: Chapter 9

“IT’S THE WAY SHE was so fucking proud of herself. Like that was the answer to everything.”

Griffin watches me as I tip my head back and finish off another scotch.

“She really thought this was about Bea.” I hang my head and trace the dark, wooden grain of the bar’s surface with unfocused eyes. “Fuck, if she knew…”

“If she knew, then it would make no difference. This is Harley,” Griffin interjects, sipping on his scotch with the reserved control I have failed miserably to execute since we stepped into this bar five blocks away from The Songbird. Five blocks away from Harley, who’s probably wondering where the hell I stormed off to.

Stormed off. Like a fucking petulant child.

She was trying to do a good thing. In a roundabout, messed up way. But this is her. She doesn’t do anything a normal person would. She does it the Harley way. I don’t know whether to be angry or jubilant that she cares enough in the first place to even entertain the idea to heal my supposedly ‘broken heart’. It means she feels something.

As long as that something isn’t pity.

I never want to be fucking pitied.

“I know. Fuck,” I hiss, pinching the bridge of my nose. “It’s just messed up, you know? I gave her a glimpse, slipped up for one fraction of a second, and now I’m her new charity project.”

“You’re not.” Griffin places his glass down and signals the bartender for another. “If you were her charity project, she would have you in a pot and be playing Disney love songs to you to see if you produced more flowers.”

I snort at his accurate analogy. She would do that. It’s not escaped my attention that Bruce now has a ‘friend’ on the hallway table—a rather pathetic looking bushy thing Harley said she rescued from one of the hotel admin girls’ desks.

“Yeah, I know… I know that.” I drag my hands down my face with a groan as two fresh glasses are placed in front of us.

But still, the thought that she’s trying to set me up with other women is just… it’s wrong. It is so wrong.

“Why don’t you be honest with her?”

“That would be the obvious fucking answer,” I say to Griffin, earning myself a smirk. “I know, you’re right. I just… not yet. It’s not the sort of shit you can bring up over morning coffee, you know, like, Oh, by the way, did I tell you the reason my family all moved to California when I was twenty-one? Why my sister became a lawyer, and why I campaign for harsher punishments for sexually motivated crimes?” I knock back half of my drink. “It’s a conversation killer if ever there was one. Like a bullet to the fucking brain.”

“Then don’t tell her. Whatever you need to do.” Griffin shrugs as I nod slowly, contemplating his words.

“It’s all in the past.”

“It is. And it can stay there if that’s what you want.”

I roll my lips, studying my glass. The past. All in the past. Griffin’s right; some things shouldn’t be dragged back into the harsh light of day. No matter how hard they seem to be trying to push their way back in recently.

Darkness suits the shadows.

“Tell me something that’ll take my mind off this shit,” I mutter, glancing at him.

Griffin swirls the honeyed liquid in his glass and then meets my eyes. “Maria’s incubating a pigeon egg in our kitchen.”

“What?” I almost spit out my drink as I snort.

“The fucking thing’s plugged into this contraption on the counter. She keeps checking on it with this weird, faraway look on her face,” Griffin groans, knocking back his drink with the same enthusiasm I was moments earlier.

“It’s a real egg?” I look at him, the fog of my mood lifting just a little.

“Yeah. I thought about accidentally knocking it off the counter, but she’d be heartbroken. She’s talking fucking names.”

I let out a deep breath, laced with the beginnings of a chuckle. I know he’s joking. Griffin adores Maria. He would open a pigeon breeding farm and sleep on a perch with the feathered bastards if he knew it would make her happy.

“You know, when that thing hatches, you’ll have to chew up worms and feed them to it.” I laugh as I conjure up the mental image.

“Fuck off.” Griffin grimaces.

“Happily,” I reply as I glance at my watch. I have an early meeting with Stuart in the morning and it’s already later than I thought. “You want to fly back together now?” I tip my head toward the door as I throw some bills down onto the bar and catch the bartender’s eye with a nod.

