Page 8 of Marriage is a Shore Thing
“What? No! One month.”
Van crosses his arms, and I try not to get distracted by the flex of his toned forearms. “Six months.”
I mirror his posture. “Six weeks—not a second longer.”
Van steps right into my space, his face inches from mine, but I stand my ground.
“Do you have any idea how breathtaking you are when you’re like this? Fighting me?”
A halting inhale pulls silently into my lungs, but I maintain my facade and say nothing.
“Everything is easy for me. You probably saw that in your report, butyou, Gen… You are…”
His sentence drops off when he tucks his bottom lip between his teeth, and I have to pinch the underside of my arm to keep myself from doing something reckless.
“Four months,” Van says, his tone firm.
“Three.”
“Perfect.” That mystifying smile lifts his cheeks. “That’s what I wanted from the beginning.”
My teeth grind as I barely restrain a growl.
His head shakes slightly, his grin growing. “This is going to be fun.”
Then Van is moving toward the door with a determined stride.
“What are you doing?” I get to the door before he does, putting my back against it.
Van’s eyes twinkle with delight. “Moving in, darlin’. What’s it look like?”
“Not with Carol across the street, you’re not.”
His head tilts slightly. “I know you’re not afraid of that sweet old lady.”
“I’m not.” My answer is too rushed, impulsive. Nothing like how I’d normally speak—calm, calculated, or not at all.
“If you say so.”
That smirk. That darned smirk.
“We need to establish ground rules,” I tell him, chin lifting.
“Let’s hear them.”
“There will be nomarriagepart to this marriage.” Van and I might have gotten accidentally married in Vegas, but we hadn’t even completed the ceremony with a kiss. There’d been a tense moment, a swaying of noses too close, shuddered breaths mixing, but nothing official.
“You’re going to sleep over there.” I point to the couch in the adjacent living room. “We’ll keep our own schedules and lives. I’m just helping you keep a promise. I’m not signing up to be a spouse.” My mind whirls, thinking of all that would entail, before I reel it back in. “And we’re not telling the town the truth. We can say that—”
Van sucks in a breath through his teeth. “That’s where I have to stop you. I don’t lie.”
“Never?”
“Nope. Chalk it up to having a deadbeat dad, but I don’t. Not even white lies. If you have spinach in your teeth, I’ll tell you. If you’re worried about how a dress looks and want an honestanswer, I’m your man.” His gaze unconsciously slips down my frame before he focuses on my face again. “I won’t budge on that.”
I mentally recalibrate. It won’t be the first time the town knew about my dirty laundry. Fortunately, most of them are terrified of me, so I never hear wind of it.
“Fine.”
