Pretend I'm Yours (Pretend 1)

“Did you hear me? I can’t afford to pay you back if I lost this ring.”

“I know. It’s not on loan.”

I narrow my eyes.

“How did you get the ring then? Please tell me you didn’t steal it off of someone’s finger when they weren’t looking.”

He laughs. “No, it belonged to my mother.”

Shit.

“I can’t wear it, it’s irreplaceable,” I say, trying to get the ring off, but it’s now stuck on my swollen finger. Great.

I feel the panic rising in my chest.

“Stop,” he says, holding onto my hand.

I freeze. If I don’t move, there is no way I can lose the ring.

“I want you to wear the ring.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to pretend marry you.”

7

Larkyn

Kade’s lost his damn mind.

Or he’s drunker than I thought.

Or maybe he’s high?

Except, he doesn’t seem any of those things.

He’s sitting in the driver’s seat next to me, waiting for me to speak. But he’s been waiting a long time; I’ve yet to find my voice or ability to move at all.

All I can do is stare down at the gorgeous ring that weighs heavy on my finger. Ten carats was what the woman said. That’s insane. If I’m going to do this, I have to convince him at least to buy me a cheaper ring to wear, because I can’t wear a ring this expensive or this sentimental to him.

What am I doing? I can’t be seriously considering this. This is crazy! I don’t even know why he would want to do this. He hardly knows me. He doesn’t want to be fake married to me.

Kade grasps my hand again and pulls it to his luscious lips, planting a small kiss on the palm of my hand before interlinking our fingers together.

I close my eyes as the familiar tingling crawls up my arm and races through my body. It’s such a sweet gesture. It’s his gesture. It’s what he does when he wants to comfort me. If I was actually his, would he do more?

Would he be kissing me on the lips? Hugging me? Fucking me? Something else to make me forget about whatever I’m thinking?

If I said yes, I might find out.

No.

He said he wants to ‘pretend marry’ me. It wouldn’t be any different than it was today. He would hold my hand and make polite conversations with people to make them think we are together. He would occasionally kiss my hand or kiss me on the lips. Nothing more.

But I would get to kiss him. And that alone would be worth the heartache of when this ended. Because this would end. Someone would find out. Or we wouldn’t need each other any more.

Kade is a guy. He won’t become emotionally attached, especially if there is no sex. He will use me to further his own goals, that’s it.