Fix It Up Page 14

  "Give what up?"

  "Your career," I specified.

  "Not right away," he said carefully. "I'd still have a mortgage to pay down. But once that was handled, I'd probably just stick with the farming."

  "Producing crops and such?"

  "There's a big market for local organic food and fruit. Luckily, my grandfather put down an orchard a good twenty years back. Kept the bugs under control with chickens and mantises. There'd be enough apples, pears, peaches, and plums to fill a grocery store."

  "Could you really make a living just selling fruit?"

  "And vegetables. Some milk, eggs, whatever I get going. Yeah. He did. He was never rolling in it, and he was too old to really work the land as much as he could have the past decade and a half. The market has changed so much. You could cash in if you know what you're doing."

  "You wouldn't miss it? Building? Planning?"

  "I'd still be building and planning. Just a different sort - outbuildings, greenhouses, hydroponic planting. And the house itself needs an addition, some updates. I'd never want for a project."

  "Do you have any pictures?"

  "Not on my phone, no," he said, sounding disappointed. The waiter returned, and Warren reluctantly released my hand, so I could reach for my fork. "So what about you?"

  "What about me?"

  "When this show blows up, and you have more calls than you can take, what's your plan?"

  I honestly hadn't even thought of that much since we had started working. My mind had been so preoccupied with the jobs, with the strangeness of our new life that I hadn't had time for daydreams.

  "I guess I could finally get an office. Maybe have an assistant."

  "Maybe?" he asked, looking up at me from under his brows. "You're definitely going to need an assistant, Brin. I think you're thinking too small still."

  "I think I am traumatized after years of just barely getting by," I corrected. "You start out so young and idealistic, you know? They tell you that if you work hard enough, if you hustle more than your peers, if you learn how to market, how to brand, how to reach your audience, then everything is just going to magically fall into place. But the world doesn't always work like that. Sometimes the people who put in all the work just keep struggling, while the slackers get dumb luck. Ugh, I'm complaining," I grumbled at myself. "Don't listen to me."

  "You work your ass off, Brin. It's understandable that you are frustrated that you haven't gotten further than you have. But I think it is safe to say that you can start dreaming again. Because you're about to be swamped. I wouldn't be surprised if you need to start looking into an intern by next summer."

  That was the dream.

  An office.

  A name.

  A team.

  And all the superficial things that came with that - a car that worked properly, a house of my own, hair coloring that wasn't bought on clearance... with a coupon.

  "Are you nervous about the interview?" I asked.

  "They're going to bring up the rumors," he warned me, bringing attention to something I hadn't stopped to consider.

  "I need to get on that Instagram as soon as possible. Post up the pictures for tonight. They likely won't have the new pics from the guy at the bar until after we finish filming. At least we will have them to show the interviewers when they ask."

  "They're still gonna ask."

  "So, we'll be honest. We fight on jobs a lot. We both have a vision for how we want it to be, and it doesn't always match up. Arguments are inevitable until we can finally agree on the end result."

  "We can sell the truth. While we act like we're madly in love," he added, reminding me of a duty that while it wasn't abhorrent to me the way it would have been just months before, filled me with dread nonetheless. There would be no way to escape it, no way to hide my reaction to it. Right there on TV. For the whole world - including my loved ones - to see. While my parents and brother, and maybe even my sister, might just write it off as good acting, Brent would know. And Brent would call me on it. Then we'd have to talk about it. And I couldn't do my best to pretend it wasn't happening anymore.

  We ate in comfortable silence for a few moments, occasionally commenting on the decor, on the dessert choices even though we likely wouldn't have room, about how much we hated having to get our makeup done before workdays - and the upcoming interview.

  "You never talk about your people," he said oddly after I rambled on about the crew who we had forged casual friendships with over the past several months.

  "My people?" I asked, confused.

  "Family. Friends. For someone who shares so much, you hold that close."

  Did I?

  I guess I did.

  I didn't remember the last time I had made a reference to my family.

  "I guess I figure that if you don't know them, you have no interest in hearing about them."

  "Well, I'm interested," he told me, shrugging, giving me his full attention, something that made me want to squirm in my seat, an impulse I just barely controlled.

  "Everyone is really successful," I led with. "My mother does project management at an energy company. My father took his inheritance when his parents died when he was twenty-five to invest in real estate. Which he continues to do. My siblings are older. My sister is a pharmacist. She is married with two kids and another on the way. You know that part," I said, remembering the excuse he gave Rachel about where I disappeared to. "Wait, how did you know that?"

  "You had a bunch of baby room DIY on your Instagram," he told me casually.

  And I had captioned those about my upcoming niece or nephew.

  He had admitted to looking into me when he first heard about me, but that post was just from a few weeks ago. In fact, just two days after he started sleeping on the couch. That was... interesting.

  "Right," I agreed, watching him for a long second, trying to read him the way he seemed to be able to do with me, but finding I had no such skill. "And then I have a brother who is an attorney. Married. Just had a baby."

  "Think I'm starting to get you," he told me, nodding a little as he reached for his drink.

  "What do you mean?"

