Page 96 of The Fiancée Farce
“It’s not that I don’t believeyou. It’s just something that’s a little hard to believe.” She tugged her towel higher with one hand, gesturing to Gemma with the other. “You’re a—amodel. You’re on the cover of romance novels, and part of that means representing people’s fantasies. You’ve got a face, a body, people dream about.”
Gemma frowned. “And you think you don’t?”
Tansy shrugged. Everyone was someone’s type. She was happy with the way she looked, and most days she was pleased with what she saw in the mirror.
Gemma’s jaw clenched, and she nodded once, more to herself than to Tansy, it seemed.
“Later,” she promised, the hand she still had resting on Tansy’s shoulder skimming down the bare skin of her arm, settling finally on her towel-clad hip, “I’m going to take the time to show you just how beautiful you are, and I’m going to keep showing you over and over and over again until you believe me.”
Gemma leaned in, lips brushing the damp shell of Tansy’s ear, dropping her voice down to a rasping whisper that made Tansy shiver, goose bumps erupting along her bare skin. “And you better fucking believe I’m going to make good on that promise to spend all the time on my knees that you want. Hell, you’re going to have to beg me to stop.”
Tansy’s knees quivered, and her breath escaped her in severalgasping pants as she tried in vain to drag air into her lungs. To calm down and keep from . . .God, combusting.
Gemma drew back and smiled serenely like she hadn’t just made some of the filthiest promises Tansy had heard in her entire life.
“Get dressed.” She shoved the clothes into Tansy’s hands. “The sooner we dole out a little harmless justice, the sooner I get to make you come.”
Tansy shivered hard.
Talk about incentive.
***
An hour later, Teddy threw himself into the passenger seat of Max’s Range Rover. “Drive on, Maximillian! We’ve got places to be and havoc to wreak!”
“You’ve got the goods?” Gemma stretched over the console and grabbed the brown paper bag off Teddy’s lap. She looked inside, green eyes going wide. “Teddy, this is—”
“Brilliant, right?” Teddy rested his arm against the rain-splattered window, looking into the back seat. “I did good?”
Gemma dug around inside the bag and laughed. “You didsuperb, my friend.”
Tansy frowned as Max pulled away from the curb outside Blick Art Materials. “We’re not going to, like, tag Tucker’s car, are we?”
What else would Teddy have purchased at an art supply store for a prank but spray paint?
“Tag Tucker’s car.” Teddy laughed. “Oh, Tansy, love, you sweet summer child. Of course we’re not going to tag his car. How painfully pedestrian.”
“I promised you.” Gemma grabbed Tansy’s hand, Gemma’s fingers warm against her skin. “Nothing destructive. I meant it.”
“Nothing destructive,” she repeated. “Nothingillegal?”
Gemma and Teddy exchanged a questionable look that did nothing to quell Tansy’s nerves.
Teddy hiked one foot up and rested his heel on the edge of the dash. “Defineillegal.”
“Teddy!” Gemma glared at him. “Seriously?”
He held up his hands. “She asked!”
Max shoved Teddy’s knee. “Get your feet off the dash, bro. New car, man. Respect.”
“The letter of the law,” Tansy said. “Are we sticking to it?”
Teddy shut one eye. “Whichletter, pray tell, would that be?”
“Honestly, Theodore?” Gemma huffed.
“There’s twenty-six of them, Gem—mantha! How am I supposed to know which letter of the law to which we are ambiguously adhering? Fuck me, that’s assuming we’re sticking to the Modern English Latin-Script alphabet. If we’re working with, say, the Cyrillic alphabet, good fucking luck.”
