“Technically, it’s a condo,” he says, and when I roll my eyes at him, he grabs my hip and pulls me toward him, and it makes my stomach flip.
Four bedrooms on the second floor, and another sitting room.
“Threeguest rooms,” I mutter, to which Russell responds, “I told you I had room for you and Gus.”
That does weird things to my stomach, so I ignore it and push on, picking up his cologne in the bathroom and smelling it, realizing I wasnevergoing to find it at Ulta. He probably imports it directly from Sweden or something like that.
“If I didn’t know better, I would think you a little freaky,” he says, raising an eyebrow when I put the cologne down.”
“Youpropositioned me with a fake marriage,” I say, pointing my finger at him. “We passed freaky a long time ago.”
When I leave the bathroom, he smacks my ass, and I laugh, turning and trying to get him back.
Here I am, with Russell, myfakefiancé, acting silly. Joking together and walking through this cavernouscondonot like it’s a museum but instead like it’s a place I could actually spend time in. I take note of the little touches of him—a stethoscope thrown on an end table so comically I actually point it out.
“Is this a bit?” I ask, picking it up and putting it around my neck. “Is this how you pick up girls?Oh, did I not mention? I’m a doctor.”
“There are nogirls,Jules,” he says, watching me with a suddenly serious expression. I swallow against the heady feeling between us. His eyes darken at the sight of me with the stethoscope around my neck, and he says, “Andthatwas my grandfather’s.”
I pale, instantly grabbing it to put it back where I found it, feeling like an ass. “Oh,shit, sorry?—”
“No.” He steps closer to me and stops me from taking it off, his voice low. “I like seeing you with it on. It’s like—a family heirloom. My dad gave it to me when I was a kid to remind me of who I was.”
“So, I’m committing blasphemy right now,” I mutter, face hot as Russell looks down at me. “Because I’m not a doctor. Not a Burch.”
Jaw working, Russell says, “Not yet.”
And with that, I’m lifted up off the ground and carried to his ridiculously lavish bedroom, with a ridiculously excessive view of the city surrounding us on three sides. Russell lays me down and strips my clothes off, and I don’t feel like a fake fiancée.
I feel like the real thing, and for the moment, with his mouth on me, his hot breath fanning against the insides of my thighs and the demands that I say his name, I forget all about the question I really, really should be asking him.
What feels like hours together, I’m sexed-out and hazy with endorphins, my head on Russell’s chest as he breaths steadily.
The food came after my first orgasm. Russell retrieved it from the elevator, came back to the bedroom, insisted on feeding me without me getting dressed, then made me come twice more before carrying me to the bathroom and fucking me against the shower’s glass wall.
Now, I breathe in the scent of him and am just about to drift off to sleep when my phone buzzes.
“Sorry,” I whisper, my voice thick.
“Don’t be sorry,” Russell says back, his voice surprisingly clear. “Could be Gus.”
I hate how considerate he is, how he’s thought of that as instantly as I have.
It would be so, so easy to love him.
The bright feeling behind that thought fizzles out when I turn on the phone, and after being blinded for a moment by the light, realize the text is not from Ettie.
But itisabout Gus.
Mom:What were you thinking, Juliette?
Mom:Darlene saw Augustus on that show.
Mom:Begging for a dad.
Mom:Trashy, Juliette
I’m thirty-two years old, managing life as a single parent, juggling two jobs, and paying for my own dental care, and yet here I am, lighting up with the same kind of humiliation I carried as a teenager.
