Jannes took to the stage to accept his award, and his eyes still had that wide, startled quality as he stepped up to the microphone. He thanked his manager and his agent, the award organisers. And then, after a split-second hesitation: ‘And Lara, for everything she is to me.’
She stood staring at him, her face frozen in surprise. When he kissed her on the cheek and laced his fingers through hers as he came back to the table, her thoughts were too much in disarray to come up with a coherent question. Until she remembered that this was all for show. He was just sticking to their story, proving once again that he really was the best friend a woman could wish for—far too good to risk losing over something as superficial as how he looked in a wet shirt. She fixed a smile on her face and sat back beside Jannes, her hand still in his, aware of the photographer just to one side.
This was fine. This was simple. This was the reason she’d taken a fake date to Pip’s wedding: because she was choosing a life where she didn’t have to guess and second-guess people’s feelings. Where she didn’t have to worry about the fact that second-guessing people’s feelings usually led to them getting hurt. She already knew that Jannes was faking his feelings for her, exactly as they had agreed. Which really should have made her feel better. Grounded. But somehow, just...didn’t. She shook herself. It turned out that fake relationships were sometimes confusing, complicated, too. But still, compared to the real thing—she thought about the way her father had treated her, and her mother, and Pip’s mother, and decided that a fake relationship was the lesser of two evils.
She stuck to Jannes’s side as the party wound down, as he accepted congratulations and handshakes and slaps on the back from all directions. Lara felt a swell of pride seeing everything that Jannes had achieved. There was no denying that he deserved the award he’d been presented with that night.
He turned to her finally, when he’d shaken almost every hand in the room.
‘Mr Henriksson, I can show you to your room if you’re ready,’ the hotel manager said, coming over to shake Jannes’s hand. Lara wondered if he was glancing at his phone to ward off the awkwardness that had suddenly popped up between them at the mention of the hotel rooms arranged by the awards organisers. ‘Congratulations on your award,’ the hotel manager went on, beaming at them. ‘We’ve upgraded you to our best suite.’
Lara was on the verge of asking about her own room when she remembered about their pretence. The whole point of her being there was to convince everyone that they were a couple. Separate rooms was going to undo all their hard work, so she squeezed Jannes’s hand and followed the hotel manager to the lifts.
When they closed the door of their suite behind them, she looked up at Jannes and burst out laughing. What else could she do? This had started with her agreeing to pretend to be Jannes’s girlfriend for a few hours and had so far escalated to a family wedding, a ballroom and now the honeymoon suite of a luxury hotel.
‘Wow. This is...’ Jannes started, before his voice trailed off. Lara glanced up at him and smiled at the pink flush of his freckled cheeks.
‘Extravagant?’ Lara suggested.
‘That’s one word for it,’ Jannes said in a low voice that suggested there were several other words that he could think of.
She burst out laughing, because it was the only thing she could think of to break the tension.
‘So,’ Lara went on, when her laughter eventually petered out. ‘Um...what do we do here?’
Jannes looked around him at the extravagant suite with its four-poster bed and freestanding copper bathtub. Lashings of rose petals and crystal and polished wood. ‘Lara, I’m so sorry,’ he said. ‘It never occurred to me to say something about the sleeping arrangements—I should have checked.’
‘Relax, Jannes. It’s just one night,’ Lara said, turning on the spot to take in the whole of the room. ‘We don’t need to turn this into a big deal.’
‘You’re right. I’ll just sleep on the sofa,’ Jannes offered.
She laughed. ‘You’re at least a foot longer than the sofa,’ she pointed out. ‘And it’s velvet. You’ll slip right off in your sleep. There’s really no need. I’m sure I can be trusted to spend tonight in a king-size bed with you without trying to jump your bones.’
He laughed at that, but she could still hear the tension in his voice. No wonder, because jumping his bones was exactly what she wanted to do right now, and her and Jannes were good enough friends that she wouldn’t be at all surprised if he knew it.
‘It’s not you I’m worried about,’ she could have sworn she heard him murmur. No way was she calling him out on that—that would be way too dangerous. Better altogether just to ignore it.
‘Come on, Jannes. We’re friends. Let’s not make a big deal out of this. It’s not like there’s any danger of something happening between us.’
* * *
Well, not now there wasn’t. When she made it so clear that she wasn’t interested. There had been times that evening when having Lara by his side had felt so right, so uncomplicated, that it made him start to question all the reasons why he was so sure that seeing if there might be something more than friendship there between them was a good idea. But there was no point letting his thoughts wander in that direction. Even if Lara did see him as more than a friend, he wasn’t going to risk her walking away from him by suggesting that having her in his life as a friend didn’t always feel quite...enough. And he wasn’t going to risk losing her by letting them get closer, and then pushing her away. He couldn’t lose her—it wasn’t worth the risk.
‘So,’ he said, hand rubbing at the back of his neck. ‘What do you want to do for the rest of the night? Are you tired? I’m still a bit wired from all...that.’
