“What time tomorrow?” she asks. “The dinner.”
“Six o’clock.” I dimly remember that from the voicemails my mom has left. “If you no-show, there’ll be no hard feelings. I’ll still get your laptop.”
She looks at me for a long moment, and I can’t decide if she’s reading my soul or memorizing my face. Either is uncomfortable as hell, but I stay as still as a statue, not flinching. Finally, she nods, and in a surprising move, she boops my nose.
“Six o’clock. I’ll be ready.”
I’m so stunned by the boop that all I can do is watch as she walks across the yard. Her hips sway back and forth to a rhythm I can feel in my cock, hypnotizing me.
She gets to the small fence between our yards, and I’m curious what she’ll do considering she came over in a flight of rage earlier. She doesn’t miss a step, taking a single running step before leaping over it gracefully, looking almost like a dancer in the air before she lands.
Well, spoke too soon because as she takes her first step on the other side, her foot slips a bit in the green grass and she stumbles.
I start to move toward her, but she steadies on her own. She looks back over her shoulder to check whether I saw that, so I lean on the doorframe, arms crossed over my chest and a smile on my lips. I’m sure that from here, if she wanted to, she could see the full bulge in my jeans. But she’s looking at my laugh, so instead she glares, turning back around. Losing the hip sway, she stomps the rest of the way to her door, slamming it shut behind her.
“Nut juice!” she calls out, and I do a double-take, laughing out loud at the odd curse. I watch her living room curtains before evaluating her whole house in a moment, mentally assessing the access points and safety concerns. She locked the door after going in, which is a plus. I wonder about the front window, though. There are no blinds, just gauzy curtains. I’ll have to talk to Poppy about that.
Shifting my attention, I scan the street looking for anything unusual. But it’s a quiet neighborhood, very suburban and polite. Hunter chose just about the safest place to drop my bad seed.
Seeing nothing, I turn to head back inside. Only then does it all hit me.
Shit . . . I’m going to dinner with my family and taking a fake fiancée!
Chapter 8
Poppy
It’s two minutes until six, and I’m in my second-best polite outfit, standing by my front door, trying to decide.
Should I go over to Connor’s? That might come off as being too pushy, and I pushed my luck really hard yesterday.
Should I wait here for him to pick me up? Yeah, no, that’d be a good way to get ghosted, if I’m reading him right.
Do I stand outside by his truck? That screams ‘desperate stalker’ way too much.
What is the protocol for a not-a-date, fake fiancée, dinner to meet the family? The more I rack my brain, the more I’m certain one doesn’t exist. I should write one.
I shake my head, deciding there’s probably not a lot of need for this specific situation. Only I would find myself mixed up like this. But ironically, it seems to have done a little bit of good. Going by memory and my written notes, I was able to actually pound out a whole supporting chapter today on my new laptop, saving it to my also new external flash drive.
I’m not making the same mistake twice.
Nervously, I peek out the front window and see Connor exiting his front door. He glances toward my place, and I’m so fucking glad that I’m not standing outside where he can see me right now. He doesn’t deserve to know what the mere sight of him does to me.
But right now he looks . . . overwhelming. In a black suit, with a white dress shirt and black tie, the look could go blah and bland, but on him, the classic look is like a sexy dream in the flesh with his day-old scruff of stubble that I want to scratch at. Or maybe feel scratch along my skin.
I wish I weren’t so affected by him, but my traitorous body responds to his like plucking an overtight string, making my hips shimmy with desire while my heart thumps a driving jazz beat in my chest.
No, Poppy. Horny or not, this is not okay. No matter that the bad boy cleans up well . . . really well. Just because his slacks look nice enough to run your hands over and the buttons on that shirt look like they’d be perfect to unbutton with your teeth, you can’t. No matter if he’s got his sleeves rolled up to show his thick forearms and his jacket is thrown over his shoulder, highlighting the gleam of a fancy watch on his wrist.