Page 8 of Misadventures With My Fake Fiancé

“Yeah, but what kind? What if it's cold, then you need your winter ones. Or if it's hot, you can just wear your underpants. Do you wear your underpants to bed when it's hot?”

“Zach,” Jane prompted. “We don't talk about Miss Miller's underwear.”

I couldn't help but smile. As a teacher, I got ridiculous questions all the time, so I was used to it. “Why do you thinkI have that second suitcase?” I turned my head to look back at Zach, saw him shrug. “For all the different kinds of pajamas.”

He giggled. “And underwear.”

“Zach,” Jane warned.

“And underwear,” I repeated. “So, who's that?” I asked Zach, pointing at the gnome in his lap.

“This is George.” He gave the gnome a loving squeeze. “He's my friend.”

“Hi, George,” I said to the gnome. He had a pointy blue hat, red coat, white beard and a cheeky grin that said he knew exactly what kind of underwear was packed in the extra suitcase. I remembered Jane's crazy adventure from the summer before and how George the Gnome had caused it all. She and Zach and Bobby had found him at a garage sale. They'd also found themselves in heaps of trouble when she discovered black market bull semen stashed inside of George. If that wasn't icky enough, she'd had to deal with a psycho wannabe-Dom who had wanted her dead.

Needless to say, George survived the experience—and so did Jane.

“Speaking of underwear,” Jane said, either in synch with the gnome or trying to get the subject off of Zach's unusual friend.

“I thought we don't talk about Miss Miller's underwear,” I replied.

Jane darted a glance at me and rolled her eyes. “I wasn't talking aboutyourunderwear. I was thinking of Mike's.”

“Why were you thinking of Mike's? I thought you thought of Ty's.”

Jane's fiancé, Ty, was a gorgeous hunk of a firefighter. It was impossible for any conscious woman not to think of Ty in his underwear.

“Ha-ha. Are you planning on seeing if he's a boxers or briefs man?”

I already knew Mike was a boxer man. I'd seen him in them, and less. The memory alone kept me warm at night more frequently than I'd like. But he'd been eighteen and even though I hadn't seen him inlesssince then, I knew he'd filled out to be even more impressive, and I didn't mean in his boxers. His shoulders were broader, his muscles were now stacked on top of muscles from taking advantage of Montana's wilderness: hiking, rock climbing, skiing, kayaking, even ice climbing. If he'd gotten me all hot and bothered as a teenager, I could only imagine what he could do now. My palms became damp, as well as other places, at the very idea.

“I'm not sure if that's a perk of a pretend girlfriend.”

“Oh, a perk? So you're saying you'd like to see him in his underpants.”

I shifted in my seat to face Jane. “You are as bad as Goldie.”

Jane's mouth dropped open. “Oh, my gosh, I am. I'm turning into my mother-in-law.” She lifted a hand from the steering wheel and tucked her long blonde curls behind an ear. “I'm so sorry!”

I waved my hand at her. “To answer your question, any woman with a pulse would want to see him in his underpants. I don't think it's limited to just me.”

“True. Very, very true.” It was hard to tell through her dark sunglasses, but I could practically see Jane imagining Mike in his underwear. After a minute, she said, “I don't care if you lump me in with Goldie. I want all the juicy details when you get back.”

Twelve hours later,I walked out of the gate area, my carry-on schlepped over my shoulder, and into baggage claim with all of the other passengers from our flight. My eyes burned withexhaustion and I was stiff from sitting, and trying to sleep, in the middle seat. The man in the aisle seat had been large enough to ooze over the armrest and into my personal space. Sadly, it was the closest I'd been to a man in a long time.

The small child behind me had chosen the first hour of the flight to kick the back of my seat, then the next hour to scream before passing out to the relief of everyone within a ten-seat radius. As a stomach sleeper, trying to get some shut-eye upright was next to impossible. All I wanted to do was climb into the nearest bed and pass out for the next ten hours.

But as I walked through the concourse, my nerves started to build, my palms to sweat. My heart kicked into overdrive at the very thought of Mike waiting for me. Forme.I was going to spend the week with him as his fake girlfriend. I had no idea what that meant exactly or what I had to do to make people believe we were together, but judging from the way I was feeling about just seeing him at baggage pickup, I was pretty sure I could pull off the infatuated look.

Surprisingly, Anchorage baggage claim was a happening place at nearly two in the morning. Wild animals weren't the only nocturnal things in this state. Several flights had recently arrived from somewhere and the carousel area was filled with people, luggage, fishing rod carriers, waxed boxes of recently caught frozen fish, and glass display cases of stuffed animals. Not teddy bears and other cuddly toys, but real wolves, bears, raptors, and other 'taken' animals. Taken seemed to be the Alaskan euphemism for shot.

There, waiting for me, stood Mike Ostranski. Tall, gorgeous, and, for one week, all mine. In a pretend sort of way. All six-feet-plus of burly, sexy, massive masculinity. A nervous burst of adrenaline shot through me just looking my fill. Faded blue jeans hugged him in all the right places. He wore a blue fleece pullover that stretched across his broad shoulders and a pair ofold sneakers that had seen better days. Even semi-conscious, my body responded, heated at the sight of him.

The stubble on his chiseled jaw was a darker shade of red than the rumpled hair on his head and I had an overwhelming urge to run my palm over it to see if it was as scruffy as it looked. He was slightly disheveled, as if he'd climbed out of bed to meet me. The very idea that I'd pulled him from his sleep was appealing and surprisingly erotic. I knew right then that my brain was not functioning on all cylinders, but my libido certainly was.

The side of his mouth ticked up in a smile as I approached. “You're a sight for sore eyes.”

I knew he was lying because I had to look like a complete disaster. Three thousand miles of travel did not look good on anyone. He opened his arms in welcome and I stepped into his big bear hug. My cheek nestled into his chest, the fleece soft, his arms wrapped around me. I closed my eyes and breathed him in. He smelled like fabric softener, soap and, well, Mike. Memories of the last time I was this close to him overwhelmed me. Back then, we hadn't been wearing nearly as many clothes. It was as if his scent had been hard coded on my brain on graduation night.

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