A knock at the door interrupted the awkward moment, and a hotel employee came in, pushing a cart with a bucket of champagne and two tall crystal glasses.
Lara thanked him and took out the card propped up against the ice bucket. Well, there were worse things than room service and a movie and free champagne.
‘Telly in bed?’ she suggested. ‘And open this?’
‘Absolutely,’ Jannes said, holding up the glasses while she popped the cork.
She poured the champagne and then took a full glass, lifting it towards Jannes in a toast. ‘To...us?’ she suggested, hoping that Jannes could hear the heavy irony in her voice.
‘To us,’ he agreed with a smile, clinking their glasses together.
* * *
What did she want to do with Jannes in the honeymoon suite of a luxury hotel? Well, wasn’t that the question. What she wanted to do and what was actually a good idea were at opposite ends of the spectrum. On the one hand, she had an evening’s worth of inappropriate fantasies involving Jannes, a white shirt and a shower. On the other hand, acting out even one of those fantasies would turn this situation from complicated to...impossible. So that pretty much left them with the minibar and a movie.
She stalled in the bathroom, taking her time brushing her teeth and pulling on the shorts and crop top pyjamas she had packed when she’d thought that she’d have a bed to herself. Jannes slipped past her as she walked back into the bedroom and she was left watching his retreating back.
She climbed onto the bed, pulling a blanket around her shoulders and nudging the throw cushions in between the two firm duck-feather pillows.
‘I can still sleep on the floor, you know,’ Jannes said, leaning in the doorway of the bathroom, wearing just a T-shirt and boxers.
This wasn’t a good idea at all. But saying so would only suggest to him that there was something other than friendship between them that made this a big deal.
‘You’re making a big deal out of nothing,’ Lara told him, desperately trying to convince herself at the same time. She wasn’t going to act on temptation—if she did she would end up hurting him, and that just wasn’t acceptable. So instead she found the remote for the TV and gra
bbed some snacks from the minibar. If they were stuck in this awkward situation she was going to make the best of it. And champagne and snacks in bed definitely counted as the best of it.
She scrolled through the TV guide, looking for a movie, before stumbling on an episode of the dating show she was guiltily addicted to. She popped the lid to her Pringles and took a sip of champagne as the opening credits rolled.
‘Budge up,’ Jannes said, reaching for a handful of crisps. ‘Hey, you’re two episodes ahead of me. What did I miss?’
She froze with her crisp halfway to her mouth, her jaw hanging open.
‘Seriously? You watch this? How did I not know that?’
‘Don’t judge,’ he said with a little huff. ‘You watch it too.’
‘Yes, but you’re—’
He raised an eyebrow. ‘Careful there, do I hear some incoming sexism? What am I, exactly?’
‘You’re a relationship-phobe,’ she said. ‘And yet you want to watch members of the public falling in love?’
He snorted. ‘They’re hardly in love, most of them. And anyway, pot, kettle et cetera.’ He waved a hand, which she assumed stood in for all her commitment issues. Well, those commitment issues were the only thing standing between him and getting hurt, so he probably should be a little kinder about them.
‘We’re not talking about me,’ she reminded him. ‘Oh, my God, this guy’s my favourite,’ she said, taking another sip of her champagne, hoping that it would dissolve the atmosphere that seemed to have suddenly thickened around them.
‘You can’t like him. He’s an idiot. I forbid it.’
‘Excuse me?’ She widened her eyes, wondering if she was seeing him for the first time. ‘You forbid it?’
‘I’m your boyfriend now,’ he said with a shrug, his eyes never leaving the TV. ‘That means I can forbid things. At the very least I can forbid you from talking about other guys that you fancy when we’re in bed together.’
She shoved him with her shoulder. ‘No wonder you’re single, thinking that you get to go around forbidding things. The women of the yachting world have had a lucky escape. Anyway, we’re not in bed. We’re on the bed.’
‘Oh, yes, of course. That’s a very important distinction.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘In bed and on bed are worlds apart. Everybody knows that.’
‘Well, I don’t know that. I’m not an expert, but I am fairly sure you’re not meant to talk to me about other guys.’
‘Jealous?’ she asked, wondering why she felt a twist of nervous anticipation in her belly as she waited for his answer.
‘Not at all,’ Jannes said at last, leaning back on the pillow with his eyes safely back on the screen. ‘I don’t need to be. I know he’s not your type.’
She laughed and elbowed him in the ribs. ‘Oh, really? And what’s my type?’
‘You know. Tall, blond, sporty. Swedish, preferably.’ The corners of his lips turned up infinitesimally, so no one but her would have been able to tell that he was joking.
She jabbed him with her elbow. ‘Ugh. Stop talking, I can’t hear the TV.’ But he swiped her back with a cushion, catching her just as she was taking a sip of champagne and spilling the whole lot down her pyjama top.
‘Argh,’ she cried, kneeling up and brushing off the front of her crop top. ‘I’m soaked! You did that on purpose!’
‘I didn’t—I’m sorry!’