“Ha, the fuck, ha,” Griffin replies, standing from his seat. He gives me a wry smile as I pat him on the shoulder.

“Thanks, man.”

His hand claps on top of mine. “Don’t mention it.”

We walk back together. Harley’s bedroom door is closed when I get home and I pause outside it, straining to hear if she’s still awake. Not that I would expect her to be at this time. A soft, sleepy moan, followed by the shuffling of sheets as she moves in bed are the only sounds that I can make out.

I’ll have left before she gets up in the morning. Maybe it’s a good thing. Because the more time I spend with her, the harder it is not to give in to the urge to pull her to me and see what those pretty pink lips of hers taste like.

But it’s like she keeps reminding me. This entire thing is fake. For show. A lie.

And if trying to set me up with another woman isn’t a blaring, flashing, loud enough signal that she does not see me in any other way than a ‘fake’ boyfriend, then I don’t know what is.

“We’re in good shape. Early whisperings are that you’re the front runner.” Stuart stretches his arms behind his head and the cracking of his back echoes around the room.

“Says who?” I circle a figure in the paperwork I’m reading. Sixteen hundred rapes in the city of New York in the previous twelve months. Sixteen hundred. And that’s only the reported ones.

Acid burns in the pit of my stomach as I throw my pen down on top of the paper and give my attention over to Stuart.

“Says everyone.” He grins. “Of course, it does help that you have the panther on your team.”

I look at his shit-eating grin and chuckle, despite the fact my main setting has been ‘grumpy fucker’ throughout our breakfast meeting. I can’t shake the look on Harley’s face as I stormed out last night from my mind. She was stunned. The way her mouth fell open before I left her standing there, the hint of panic in her voice as she called after me. She’s probably wondering what kind of asshole she’s living with.

“Come on, spill.”

“Pardon?”

Stuart sighs and leans back in his chair, twizzling his pen between his finger and thumb as he surveys me. “You. There’s something up with you. You’ve barely said two words all morning.”

“It’s nothing,” I murmur. “Just a small misunderstanding with Harley.”

“Right.” He purses his lips and drops his pen onto the desk.

“Nothing worth mentioning.”

“No, course not.” Stuart holds his palms up toward me. “I guess it must suck, though. I mean, if you were a real couple, you could have banged each other’s brains out during makeup sex and be over it by now.”

The thought alone is enough to make my redundant dick stir in my pants. “Yeah, well. We’re not.”

“So go beat your frustrations out in another way. Have a run, hit the punch bag, go to one of those places where you get a bat, and smash shit up. Do whatever you need to get your head back in the game. It’s not long until the election and I need you focused. One million percent, you understand?”

“I am.” I clench my jaw. “Nothing is more important to me than winning this thing.”

Stuart nods. He knows I mean it. He knows I’m driven to landing the role of mayor, and he’s sure as hell been witness to my determination and thirst for it since working together. But not even he knows what truly motivates me. Only my family and Griffin know that.

“Better still, go tell Harley you’re sorry for whatever shit went down.”

I snap my eyes to his. There’s no use in pointing out that the ‘shit that went down’ might not have even been my fault in the first place. He won’t care. All he will care about is that I’ve got my game face on. Plus, from the handful of times he’s met Harley, he’s already enamored by her, as most people are. She’s got this easy, genuine way about her. Her eyes light up when she’s speaking, and she gives everyone her full attention. You feel like you’re the fucking king when you have her eyes on you. She shines like the sun. I swear, if her beloved plants were put in a completely darkened room, they would still flourish if they had her in there with them. Given the choice, if people were asked who they like more out of the two of us, I know what would happen. She would wipe the floor with me.

Every. Single. Time.

“And while you’re at it, you can make sure she’s free for the retreat?”

“Is Shannon coming?”

“Er, an all-expenses paid trip to a fancy hotel in the mountains, organized by the president of the United States himself. Hell yes, she’s coming. I’m going to be drowning in grateful sex and blow jobs for the entire trip. I’m seriously setting a new bar in boyfriend standards here, you know?”

