Page 32 of Unrealistic Expectations

Nothing about that woman would surprise him, but he added it to the list of reasons he disliked Laurie. “We’re going to dump it out before we leave.”

“What makes you think that I’m going to go along with your plan?” She smiled when she said it, but he was willing to do some convincing. He put his hand around her jaw and pulled her close. He kissed her forehead like he’d been wanting to since Laurie walked out. Then he kissed the spot behind her ear that would make her melt against him. Then he touched his mouth to hers.

“If you come with me, I’ll have you for dessert.” He bit her bottom lip lightly, to drive home his point. If he had his way, he would consume her right here, right now. But the ghost of her mother lingered in this place, and he didn’t like the idea of fucking her in the bed that she’d shared with Luke. He didn’t want to think about how she’d shared a life with someone else and realized that he didn’t know what he was doing right now.

On one hand, it surprised him how easy it had been to be there for her and support her. But it was so hard to not be sure if he should. He didn’t want to fuck up. So he kissed her again, and hoped what he had to offer was enough for her.

—

True to his word, he’d poured out the handle of cheap vodka that she’d always kept at the house—at Luke’s suggestion—while she packed an overnight bag. She was still processing what had happened with her mother today, and she knew there would be fallout. But she felt remarkably safe and calm now.

She hadn’t been lying to him or minimizing anything when she’d told him that she didn’t need anything. He’d made that the truth when he’d kicked her mother out of her house. She knew that her mother would come back. She would always come back. Whenever Jessica felt weak or tired, her mother came back. There would be hell to pay.

But she was safe from her for now.

And she and Galvin were going to have a sleepover. They hadn’t done that before. When this fake-dating scheme had started, she hadn’t imagined it. But something had shifted when he stood up to that bully at her book signing. It had started to feel real. It had all been dates and heavy petting, and he hadn’t even let her make him come. It was starting to get weird, and she was going to put her foot down tonight.

She could guess that he was afraid that his usual post-nut anxiety would rear its ugly head and he’d do a runner. But she didn’t think it would happen now. They were connected by something more than just sex—it had started out as friendship and now it was feeling like something more. It wasn’t partnership, yet. But it had that potential. She would never say as much to him because that would definitely scare him. But she knew it in her bones.

Jessica wasn’t sure what she was expecting from Galvin’s house. They’d mostly hung out in public places or her condo. He hadn’t invited her in the one time she’d picked him up for a date. But she definitely wasn’t expecting something quite as warm and cozy as this.

He lived in her actual dream home. It was right down the street from the place that she’d wanted to buy with Luke, and it was probably designed by the same architect. The exterior was painted a bright white and trimmed in dark wood. As he led her up the front walk, he pointed out that the water features used rainwater collection and irrigated the garden while mitigating runoff.

She was impressed with all of that. She liked the environment as much as the next girl. But she had a brief, internal freak-out when she walked into his house. It was genuinely cozy. Totally neat, but utterly lived in. The furniture was coordinated, but it didn’t match. There were both family pictures and art pieces on the few walls that weren’t taken up by built-in bookcases.

Before she could stop herself, she rudely walked around the perimeter of the open living space, surveying the books. Predictably, he had lots of big books about art and architecture, but he had eclectic taste in fiction—sci-fi and fantasy, mysteries and thrillers, and even a few romance titles. She was particularly impressed that his shelves weren’t totally dominated by dead white men.

“Did an interior designer pick out your books?” It seemed impossible that he would have had time to read all of these books with his reputation for being a man-about-town.

Galvin scoffed. “Nope. I read them all.”

On closer inspection, the spines on the paperbacks were mostly wrinkled, so she knew he was telling the truth. The more she found out about him, the less and less his carefree, playboy image made sense. He had depth. But looking at him, he seemed a little bit embarrassed that she was seeing inside his inner sanctum. “Eclectic collection.”

He shrugged. “I spent a lot of time alone as a kid, and books were always good company.”

Something else they had in common. Wherever she and her mother moved while she was growing up, she made sure to get a library card. More than once, on the way out of town, she’d had to beg her mother to swing by the drop box to return the books. “Me too.”

He stood there staring at her. There was something naked and vulnerable about his gaze that entranced her. She didn’t get too much of it, because he turned and said, “I’m going to run you a bath.”

She followed him.

—

Galvin had never invited one of his girlfriends over to his house. Somehow, even though he’d dated half the city, it had never come up. But he’d always been with women who were so far up their own ass that they didn’t notice that their relationship was superficial. They were so used to people being obsessed with them and relinquishing their own personalities that they didn’t really get into his thoughts or feelings.

And he’d always been fine with that. He’d chosen his romantic partners for precisely that reason, all his life. Until he’d shot up in height and filled out before college, no one had noticed him romantically. All of a sudden, people looked at him differently—hungrily—and he wasn’t sure what to do with that. Eventually, he’d put up a wall of charming cad who no one would take seriously as a barrier between him and other people.

Over time, that wall had taken over, and he’d thought that was who he was. His personal boundaries were the only thing he had between himself and being consumed. But he didn’t feel the need for those boundaries with Jessica. Somehow, their PR relationship was already more real than any of the other relationships he’d been in.

The fact that he’d allowed her into his home was huge for him. But he still couldn’t tell her how huge because that would be too vulnerable—her knowing how close he felt to her.

Instead, he led her to his bathroom. It had the original tiling around the sink from when the house was built, but he’d turned the back half into a wet room, with a shower and bath. He started the water and grabbed his robe off the back of the door. He liked the idea of her wearing something of his. Again, he’d always been annoyed when girlfriends had tried to wear any of his clothes, because he knew he’d never see it again. But he liked the idea of Jessica wearing his robe, in his house, drinking his wine in his bathtub.

And yeah, part of the appeal of that whole scenario would be that she was naked. But there was more to it than that. The room filled with steam, and he put in a few drops of the bath stuff that matched his cologne. She would smell like him. Something about that made a possessive thing rise in his chest, as though he was marking her.

He brought the robe to her when she lingered in the doorway. She looked up at him through her lashes. “You’re not going to stay?”

“If I stay, I’ll end up having to mop up the floor.” He would get one look of her delicious body, all wet and glistening under the perfect lighting that he’d installed himself, and they would end up taking a bath together.

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