by Megan Bryce
When Mackenzie walked into Ethan’s office, he did a double take, then laughed at himself. Even after dinner last night, the blond was catching him off guard.
“I’m not used to your hair yet.”
“I’m starting to like it. I hardly recognize myself.”
“I wish it worked on the paparazzi.”
Mackenzie said, “Yes. Wasn’t dinner last night supposed to appease them?”
“They must not have gotten the memo. I’ll send another.” He looked her over carefully. “Any problems getting out of your house?”
“Not once your driver showed up.” She crinkled her nose. “There may or may not be some photos of me climbing my fence.”
He raised an eyebrow at her and she sat down. “It wasn’t my finest moment. But your very kind driver advised me that as long as they weren’t intruding on my personal space, it was usually better to just let them take the pictures.”
Ethan grabbed a bottle of water from the mini-fridge and handed it to her. He should have realized earlier that her paleness wasn’t a symptom of her new hair color. The most seasoned star could be overcome by hordes of shouting “journalists” and their cameras.
He said, “Do I need to sue some asses? Please say yes.”
“Because that always works so well?”
“Because I feel impotent and that enrages me.”
She shook her head. “This happens to you all the time.”
He sat down. “And I’m used to it. And I know how it feels. And I’m sorry.”
She took a long drink, then looked at him thoughtfully. “A half million sorry?”
He smiled slightly. “Probably not.”
“Well, I was talking about the impotence anyway.”
He opened his mouth to remind her of last night and she said quickly, “Tell me it will be better in New York.”
“It will be better in New York. Really. Probably.”
“I don’t think you have a handle on the paparazzi like you think you do.”
“Makes me want to sue them even more.”
She laughed, her cheeks gaining back their color. He smiled at her.
He said, “Are there going to be any pictures of you flipping them off?”
“Only with my eyes.”
“It’s what I hired you for.”
Mackenzie sat back, relieved. “Mission accomplished, then. I guess I can go back home.”
“I prepaid for six weeks. I’ve got five weeks, five days of death glares left.”
She sighed loudly. “My work is never done. But where exactly will I be living for the next six weeks? I assume you’ve got me in some swank hotel where I can run up the room service bill when I’m mad at you.” She looked like she was looking forward to it.
“You’re living with me.”
Her forehead wrinkled. “I can’t live with you.”
“You’re my fiancé. Where else are you going to live?”
“I’m sure there are places to rent in New York if a hotel is no good. If I live with you, everyone will think we’re sleeping together.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I think most people already think that.”
Her face turned a delightful shade of red. “Has no one ever heard of waiting for the wedding?”
He just looked at her. “No one is going to believe that.”
“Oh, God. Can’t you leave me with a shred of dignity?”
He walked around his desk and started rubbing her shoulders. “I am not so bad, you know. I think you overestimate how much damage I’m going to do to your reputation.”
She tried to get up and he pushed her down. She glared at him over her shoulder. “My reputation before you was a hard-working, sensible woman. There is no way bringing you into the equation is going to make my reputation go anywhere but down.”
“It’ll be fine. You can have the extra bedroom all to your lonesome. And we’ll pretend that we’re not going to sleep together.”
She stood up, wrenching her shoulders out of his hands. She turned to yell at him, and snapped her mouth shut when she saw him laughing silently, his shoulders rising and falling in silent wheezes.
He gasped, “Prude.”
She folded her arms. “You keep kissing me.”
He held up a finger. “Once.”
“Three times!”
“They didn’t count. It was really only one.”
“They all count. If your lips touch mine, it counts! If I can taste the chocolate you ate, it counts!”
He laughed again, thinking there was no one he liked messing with better than Mackenzie. “What you’re saying is you’re sensitive and I need to keep my mouth to myself.”
“Half of that is true, at least. The last half. I don’t want your germs.”
“Oh, yes? It’s that you’re a germaphobe?”
She raised her eyebrows. “You have had a lot of girlfriends.”
“Perhaps you would like to see a bill of health?”
“No. Because there will be no more kissing!”
He propped his hip against the desk, still smiling, and nodded at her. “Okay, okay. There will be no more kissing.”
Ethan didn’t feel even a little bit bad about lying to her. Her lips were still imprinted on his from last night. It was a pleasant memory for him. He wasn’t taking it personally that she didn’t seem to feel the same. He had evidence to the contrary, and if there was anything he knew about Mackenzie it would be that she would fight him with her last breath. Just on principal.
He was looking forward to getting her to that last breath. And then beyond.
She stared at him, then sat down slowly.
He said, leaving himself an out, “Except for an occasional photo-op.”
Mackenzie narrowed her eyes at him and he pinched his fingers together. “Very occasional.”
“Try none.”
“I’m not making any promises.”
“Then how about a thousand bucks per photo-op.”
Ethan tapped his chin. “Hmm. I’m trying to decide if you’re worth it.”
“I’m not. I would strongly advise against putting your lips anywhere near mine.”
