Page 15 of My Real Love Affair

There she was, the woman from the ceremony. She was standing alone near one of the garden paths, holding a glass of champagne and looking like she was trying to decide whether to bolt.

Then I saw them. Three guests, phones out, pointed in her direction. Whispering to each other. One of them was filming. The woman noticed. Her entire body tensed.

More people started to take notice. Phones appeared like vultures sensing blood. The whispers grew louder. I knew that look on her face. Trapped. Hunted. Wondering how bad it was going to get.

Something in my chest twisted. I’d been exactly where she was. Different scandal, different reason, but the same feeling of being picked apart by strangers who thought they had the right.

Fuck it.

I handed Summer’s clutch to a very confused Rodney and crossed the distance to the woman in quick strides. She didn’t see me coming until I was right there, sliding my arm around her waist and pulling her against my side.

She fit perfectly. Soft and warm and smelling like an orange grove. I wanted to bury my face in her hair. Her head snapped up, eyes wide with shock.

“Play along,” I murmured, just loud enough for her to hear.

Then I raised my voice, letting it carry across the garden with all the Bancroft confidence I could muster. “You look stunning, baby girl.”

Her mouth opened. Closed. She was looking at me like I’d lost my mind. Maybe I had.

Every phone in the vicinity swung toward us. Perfect.

CHAPTER 6

MELODY

My first instinct when I felt the arm wrap around my waist was violence. Specifically, driving my heel down onto whoever’s foot had the audacity to touch me without permission. I was already having the worst twenty-four hours of my life. I didn’t need some handsy wedding guest making it worse.

But then I looked up. And up. Into the face of Austin Bancroft.

Oh god.

I would have recognized those features anywhere. That gorgeous face with the chiseled jaw I’d been staring at on my phone last night. The dark hair that looked artfully messy even in person. The eyes that looked like he was perpetually one second away from doing something reckless.

He was even more devastating in person. The kind of hot that made intelligent thoughts evaporate. The kind of hot that made you forget your own name.

My tongue felt thick and useless in my mouth. I tried to speak but just made a confused noise. His lips curved into a smirk that should’ve been illegal. Devilish. Knowing. Like he was fully aware of the effect he had on people and enjoyed every second of it.

“You look stunning, baby girl.”

Babywhat?

There was no way he just said those words to me. He had to be talking to someone else. But his arm was most definitely around me. My heart did a full gymnastics routine in my chest. My cheeks flooded with heat so fast I probably looked sunburned.

Did Austin Bancroft just call mebaby girl?

I opened my mouth to respond—to say literally anything—but my brain had turned to complete mush. Every synapse was firing in different directions. Some part of me registered that people were still recording and watching every second. Every nuance. Every blink of my eyes. The interaction was about to become very public very quickly, but I couldn’t make myself care.

He leaned in closer, so close I could count every dark eyelash framing those dangerous eyes. So close I could smell his cologne, expensive and woodsy. It made me want to press my face into his neck and just breathe.

“Thank me later,” he whispered, his breath warm against my ear.

And then his lips were on mine.

Oh.Every rational thought I had scattered like leaves in the wind. My first instinct was to push him away. To ask him what the hell he thought he was doing. I really should remind him that consent was a thing and you couldn’t just go around kissing strangers.

But then his lips moved against mine, and logic became a very distant concept. The kiss started gentle. Almost tentative, like he was just brushing his lips against mine in one of those polite European greeting kind of things. Or he was giving me a chance to pull back.

But I didn’t. I couldn’t. And when I didn’t resist, something shifted. The kiss deepened, became white hot and consuming. His hand tightened on my waist, pulling me closer until I was pressed fully against him, all hard muscle and man.