“That’s right. He’s my fiancé.”
“Since when?” the other woman asks, her face skeptical.
Not a single one of them have noticed me standing in the shadows. I’d like to hear her answer to this as well.
“Since, uh…since…” From the limited time I’ve known Layla, nothing gets to her. This whole fake dating thing was a means to an end for her. To keep her shop and get the town off her back. Now she’s rattled.
“Since her last trip to London.” I step in, setting the drinks down and wrapping an arm around her waist, pulling her back into me. Her blue eyes turn up to find mine, panic written all over her face.
“When were you last in London?” one of the two women asks. For fuck’s sake they’re nosy.
“April. Would you like a copy of her travel itinerary to confirm?”
“You said you were going to visit your parents in April,” one of them says to Layla with a questioning gaze.
Fuck, that was lucky.
“Like I said, April. We’ve been keeping it under wraps because we didn’t want to take focus away from Gemma.”
“And where’s the ring?”
“It’s being resized. It’s tucked safely away at a jewelry store back home.”
“It’s beautiful. I’ll be sure to show you the next time I have it on,” Layla tells them, resting a hand on my abs. A shock of heat races through me at her soft touch. She must feel it too because her fingers dig even farther into me.
“How did he pop the question?”
“Can’t we keep some things to ourselves?” I ask them.
It’s the wrong thing, as they start to go off on me.
“Are they always like this?” I bend down closer so they can’t hear me.
Layla turns to face me, a tight smile baring her gritted teeth. “Yes. Now you understand why.”
I tuck a stray lock of blonde hair behind her ear. This close, I can make out the faint freckles dusted across the bridge of her nose. The way her blue eyes give way to gray.
Fucking hell, this woman is gorgeous. Should I really have agreed to fake date—now I guess fake marry—someone that I’m actually attracted to?
Not one of my better ideas.
My eyes don’t leave Layla’s. “I proposed at St. Dunstan’s. It’s a quiet spot in London. Layla doesn’t like the touristy spots in the city, so I took her there.”
She’s biting her lip now, almost like she’s waiting to hear where this goes.
“We snuck in just before it closed and were the only ones there. She was leaving the next day and I just couldn’t let her leave without asking her to marry me. I didn’t care that we’d only met last summer. I couldn’t lose this woman. She’s my everything.”
Layla sucks in a breath at my last words. Her eyes widen, not straying from mine. The noise of the bar dims around us. It’s like we’re the only two people here.
It would be so easy to kiss her right now. To close the distance between the two of us and see what she tastes like.
Does she taste like that sugary lip balm she put on earlier? No doubt she’ll taste as good as she smells. Whatever perfume she’s wearing hits me right below the belt.
Everything about this woman is seductive, pulling me into a trance.
Fuck, do I ever want to find out how she tastes, but we never discussed PDA. Sure, hand-holding and light touching to make it seem believable.
Except…is Layla getting closer? All I can think about now is kissing her.