  "This drive you have. It isn't really about superficial shit. Wanting to have designer shoes and a top-of-the-line car. You feel inferior. Everyone around you is doing well. And you're still struggling."

  "Yeah," I agreed, swallowing back the bitter taste of my own failure.

  "You're successful now, Brin. You have a TV show."

  I snorted at that, shaking my head. "That I got by lying."

  "No. You got it because when Rachel looked into you, she found something she liked. It wouldn't have mattered if she thought we were fantastic together," he said, emphasizing the word the way Rachel did, making me smile, "if your work sucked. You got this on merit. And a small white lie."

  For a small white lie, it sure felt big, world-changing if it were found out, career-shattering. Maybe I should have taken him up on the offer to actually tie the knot. Sure, if someone started digging, it would show that we did so after we signed the contracts, but it would still make it legit.

  But even just the idea of that made my belly slosh around uncomfortably. It was hard enough seeing a wedding ring on my finger, one I had put there myself. It would be a whole other monster to have him slide it on in front of a Justice of the Peace. It would steal something away from me, the chance to experience that for real the first time it happened, to feel excitement and nervousness, and love all at once instead of a sort of resigned obligation.

  I meant what I said - marriage meant something to me.

  I didn't want to cheapen it.

  Not even for the success I had worked so hard for.

  "They've got to be proud of you, Brin," he added after a long moment where I was lost in my own thoughts.

  I guess they were. When I told my parents - even with the lie - they had said they would bring all their friends together to watch it, carefully avoiding answering questions that they had no
answers for. Like what the wedding was like. What Warren was like when he came and asked for my hand. Why it was such a secret.

  "Yeah," I agreed, nodding.

  They were proud.

  Even before this.

  My mom trolled my social media, gushing about jobs I did or projects I worked on. My dad hired me to redo the interior of a doctor's office he had acquired a year back.

  Maybe it had always simply been my own insecurity about where I was in life that prevented me from seeing that they didn't look down on me because I didn't make a ton of money like my siblings, like they themselves did.

  Sometimes it was hard to see past your own bias. Even toward yourself.

  "So, do you actually have room for dessert?" he asked, sounding dubious.

  "I wish," I said, longingly rubbing my hand over the dessert menu that had been discreetly dropped off again at our table after the food had been taken away.

  "If you want something later, there are about three dozen places open for dessert at all hours."

  "This is true," I agreed, thinking I would much rather have three big cupcakes for half the price of a small slice of cheesecake here.

  "No, we can split," I started to object when he reached for the bill, discreetly placed inside a thin leather fold. "What?" I asked when all he did was raise a brow at me. And maybe look at me like I had lost my ever-loving mind.

  "You're not serious," he informed me, slipping a card into the fold, and pushing it out toward the edge of the table.

  "This place is crazy expensive. No way you should be paying for it all." I hadn't exactly chosen something cheap either, something I was now kicking myself for.

  "You're not paying," he informed me as the waiter came to take the check away.

  "Why not?"

  "Because you're not. Not when you're out with me. Do the guys you usually go out to dinner with let you pay half?"

  "I haven't been out to dinner with anyone in a long time, but yeah, sometimes."

  "How long is a long time?"

  "How is that your business?" I asked, stiffening, knowing the answer - for a healthy, confident, sexually active woman in her twenties - was a bit embarrassing.

  "Don't argue," he reminded me, smiling a little, trying to throw off the guy who was likely still at the bar. "Just answer."

  "I don't know exactly. A year, give or take."

  "You're shitting me."

  "No," I said, shrugging. "I've been busy with work."

  He looked away for a second, and I found myself wanting to know what was going through his mind, but was too chickenshit to ask. "You need to date better men."

  "What? Just because we split the check, they're not good men?"

  "They're boys in men's clothing," he told me, taking the book after the waiter dropped it back off, doing some quick math, then signing his name.

  "Not all men can afford to pay for dinner," I said.

  "Then he shouldn't be dating."

  "That is very backward."

  "If a man can't pay for dinner, his finances aren't in order. If his finances aren't in order, he has no business bringing a woman into his mess."

  "But..."

  "You take dating seriously, right?" he cut me off, catching me off guard.

  "What do you mean by that?"

  "Do you date just because it's a nice way to spend a night, or because you're looking for something serious?"

  "Something serious," I admitted, shrugging.

  "Right. So, if you're looking for something serious, you need someone who is serious about building a life. How can he build a life, help pay a mortgage when you get a place together, cover the bills if you want to take a few months off after you have a baby, if he can't pay for dinner?"

  Okay.

  Put that way, I could maybe see his point.

  "You're forgetting one thing, though."

  "What's that?" he asked, leaning forward. I knew he was probably just putting a show on for the paparazzo who was still at the bar by moving closer, like he was enthralled by the words that came from me. But it still gave me a small thrill as his hand brushed mine again.

  "I'm not financially stable."

  "How'd you get to my house?"

  "An Uber," I admitted.

  "You paid it?"

  "Yeah," I said, brows drawing together, figuring that was obvious.

