“Oh God,” she says in a small voice as the realization of what I just said hits her. “But—but—what are we going to do? Should I just cop to my dad that this was all my stupid idea?”
“No fucking way,” I say gruffly, not willing to let Brooke take the fall for this. We were in it together now.
And then she does what I sort of hoped she would. “Maybe we should keep this going for a little while longer. I mean, the team is doing so well and I don’t want anything mess it up.”
Oh yeah…I like that idea a lot. More time with Brooke while we figure out a good way out of this shit.
“I think we should do a fake engagement,” I say with determination.
Her eyes bug out. “A fake engagement?”
“Yeah, keep your dad off my back completely. Give us some breathing room. He can concentrate on being a coach, and I can concentrate on the game and—”
“It’s a good solution,” she breaks in on me, and I let out a slow and silent breath of relief. “Is that weird?”
“Totally not weird,” I assure her with a wave of my hand, but this is the weirdest fucking thing I’ve ever been involved in in my life. I am absolutely aware of just how harebrained this entire thing is. I would never say it out loud, but fuck, we should have come clean the moment he busted into her office and caught us, and probably a million times after that.
We should just goddamn come clean right now.
But instead I’m plotting a fake engagement because I don’t want it to end yet, but I also don’t know where I want it to go either. I just know that this past week has been amazing with Brooke and she’s the only woman I’ve ever been with that makes me excited to see what tomorrow will bring.
So yeah…fake engagement it is.
“How would we go about this?” Brooke asks, her voice sounding a little too brisk and professional as if we’re negotiating a business deal.
I slide my fingers across her cheekbone, over her ear and to the back of her head to hold her in place. Leaning in, I give her a devilish smile. “That’s for me to figure out. I’ll handle the details.”
“You can’t buy a ring,” she says looking horrified.
“Stop worrying about it, Brooke,” I murmur, and lean in to kiss her.
She pulls back. “But—”
“Stop talking, Brooke, or I’ll occupy that mouth with something that will make it impossible for you to say anything.”
I get a husky laugh and she leans in to nip my bottom lip.
That leads to another kiss, deeper this time, and before long we’ve forgotten about fake engagements, her dad, Nanette, and everything else in the world.Chapter 18BrookeMy house is quiet when I walk in, my ears open and receptive. “Nanette?”
No answer. I set the grocery bags I’d been carrying on the kitchen counter, then walk through the living room. “Nanette…are you here?”
“In your bedroom,” she calls out.
My little three-bedroom, two-bath Mediterranean-style bungalow with red tiled roof and stucco walls is actually one of the big things I cherish about moving here from New York. It’s only about sixteen hundred square feet, but that seems monstrous to me after living in half that size for years.
And yet it’s just still not quite big enough to give me space from Nanette. She’s been here three days and I can’t wait until Sunday when she flies back to New York. I feel terrible at the same time for thinking that, but these last few days have reminded me why we weren’t the best of friends.
In looking back on our relationship spending five years at the same job together, I realize I could handle Nanette in small doses. At work that may have been a few encounters throughout the day. Nanette mainly did assistance on photo shoots for the magazine and some days I wouldn’t see her at all because she’d be away on location. The times we went out for a meal or drinks were just as sparse, and usually with a group of people. During those periods, it’s almost as if she had a “good behavior” tank filled up that fortunately for me never got depleted in the short snatches of time we spent together. But I think the tank was empty by day two and the real Nanette was exposed: a lazy, freeloading visitor who was trying all of my patience.
Bishop came by the arena today to take me to lunch, and I basically complained the entire time. He loved teasing me about it too.
“She seems pretty nice to me,” he’d said with a sly smile.
“Despite the fact she has nowhere to be, she gets up before I do, and uses all the hot water in her shower,” I grumbled, and then added, “She does it on purpose.”