I shake my head, a smile playing on my lips. Lucky fucker. That is a giant perk when things like this happen. To be invited to a retreat with the other candidates by the president himself is a huge honor. Then to be able to take partners and treat the nights like your own private getaway is a bonus. During the day, we will be involved in conferences and press events. And there is a dinner being put on in the evening. But the partners can please themselves during the day. I wonder what Harley will choose to do with herself.

“Yeah, I’ll make sure I ask her about it. But I’m sure she’s free those days and she’ll be there.”

After our strict dating ban, she better be free. She’s mine.

For now.

It’s not long until the election, and the idea of what she might do after our agreement ends has me clenching my hands until my knuckles look like they might explode.

“Harley will be there,” I repeat, needing to hear the words for my own benefit as I crack my knuckles.

“I’ll be where?”

Our heads snap up and over to the open doorway where Harley is standing in a fitted pink dress that wraps around her body and hugs her curvy hips and ass tight. Her blonde hair falls around her shoulders in soft waves.

Fuck my life.

I’ve seen her wear the same dress once before, and I wanted to rip the damn thing open and bury my head between her thighs then. What makes it even sexier is that she literally has no idea how stunning she is. She doesn’t notice the looks she gets, the guys that step out into the street, cabs swerving to avoid them because they’re too distracted by staring at her.

But I do.

I notice every chancing prick who tries to eye-fuck her in broad daylight. And they know I’ve seen them. They fucking know I have seen them. But that’s only when I’m with her. The thought of all the times she’s out without me that it could be happening has me clearing my throat and fighting to stop my teeth from grinding together until only dust is left.

I stand from my seat and walk over to her, lowering my lips to her cheek, one hand curled around the back of her neck.

“Hey, Babe.” I kiss her soft skin and inhale her coconut scent that’s been warmed by the heat of her body.

She sucks in a small breath as I pull back. Her eyes dart from me to Stuart and back again, two lines funneling between her eyebrows.

“I love it!” Stuart gives us an impressed look. “No wonder the press is eating out of our fucking hand. You two are naturals. I even got a little hard there for a second with the fake sexual tension. Keep it up. It’s only working in our favor. Damn, I’m a fucking legend for having the idea.” He chuckles to himself as Harley gazes at me.

“I, um…” She looks back at Stuart, who is still reveling in his own deemed greatness. “I came to give you these. After yesterday and everything, I… well, I thought of you when I saw them, so…” Her smile is apprehensive as she looks up at me, lifting a small paper bag in her hand. I’m still standing as close to her as possible, my eyes fixed on hers.

“I was a jerk for storming off,” I say, lowering my voice, even though Stuart can still hear us if he wants to listen.

“No, you weren’t.” Her baby blue eyes widen before she squeezes them closed and shakes her head. “It was my fault. I was reading into things wrong, and being a fool, and… I’m sorry.” She opens her eyes and blinks up at me shyly. “Will you forgive me if I tell you I brought truce cookies?”

“I could eat a cookie,” Stuart pipes up.

Harley hands the bag to him and he pulls out an iced cookie in the shape of a…

“Is that a dog?” I stare at what I think is the tail before Stuart bites it off and chews, humming his approval.

“I tell you what it is,” he speaks through his mouthful. “What is it they say in England? Oh yeah… it’s the dog’s bollocks.”

Harley giggles, pressing her hand to her lips, and I watch as she illuminates the space around her. “It really is. You’re eating its butt.”

Stuart winks at her, and she turns to me, her giggle leaving her lips in a sigh as she smiles. “Friends again?”

I stare back at her as she holds her breath, her eyes fixed on mine. The pulse in her neck flutters against her skin, and this time, I don’t hold back. I reach up and touch it, stroking my thumb lightly over it and watching as a blush spreads up her neck and her lips part involuntarily.

She gazes at me as I hold her eyes with mine. My words come out as a low whisper, just for her, and she struggles to swallow upon hearing them.

“Friends again, Mrs. Walker.”