“I’m going to get some coffee...”
YOU KNOW THAT MOMENT that comes right in between having an amazing dream and waking up? That suspended moment where you vaguely know things are too good to be true, but for the time being, you can’t bring yourself to care? Like if you close your eyes for just a second more, you can find your way back. Extend it just a little longer. Find a way to make it last.
...then you open your eyes, and the whole world comes crashing down?
Yeah. That was happening to me.
For the second time in my life, I opened my eyes to see Mitchell Hunter standing over me. Arms folded. Jaw clenched. Towering over the foot of the bed.
I jerked awake with a gasp, pulling the sheets up to my chin in the same motion. While I had fallen asleep on my back, Nick was passed out on his stomach. When he felt me move, his arm tightened automatically around my waist in his sleep.
It was then that I realized Mitchell was staring at me.
“Nick,” I whispered, trying desperately to pull myself to a sitting position while keeping my sheet at the same time, “Nick—wake up.”
Much to my horror, he mumbled in his sleep.
“You know the rules...coffee first.”
I blushed as red as a fire engine, while Mitchell painfully closed his eyes. A second later, and after several sharp kicks from me, Nick finally blinked open his eyes.
“Good morning.” He gave me a sleepy smile, still not registering much of anything around him. “You know, I could have sworn that—DAD!”
He jumped in his skin like someone had shocked him—reaching automatically for the sheets just as I’d done. Then, for the first time in his life, he did something that neither I nor his father had ever seen him do before.
“Turn around!” he demanded, throwing a protective arm in front of me. “Have you lost your fucking mind—she needs clothes!”
I froze, staring at him in shock.
How many times had I walked in on him and some girl in exactly this state? How many times had his father? How many nude pictures were plastered all over the internet of him and some random woman in the throes?
And yet...did he just defend my honor?
For a split second, even the great Mitchell Hunter was thrown. He froze in shock, just as I had, then turned around for exactly three seconds—just long enough for me to grab a robe.
“I see the two of you have decided to fully commit to this professional arrangement,” he said dryly, when he turned back around. I blushed a million shades of scarlet, but for one of the first times, Nick held his gaze. “That actually makes this next part a little easier.”
“Next part?” Nick repeated, sensing trouble not far ahead. “What are you talking about?”
If only he hadn’t asked.
“I just got a call you see, from a cameraman working for the Post. It seems he has a flash drive with some rather incriminating photos of my son in a boxing ring. Not boxing.”
His blue eyes swept over me. “I’m assuming the woman in the photos is you?”
An unnatural chill fell over me, bowing my head to my chest. “Yes, sir.”
“You’re in public relations for goodness sake. You get him out of these sticky situations all the time, yet, you join him on this one? How could you sink to his level? You should’ve stopped him and demanded he take you to a proper location. Having sex in public is unacceptable. Steady girlfriend or not! This won’t help our cause!”
“Nobody was there.”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“It was the heat of the moment. And I know that’s not a very good excuse, but it’s the truth. I swear it will never happen again, sir. Nothing like this has ever happened between us, I assure you of that. We were nothing but friends, and then things recently changed.”
“Nick hit on you when you were first hired and you stayed strong. I had high hopes he could never taint you. But two years later, he did it. Did he keep chipping away at you, little by little?”
“No, not at all.”