  "Couple hundred, right?"

  "Yeah," I admitted, nodding.

  "You still got money in the bank?"

  "Yes," I told him.

  "Enough to pay your bills?"

  "Yeah."

  "It's not that you aren't stable then, is it? It's that you live within your means. If a man can't afford to pay for dinner, if his finances are that tight, then he doesn't have it together enough for something serious. Because shit pops up. Cars break down. Water heaters crap out. Partners get laid off. If you don't have a little something stashed away for that, then - in my opinion - you shouldn't be starting something serious. I'm not saying all the men need to pay all the time. But on a first date at least, Brin, you shouldn't be splitting a check."

  He told me this as he moved to stand, coming around the table in one stride, reaching to help slide my chair back. His hand moved out, palm up, inviting me to put mine there to help me up.

  With little choice, I placed it there, pretending to ignore the tingling feeling at the contact as I pushed to my feet. He didn't release me, though, when I was on my feet, put his hand to my back like I was expecting. No. His palm slid down mine, fingers slipping between my fingers, and closing in tight, completely swallowing up my hand with his.

  "Try not to look so freaked. We're supposed to love doing this, remember?" he reminded me, head dipping down a little.

  The problem wasn't that I didn't love it; the problem was I liked it too much.

  My hand instinctively curled into his, held on tighter, as he led me down the path of tables, then out of the building.

  "Want to walk around a bit? See if the guy follows for a few more shots?"

  All I managed was a nod as we started walking.

  "Cold?" he asked a few moments later after I had shivered hard against the cool night air.

  "A little," I admitted, feeling his hand unclench from mine, slide away. I barely had a moment to feel the loss before his arm was around my shoulders, half curling me into his body. Too close to do anything else, my arm went around his lower back, the other resting on his stomach. This close, I could make out a slight trace of cologne, something woodsy - trees and dirt and fresh air, a scent that seemed to fit him perfectly. His warmth moved over and through me instantly, making another shiver rack my body as the heat chased away my chill.

  "Better?" he asked, voice almost a little rougher than usual.

  "Yes." My voice was markedly breathless. I swallowed hard to combat it. "Did he follow us?"

  "Across the street," he informed me. "Probably will follow us back to the hotel."

  "How far is it?" I asked, not having gotten any better at figuring out how the streets were laid out.

  "Five minutes straight ahead," he told me, his arm seeming to squeeze a bit.

  So we walked, wrapped like lovers to any who saw us.

  We were a handful of steps away from the front of the hotel when Warren suddenly stopped, pressing me back against the wall, head ducking down into my neck, warm breath making a tremble move through my belly.

  "Warren," I hissed, my voice a warning. "Don't," I pleaded much like I had in the car.

  "Sh," he told me, breath moving over my sensitive skin beneath my ear. "Relax," he demanded softly, his nose tracing up my ear, making another tremble move through me, but this time, not just on the inside.

  It's for the camera, I tried to remind myself, to focus, to keep control of the chaos in my body.

  "Warren, let's go inside," I suggested.

  I knew what I meant.

  Let's go inside.

  Slip out of our clothes.

  Give in to the pull b
etween us.

  But he didn't hear that.

  He heard the words, not the meaning behind them.

  "Yeah, I think we're all set," he agreed, pulling away, grabbing my hand, and all but dragging me inside.

  Maybe it looked romantic.

  Like he was desperate to get me inside, to get his hands on me.

  But there was nothing sweet or loving about his hold on me. If anything, it felt frustrated. As soon as we were in the elevator, his hand ripped from mine, his body going to the furthest corner.

  Nothing was said.

  It didn't need to be.

  The charade was over.

  He didn't need to pretend to be in love with me anymore.

  It shouldn't have - since I knew what this was - but it did send a sinking feeling through my chest and belly as we walked back into our hotel room.

  I closed myself into the bathroom, removing my makeup with an almost savage diligence, wanting every trace of this night out of my reflection. I stripped out of the dress that suddenly felt too tight, cutting off my air, and got into a simple short and tank set before going back into the bedroom.

  Warren had been staring out the doors as I walked in, but turned as he heard me, stalking past me to lock himself in the bathroom.

  He hadn't even looked at me.

  But there on the bed were three pillows he must have had someone bring up.

  With a sigh, I turned out most of the lights, set up the pillows in our usual order, and climbed into bed, pretending not to listen to the water running in the shower, trying not to imagine him under the stream, the water sliding down his...

  Okay.

  Enough of that.

  It was clear that Warren was simply an amazing actor, someone who could put on a real show, could fool even his co-actor into believing that there was sincerity in his words and actions.

  I was every kind of fool for believing it.

  But that was over now.

  I was going to get control over myself.

  The bathroom door opened as I pretended to sleep, body curled up into itself.

  He moved slowly around the room, flicking off the last remaining light. It would have darkened the room, but not to pitch because I hadn't closed the curtains to the balcony, and the city that never sleeps was bright as ever, no doubt shining into the space, making it easy for Warren to find his way to the other side of the bed. I could feel it depress as he moved up on it, settling into place.