She dived into the bathroom—leaving Jannes looking crestfallen on the bed—and rinsed out her top, before hanging it in the shower to drip dry. It was only once the emergency was dealt with that she realised she was wearing not much more than a slightly damp bralette underneath. And now she was in her underwear, in a hotel room with Jannes, and had no idea where she was going to find something dry to wear.
Jannes appeared at the bathroom door, his eyes fixed firmly on the floor. ‘Everything okay?’ he asked. ‘Could it be rescued?’
‘No harm done,’ she said, crossing her arms over her chest, and then spotting the towelling robes on the back of the door. Jannes’s eyes grew wide as she came towards him, and then a look of relief washed over his features as she grabbed the robe and tied it firmly around her waist.
‘Do you want me to get you something from your case?’ he asked her, his ears slightly pink, giving him away.
‘I didn’t bring a spare,’ she said. ‘Wasn’t anticipating pyjama disasters.’ But they would have to do something, because it was hard enough ignoring these feelings for Jannes that were only growing stronger. Spending the night with him in only her underwear would be unbearable.
‘Want to borrow a T-shirt?’ Jannes asked, and she could have kissed him with gratitude, if that wouldn’t have made things infinitely more complicated. She took half a second to think about how intimate it was, borrowing his clothes to sleep in. But if the alternative was this flimsy underwear, she didn’t really have much of a choice.
‘Thanks, yeah, that’d be great.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
LARA WOKE TO the smell of oranges—the smell of Jannes, his shower gel or his laundry powder, she’d never been able to work out exactly what—and a complete lack of feeling in her left arm. She opened her eyes a crack before squeezing them back shut. She couldn’t be responsible for what she did when she was sleeping, she told herself. Except she might have been dreaming about Jannes—things were a little hazy—so that did make her kind of culpable if she’d somehow started acting out her fantasies. But that wasn’t important now.
What was important was extracting herself from this situation without waking him. She took an inventory of body parts. Her left arm was trapped under his chest, hence the lack of feeling. Her right had fallen into the notch of his waist. Her left leg was tucked in behind his knees, but her right was clamped between hard thighs. She tried an experimental pull, but Jannes’s legs tightened around hers and he pulled her closer with the arm trapped beneath his body. He smelled of oranges, and the soft hair at the nape of his neck was tickling her face.
She had to get herself out of this before Jannes woke up. The last thing that this situation needed was for there to be two of them conscious of how unbelievably close and unbelievably hot this was. Because while this was one-sided it was something that she could undo. If they were both awake, both aware of how close they were to...to something stupid, then she wasn’t sure if her self-control would hold and she wouldn’t do something to embarrass herself—something that could break her heart and their friendship.
She took just half a moment to imagine a world where things were different. Where something deep inside herself hadn’t broken when her father had left her. Where Jannes wasn’t scarred by being left again and again by his parents. Where they were both whole and healthy and ready to trust. If she had been that person, if he had been that man, she knew that they would be happy. She knew that there was no one on the planet who was more perfect for her than Jannes was. But they weren’t those people. And trying to make this friendship any more than it already was would result in both of them getting hurt. And losing Jannes from her life... Removing herself from the bed was the only safe course of action.
She withdrew the arm that was resting on top of Jannes’s waist and laid it against his back, using it to gently push him away. If she could just free her leg, she could snatch her arm from underneath him and it wouldn’t matter if that woke him because she had every intention of being out of the room before he even realised what was going on. But she couldn’t take that approach with both arm and leg: too high risk. Too much of a chance of getting caught.
She tried easing away from him again, this time pushing gently at his shoulder as she tried to move her leg. But he just held on to her tighter, wrapping her trapped arm around his middle and scooting back closer to her. So he was a touchy-feely sleeper. She tried really hard not to file that fact away for future reference. She let her forehead rest against th
e nape of his neck as she took stock of her failure and reconsidered her tactics. When she moved away, he pulled her closer. So if she wanted to get out, she would have to get...closer? Oh, this was going to end in tears, she was sure of it.
She rested her arm back on his waist and tightened it experimentally. Jannes took a deep breath in and let it out as a long sigh. Interesting. She pressed her chest harder against his back, keeping her forehead close to the soft hair at the nape of his neck. She was never going to be able to eat an orange again after this. But the longer she held him, the more his grip on her relaxed. She just had to stick this out.
The next time he breathed out, she pressed herself against him again, trying hard not to notice the shift of his muscles under his shirt, the tensing of his abs as she pressed her hand against them. But the vice around her trapped thigh loosened, and slowly, slowly, she drew her leg back.
Jannes shifted restlessly when she finally got it free, and she tucked her cheek into the notch where his neck met his shoulder until his stirring stopped. This was torture. It was everything that she wanted, but knew that she couldn’t have. If she had to design a torture for herself this would be it. Being so close to Jannes that she was practically inhaling him without being able to do anything—to keep them from both getting hurt. Worse—having to rely on her own slightly shaky self-control to keep them both in line.
From Best Friend to Fiancée Page 5