Page 72 of Black Ties and White Lies

Any amount of time I can have Beck looking at me the way he is right now will have to be enough for me. Women would kill to have one night with him. I get an entire year.

“You did say people would believe us after a month of me working for you…”

His hands drift underneath my robe, running over my ass. “Are you saying you’ll be my fiancée?”

“I’m saying whenever you decide to ask, I’ll say yes. Don’t forget I want a big ass ring Mr. Sinclair. It has to be believable, of course.”

He kisses the tip of my nose. The gesture makes me feel warm all over. He’s so commanding and scary at work, when he does soft things like kiss the tip of my nose or run his thumb along the top of my hand, I can almost convince myself that this isn’t all just for show. That we did develop feelings while working with each other, and that none of this is pretend. That everything between us is raw and real.

“Noted.” The tone of his voice makes me wonder if there’s more he wants to say, but I don’t push it. I’ve already tested my luck by bringing up the impending fake engagement.

A knock sounds at our door, bringing a halt to our conversation. I miss the warmth of his body the moment he pulls away. Taking long strides to the door, he peeks out the hole, standing there and watching whatever he can see on the other side. He waits there for a few moments before opening it.

He grabs a paper bag identical to the ones we got in the gift shop from the ground. Smirking, he shuts the door. “Looks like our new sheets came.”

“I don’t know if I’ll be able to look that nice woman in the face again tomorrow morning.” She seemed so sweet, like my grandmother. The fact she knows that Beck and I clearly put the honeymoon suite to good use—even after admitting we work together—mortifies me. I’m fairly confident my grandmother still thinks I’ve never kissed anyone. She’d probably faint if she knew all the filthy things my boss just did to me here.

Beck sets the bag on the top of the bed. Walking over to our stuff from earlier, he pulls out the clothes we bought at the gift shop and throws them over to me. “Put these on before I strip you of that robe and sink inside you again.”

“That doesn’t sound so terrible.”

His returning look is heated. “As much as I want to do that, you need rest. You need to eat. So put some god damn clothes on so I can think straight.”

Teasing him, I slip my arms out of the sleeves of the robe. It’s so oversized that it slips to the ground now that my arms and shoulders no longer keep it secure on my body.

I don’t think I could ever get used to the way Beck looks at my naked body. I’ve never had anyone look at every part of me with such primal need. When he looks at me, I don’t think of the flaws of mine he could notice. No. Under his stare, I feel like the most beautiful woman in the world.

He licks his lips, letting his towel fall to the ground. “Two can play that game, baby.”

He’s rock hard, his cock standing at attention. I know if I closed the distance between us and touched him, that he’d forget about his insistence on giving me a break. At least I think he would. I resist the urge to test my theory, because he’s right. I’m starving and my muscles are already sore despite the warm bath.

It doesn’t mean I can’t have a little fun with him, however. I turn around, giving him a perfect view of my ass as I bend to the ground to pick up the clothes he’d thrown at me earlier. I stay bent over a little longer than necessary, arching my back in hopes of driving him wild.

“One day I’m going to put a perfect handprint on that ass.”

“What for?” I slide one foot and then the other into the pant legs of the pants he bought.

“For all the times you’ve been a pain in my ass.”

“Me?” I mock. “Never.”

He lets out a deep, rumbly laugh. “Being a pain in my ass is like a personality trait for you, Margo.”

I slide my arms through the sleeves of the oversized hoodie he’d picked out for me in the store. It’s warm in here, I could’ve totally picked out something else so he could have the hoodie. But I don’t say anything. When I turn around, I much prefer the view of him in a pair of pajama pants and no shirt at all.

“Name one time I’ve been a pain in your ass.” The both of us are now dressed. Well, me all the way and him partly. He begins to strip the sheets off the bed, throwing them into an empty corner of the room.

“I could name way more than one.”

“Then do it,” I challenge, stepping up to the opposite side of the bed as him. When he tosses the fitted sheet on top of the bed, I do my best at laying it out and hooking one of the corners of the mattress.

We work in unison putting the fitted sheet on followed by the rest of the sheets. They smell nice and fresh. Part of me hopes we’ll dirty them all over again tonight.

“Well for starters, you were a pain in the ass from the moment I met you. I’d been on an important business call when I walked in the door of the beach house and found you standing in the kitchen in nothing but a string bikini.”

My eyes go wide in shock, remembering the exact moment. “That doesn’t count, I didn’t even do anything,” I argue.

“Doesn’t matter. You were a pain in my ass because you had the nerve to be so fucking sexy while also dating my brother.”

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