Page 11 of Her Fake Mate

“Pass what?”

“Your inspection,” he murmurs. The corner of his mouth curls in the barest hint of a smile.

I roll my eyes. “Don’t flatter yourself. I’m just trying to decide what I want to do.”

“You don’t have a choice.”

My temper snaps. “Oh, you’re going to force me to date you? Let me guess, for my own good?”

The fire in my voice is clear. Zander takes a step back. “I didn’t mean…”

“You didn’t mean anything. Because you didn’t think about it before you said it,” I bark.

“Mia!” I hear a shrill voice from inside the house. “AJ is eating crayons!”

I shut my eyes. “Shit. I have to go.”

“Give me your phone.”

“Why?”

“So you can text me your decision.”

A wail starts inside the house. “I don’t have a phone,” I snap at him. My hand is on the door, and I turn to look back. “Come back later.”

“When?”

“I don’t know, Zander. Just later.” I open the door, and it slams shut behind me.

I take one deep breath before zooming over to where the babies are, in fact, chomping on crayons.

It takes me ten seconds to sort it out and put everyone back to where they need to be. Then, I deal with another crisis, which is one of the older foxes coming to ask me if I can help them set up a library card.

Before I know it, the sun is turning gold, the late afternoon glow approaching, and it’s time to get the older kids from school. One of the older foxes takes over the task of caring for the kids. I go to open the front door, but a giant body is blocking my way.

I blink. “What the hell are you doing here?”

Zander shrugs. “You said to come back later.”

My jaw drops. “Zander. That was—” I check my watch. “Five hours ago.”

“I know. But it was easier to wait. You have a hornet problem on the porch. I’ll take care of it while you get the kids from school,” he says casually.

I stare at the very broad back descending my front porch.

I haven’t even agreed to this yet. But, apparently, I’m in a fake relationship.

With Zander freaking Black.

It turns out, I didn’t need to scramble to get the kids. I forgot that today is the day they go to soccer after school, and there’s another hour I need to kill.

Apparently, since Zander Black and I are fake dating, we are going to fill that time together. By getting something that will kill hornets.

“You know,” I say as we wander the aisles of the only hardware store in town. “I feel like if I really had a boyfriend, he would just grab the hornets.”

I stop short of running into Zander’s broad back. Barely.

He’s looking down at me. “What?”

---