Page 57 of Romancing the Grump
“You deserved it,” Summer says, laughter in her voice.
“Oh, you’re getting it now.”
I reach for her, my hand skimming over her arm as she shrieks and scrambles to the other side of the bed. I’m a lot bigger than she is, so it only takes a moment to catch her and tug her into the center of the mattress. She laughs and laughs, her fists raining futile blows against my chest until I capture her wrists and loosely pin them above her head. I’m not actually holding her in place. One tug and she’d be free of me. But she stays where she is anyway.
“Okay, okay,” she says through her laughter. “I surrender. You win.”
It’s too dark for me to see more than her outline, but my other senses are making up for it. I hear her breathing, feel it as I hover over her. I smell hints of vanilla in her hair, something citrusy on her skin. Every single part of me feels tuned into her every movement, her every breath.
“I loved watching you play tonight,” she says, her voice soft. “You were great.”
I don’t tell her that knowing shewaswatching, having her in the stands, made me play harder and faster than I have in months. I’ve rolled my eyes at guys who fawn over their girlfriends while they’re on the ice, but when I saw her standing behind the glass, I understood the appeal. I may be morallyopposed to relationships on principle, but it did feel good knowing there was someone at the game just for me.
“I loved knowing you were watching,” I admit, and Summer takes a stuttering breath.
She tugs her wrists free, and I immediately shift away, giving her room.
“Okay, I have one more rule,” she says. She moves up the bed, shifting, then tugging the covers into place. This time, she’s definitely not close enough for me to warm her feet.
I lay down on my side of the bed, one arm lifted over my head. “Okay. Shoot.”
“If we’re faking, then we’re faking. I don’t want to wonder if every touch or every look means something that it doesn’t. So let’s just decide that it doesn’t. We’re doing this to make things easier on you and Parker. Unless we explicitly tell each other differently, we assume there are no actual real feelings involved. Is that fair?”
I’m not an idiot. I know what she’s doing, and I understand why she’s doing it. She’s protecting herself. Setting boundaries that will keep all this from getting confusing. She’s respecting what she already knows aboutme,acting on the assumption that I don’t want anything real. And she’srightto do that. Even though the tension and pull between us are more real than anything I’ve felt before, it still doesn’t change my resolve.
“Yeah,” I finally say. “That sounds fair.”
It’s the smartest path forward.
It’s logical. Practical.
It’s exactly what I want.
So why do I feel so disappointed?
CHAPTER 13
SUMMER
Havinga sister married to a very famous movie star has a lot of perks. But the red Louis Vuitton heels I put on for our brand meeting with Flex might be the biggest one.
Audrey wore them down the red carpet once, then decided they were too small. Because I am a very good sister, and because Lucy happened to be at work so she couldn’t fight me for them, I was generous enough to take them off Audrey’s hands. They happen to perfectly match the Hermes silk blazer I found in a second-hand store in West Asheville. When I pair both with my black pencil skirt with the tiny kick pleat, I feel like a million bucks.
In control. Powerful. Empowered to represent my clients’ best interests.
The fact that one of those clients turns my insides to pudding every time he so much as looks at me?
It’s fine. I’m totally in control.
We stop at the bank of elevators in the building thathouses Flex’s corporate offices, and Nathan presses the up button. He and Alec are both quiet this morning; it could just be the early hour, but Alec seems particularly distracted. And completely incapable of looking me in the eye, which is weird for him.
Alec’s teammates like to call him Ego, and it makes sense. He’s supremely confident, and his sharp sense of humor means that sometimes he really does come across as egotistical. I’ve seen Alec play it up intentionally, like he knows he has some sort of reputation to keep up, but then, all the guys do that to some extent. Nathan is the grump, Van is the flirt, Alec is the ego, Felix is the bookworm, Eli is the golden retriever.
But they’re all a lot more than that, too. Now that I’m getting to know Alec, I’m seeing a lot less ego and a lot more unusual self-assurance. Alec Sheridan is happy with who he is in ways that a lot of people don’t ever figure out. That inner confidence means he’s the kind of person whoconfrontsproblems instead of evading them.
But he’s definitely evading something right now.
“Hey,” I say as we climb onto the elevator. I nudge his elbow. “What’s up with you?”
