.
“The last thing I am is an idiot,” I said with a shrug. The only trouble I ever got into at school came from being bored, waiting for my classmates to catch up.
Maisey looked down and away, and I knew she regretted using the word idiot—a word she despised because of the way people had used it against her. But I proved just what a bastard I could be by using her regret to push my cause.
“Look. This is a two-way street here. I need a fake fiancée, and you need a place to live. You can save your rent money, put it all toward your dad’s mortgage, and no one needs to know you aren’t sleeping in my bed.” I paused as that image slammed into me—her spread out across my navy sheets, dark hair spread over my pillows, naked skin glowing. I pushed it aside and kept going. “Plus, I can sweeten the deal by throwing in my manual labor. We can keep the repair costs down at your dad’s by doing alot of the work ourselves, just like I did with my house.”
She pressed a hand into her stomach, but she didn’t reject the idea again. Instead, I could tell she was thinking about it, weighing the pros and cons in that careful way Maisey was so good at doing.
“It’s not like this is forever, Maise. We just keep up the engagement until I get the chief’s job, and you get your dad back on his feet. It’s a win-win.”
“And what if Nattingly and the city council expect us to actually sayI dobefore they give you the job?”
My hands turned sweaty, and my lungs filled with ash. I fought past it, shaking my head to give myself time. Once the worst had subsided, I said, “They’ll need someone in the job far sooner than we could plan a wedding.”
She rubbed her forehead. “This is a bad idea, Beckett.”
She hadn’t said no. If she’d been going to, she would have already. This was like when we’d been kids and she’d debated whether she should sneak out of the house to join me in the treehouse at night. She just needed a little nudge.
I closed the distance between us, tugged on a long strand of hair, and indulged myself in wrapping it around my fingers. She watched me slowly twist it, and I was rewarded with her breath turning choppy. This new chemistry wasn’t one-sided. I relished knowing she was fighting the attraction too, even if I’d never let us act on it.
“Come on, my Maisey-girl, what’s the worst that could happen?”
The answer popped into my head before she could respond. Sex. Sex and passion and things that might permanently break through the layer of scars that kept my heart from fully feeling anything, that might ruin the only real friendship I had.
No. I wouldn’t risk her for sex.
You’ll risk her for your job, though, a little voice whispered.
I shoved it aside. This wouldn’t risk us. Wouldn’t risk what we had.
If anything, this might bring us even closer. We could be there for each other as we’d once been when we’d lived next door as two broken kids.
This actually might be the best thing that had happened to either of us in a long time.
Chapter Nine
Maisey
CHANCES ARE
Performed by Lee Ann Womack
THREE YEARS AGO
HIM: You looked pretty darn cute when I left, passed out in your bed.
An hour later.
HIM: Are you not talking to me?
HER: I’m not sure what to say. I’m embarrassed. I don’t even remember you putting me to bed.
HIM: Nothing to be embarrassed about. We’ve all been there.
Another hour went by.