“It was.” He settled next to her in the breakfast nook. “But if you and Blue are going to risk your necks on an unstable balcony, I’d better do that first.”
“You’d change your plans for me? I’m flattered.” She flattened a hand over her heart and fluttered her lashes at him, and his heart thumped at how pretty she was in the morning with her bare face and bare feet.
“Up to you. Which do you want done first?”
She turned to study the empty walls in her kitchen. “I feel like you’re going to worry about that damn balcony until you fix it, so I can live with this mess a little longer.”
“Cool.” He’d left his binder on the kitchen table last night, so it was within arm’s reach now. He grabbed it and started jotting notes on what supplies he needed for the balcony repairs.
“Aiden.” Thea’s small hand rested on his, and he immediately stilled at her serious tone. “We had sex last night.”
He dropped the pen and wrapped his fingers around hers, his nerves unaccountably ratcheting up. “Yes. More than once.”
“What do we do now?” She worried her bottom lip with her teeth and looked at him expectantly, as if he had all the answers. Christ, he wished he did.
“I’ll do whatever you want. Pretend it didn’t happen. Carry on like normal. Hell, I’ll”—he swallowed hard—“I’ll end our deal early if you want. Finish the work on your house but no more obligation to be my girlfriend. Whatever makes you comfortable.”
She yanked her hand away. “End it early? Pretend it didn’thappen?” Apparently she was now awake enough to be outraged, which told him he was already screwing this conversation up somehow.
“Like I said, it’s whatever you want.” He tried to smile at her, but she only scowled back. “You specifically asked that our agreement not include sex, and I broke that part of the deal last night, so—”
“Wait.” She held up her hand. “Iasked for our agreement not to include sex?”
Her confusion stopped him short. “Didn’t you?”
“I don’t have perfect recall or anything, but I think I askedifit would include sex. That doesn’t mean I wasn’tinterestedin sex.”
“Were you?”
She blushed. “Obviously.”
“No, back then I mean.” He didn’t know why, but the idea that Thea might’ve been interested in him before last night reverberated through him like a cymbal crash.
“Um.” She shifted in her chair and avoided meeting his eyes. “I have wondered from time to time what the whole Aiden Murdoch experience would be like.”
“Oh yeah?” He crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair, no doubt failing miserably at hiding his intense curiosity. “And in the end, what was it like?”
She threw her hands up in exasperation. “You tell me! I thought it was great, but you’re being Mr. Chill this morning, so maybeyouwant to pretend it didn’t happen.”
“Itwasgreat,” he said immediately, dropping the teasing grin. But knowing it was great wasn’t the same as knowing how to move forward, so he opted for honesty. “I’m not sure how to do this.”
“Not sure how to fake a relationship? Or not sure how to have sex with the same person more than once?” She quirked an eyebrow at him. “Or maybe you’re not sure how to talk about your feelings.”
“Nobody’s talking about feelings. We’re talking about sex.” He snatched his mug to take a fortifying sip. “And that’s not part of the agreement.”
“I wish you’d stop calling it ‘the agreement.’ It makes me feel like a high-paid escort.”
“Or maybeI’mthe high-paid escort.” He smoldered at her, and as he’d hoped, it made her giggle.
She perched her foot on the seat of her chair and wrapped her arm around her leg, propping her chin on her knee to study him. “We can’t exactly unring that bell.”
“True. But we can make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
“Probably smart.” She looked down quickly, but he still caught the disappointment that floated across her face. This was exhausting. Maybe he should’ve stuck to the no-sex plan, no matter how great last night was.
He laughed softly. What the hell was wrong with him? Last nightwasgreat, and he wanted to do it again, and soon. She clearly did too. And hadn’t he just been lamenting that his recent celibacy was making this fake relationship harder on him than it needed to be? So maybe the solution had just landed in his lap and given him an inconvenient erection.
“Or…” His voice trailed off enticingly.
