From Enemies to Expecting

Trinity took a long soak in the garden tub and used every ounce of the bubble bath the hotel had provided from their signature spa, strictly for market research purposes.

One hot-and-heavy sheet session with Logan could do the trick to get her muse back in the game full-time. But she was fully prepared to go all night with him if need be. Three or four orgasms fit into her schedule just fine, especially when Logan was the one delivering them. The man got her hotter than concrete in August.

In deference to her agenda, she selected a very simple white shift dress strewn with tiny colored flowers that covered her almost to the neck. It looked spectacular on her even though it didn’t advertise any skin. To make up for the conservative dress, she put a pink stripe down the side of her hair and wore lace-up heels that crisscrossed her ankles a bajillion times. It would take both an enterprising and patient man to get these shoes off, and she shivered in anticipation of the foreplay that could be involved.

Logan knocked on her door.

She answered. His gaze dropped to her dress and lingered, hot appreciation blooming on his face. Score one for Trinity.

How had she missed that he liked her that much better in conventional clothes? He’d been so turned on by the simple jeans and T-shirt, but she’d mistakenly believed that had been a result of him being the one to put them on her.

“I expected to have to redress you,” he threw out casually, but she did not miss the undercurrent of disappointment. He not only liked her in conservative clothes, he liked picking them out. Road trips made for interesting fonts of information, that was for sure.

“I was feeling generous.”

“Noted. I will return the favor by escorting you to a nice dinner.”

Where she would be charming and pretend that dinner was the only photo op of the night.

As predicted, a few photographers were still hanging around in the lobby, and she and Logan dutifully stopped before continuing on to the restaurant, allowing pictures. It didn’t matter that the photos were staged, because they would all pale in comparison to the ones later on tonight, anyway. These chaste pictures got them nowhere.

Dinner was surprisingly normal. And nice. Logan exhibited incredible patience as Trinity peppered him with baseball questions that he must have found tedious. But she liked listening to him talk about his passion, and baseball was clearly it. He talked with his hands, smiled, laughed. If she didn’t know better, she’d think they were actually dating.

No. Slipping into a fantasy about this whole thing being real was the surest path to problems.

“Walk me to my room?” she asked casually after noting several photographers had drifted away. Only the most tenacious had hung on, which meant they would likely be the most interested in being thrown a bone.

“Sure.” Logan laced his fingers with hers in what had become a very common move for him. She liked it, but that was a deep, dark secret she’d never spill.

Was this what normal couples did, how they acted with each other? Was that why so many people did the relationship deal despite the surety of things going south? If nothing else, participating in a fake relationship gave her an inkling why Cass, Alex and Harper had all jumped on the marriage bandwagon.

But none of her friends were broken. Obviously. Just because real relationships had happened for them didn’t mean it would for Trinity. That’s why this one was so great—it would end before anyone got attached.

Of course, they hadn’t exactly established an expiration date, but he could announce one any second. Letting go of Logan suddenly felt like the very last thing she’d be okay with, and her throat tightened along with her hand.

He squeezed hers back and oh, God, she didn’t want to let him go. Not tonight.

They stepped out of the elevator on her floor without any reporters following them, and she didn’t care. None of this was about the press or sales. He was a man and she was a woman and she needed him. For a lot of things, some she didn’t even want to articulate to herself, let alone to him.

Logan must have sensed her distress, because he lifted her hand to his lips and kissed two knuckles as they arrived at her door. “What’s wrong? You’re shaking.”

“Nothing.” Blow it off. Not letting a man see her weaknesses was so ingrained, she did it automatically. “Just thinking about our missed opportunity to get photographed kissing downstairs.”

“We have the next three days. We’ll have plenty of opportunities.”

She couldn’t let him leave. Desperately, she shook her head and smiled, easily falling into seduce-and-conquer mode. Because that’s what she knew how to do. “Maybe we should practice.”