Page 3 of Forbidden Games

Until now.

Gideon shifted, bringing her back to the present. “How exactly were you planning on going about this?”

This, at least, she had an answer for. Lucy had spent entirely too much time reviewing the steps required to get to her goal with minimum fuss—a husband and her promotion. “I thought you could come up with a list of suitable candidates, I could have a date or two with each, and then we could narrow the list down from there.”

“Mmm-hmm.” He tapped his fingers on his knee, dragging her attention south of his face. He wore a three-piece suit, which should have been too formal for this meeting, but Gideon managed to pull it off all the same. The pin-striped gray-on-gray gave him an old-world kind of feel, like something out ofMad Men.

Thankfully for Lucy, he had better morals than Don Draper.

She fought not to squirm in her seat under the weight of his attention. It was easy enough to be distanced and professional when she’d laid out her proposal—she’d practiced it the same way she practiced opening and closing statements before a trial. Getting into the nitty-gritty of the actual planning and actions was something else altogether.

“I’m open to suggestions, of course.”There—look at me, being reasonable.

“Of course.” He nodded as if deciding something. “We do this, we do it on my terms. I pick the men. I supervise the dates. And if I don’t like the look of any of them, I have veto rights.”

Veto rights? That wasn’t part of the plan.She shook her head. “No. Absolutely not.”

“You came to me, Lucy. That means you trust my judgment.” He gave her an intense look that made her skin feel too tight. “Those are the terms.”

Terms. Damn, she’d forgotten the most important thing.

It doesn’t have to be the most important thing. He doesn’t know it was part of the plan, so it’s not too late to back out.

But if she backed out, the deep-rooted fear from her time with her ex would never be exorcised. She’d spend the rest of her life—and her prospective marriage—second-guessing herself and her husband. It would drive her crazy and ultimately poison everything.

She couldn’t let it happen, no matter how humiliating she found asking for Gideon’s help with this.

Lucy managed to drag her gaze away from his. She pulled at the hem of her dress. “There’s one more thing.”

“I’m listening.”

She smoothed her suddenly sweating palms over her desk. “Are you seeing anyone?”

“What the hell does that have to do with anything?”

It had everything to do with things. She’d never known Gideon to hold down a relationship longer than a few weeks, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t somehow changed in the last two years. The entire second part of her plan leaned heavily on the assumption that hehadn’tchanged.

The Gideon she’d known before had been her friend, yes, but he’d also been a playboy to the very definition of the word. He hadn’t dated seriously. He’d never mistreated women, but he hadn’t kept them around for long, either. Lucy had heard the whispers in college about his expertise in the bedroom—it was legendary enough that most women ignored the fact they had an expiration date from the moment he showed an interest in them.

To put it simply, he wasperfectfor her current situation.

She just had to find the strength to speak the damn words. She forced her hands still. “I’m going to need...lessons.”

“Lucy, look at me.”

Helpless, she obeyed. He frowned at her like he was trying to read her mind. “You’re going to have to explain what the hell you’re talking about.”

It was so much harder to get it out while looking at him. She pressed her lips together. She’d faced down some of the most vicious prosecutors New York had to offer. She could damn well face Gideon Novak down, too.

You know these words. You’ve practiced them often enough.

“I need lessons of the sexual nature.” He went so still, he might as well have turned to stone, so she charged on. “This might be an arranged marriage, so to speak, but it would be a true marriage. And, as I don’t cherish the idea of being cheated on by yet another fiancé, that means sex needs to be part of the bargain. It’s been a long time for me, and I have to brush up on my skill set.”

Not to mention the only man I ever slept with was Jeff, and he never missed an opportunity to tell me how uninspiring he found our sex life.

Or that he blamed his cheating on my being unable to meet his needs.

She didn’t let what Jeff thought dictate her life anymore, but Lucy would be lying if she pretended his words didn’t haunt her—that they hadn’t been instrumental in her two-year celibate streak. She’d enjoyed sex. She’d thought Jeff had enjoyed it, as well. If she could be so terribly wrong on such a fundamental level before, what was to stop her from failing at it again?

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