“Okay, deal again. I’ll pay a thousand dollars every time I feel the need to kiss you in public.”
She shook her head and stood up. “I’m going home.”
“You want to go back home after all the trouble I went to get you out?”
“What trouble? You sent a driver. And I’ll go to Cassandra’s.”
“Why? I’m done here. You’re packed. Let’s just go to New York.”
Mackenzie jerked her head back. “Right now?”
“Yes. Why not?”
“I just wasn’t expecting. . .”
“To have to go at all?”
She looked sheepish. “I was hoping I was going to wake up soon.”
He reached out and pinched her arm.
“Ow!” She slapped his hand.
“Yep, you’re awake. So let’s go tonight.”
Mackenzie took a deep breath and said, “Fine. Let’s get this over with.”
Ethan hung his head. “If you must think of it that way.”
“I do. And I don’t want to live with you. You could chop me into bits while I sleep and keep my tongue in your fridge.”
He blinked. “Well. Now I’m worried that you’re going to chop me into bits while I sleep.”
“See? We don’t know anything about each other. It’s not safe.”
“You could always live with my mother if you’re so worried about it.”
Mackenzie choked. “Let me think about it. What about with Ellen?”
“She lives with my mother.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, as if she didn’t believe him. “Why?
“Because neither one of them likes to live alone. When my grandfather died, Ellen moved in with my parents. And when my father died, they just kept living together. They share a 4000 square foot penthouse; they’re not tripping over each other.”
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br /> “It’s still weird.”
“Why? They both like living in the city, but don’t want to live alone in the city.”
She looked unconvinced.
He said, “They have someone to go to the movies with, go to dinner with, argue with.” He grimaced. “Follow me across the country with. They would be lonely without each other. They have separate lives, separate interests; they’re just not alone.”
“That’s. . . sweet?”
He grinned. “You like living alone.” It hadn’t been a question but she nodded anyway.
He said, “You like having no one to spend the evening with, to talk about your day with, to just be close to when you don’t want to be alone?”
“I have my friends. I don’t need to live with them.”
“Maybe family is different.”
She blinked a few times. “I wouldn’t want to live with my family. Besides, Ellen and Christine aren’t really related. They’re in-laws.”
He shook his head. “Family. As thick as blood when you marry an O’Connor.”
She shuddered. “Remind me not to marry you.”
He tapped his temple. “Locked up tight. If you forget, I’ll remind you.”
“If I forget, you can shoot me.”
“Will do.” He smiled. “So are you going to live with me or my mother?”
She looked as if he was asking her to choose between arsenic or hemlock.
He said, “Will you live with me if I promise not to chop you to bits, maim you in any way, or even leave the toilet seat up? You will be completely safe from me.”
He thought about Alyse wanting to live with him, nearly every girlfriend he’d ever had wanting to live with him, and Mackenzie Wyatt trying to bargain her way out. There was definitely something to said for the chase. At least for him. There was no way she was living anywhere else but with him.
She took a deep breath and nodded slowly. “Separate rooms?”
“Of course.”
Maybe.
“Locks on my door?”
He looked to the heavens beseechingly.
She tried not to laugh and said, “Fine.”
He paused. “I would like the same assurance from you.”
“I promise I will not chop you to bits, maim you, or leave the toilet seat up.”
He smiled at her. “I’ve already alerted housekeeping to remove all staplers from the premises. Anything you would like removed before we get there?”
She opened her mouth and he held his hand up to forestall her. “If you say me I will tell housekeeping to also get rid of all the chocolate.”
A laugh escaped before she could stop it. He grinned at her. “See, we do know a little something about each other.”
She folded her arms. “If I’m going to be living with you, I’m going to need some sort of compensation. Everyone will think I slept with you.”
“Who is everyone, and why do you care?” His eyes twinkled as he mimicked her.
“Everyone is everyone. And I care because if one more person talks to me about our sex life I am going to dunk my head in the nearest toilet bowl and drown myself.”
“Sounds extreme.”
“You’re not the one they’re talking to.”
“True. And perhaps all that trauma is worth something.” He stood up, leaning in to say softly in her ear, “Maybe that half mil you keep going on about?”
“That’s all my reputation is worth?”
“Seems about right.”
She huffed and he took a step back, grinning. “But it’s not going to happen. I’m not going to pay you for people thinking you’re sleeping with me. You’d actually have to do it.”
She grimaced. “I honestly don’t know what everyone sees in you.”
He sighed in satisfaction. “I can say things like that because I know you won’t take me up on it.”
“Say things like that and no one will want to.”
He shook his head. “You, especially, would be surprised.”
Mackenzie snapped her fingers. “That reminds me. Cassandra says if this doesn’t work out as you’re hoping, she’s available as a wife and mother.”
“She’s a lovely woman.”
“Lovely. Yep, that’s the word I would have chosen. You two might work out well. Want me to call her up?”
“I’ll keep her as a back-up. Gotta give you a chance to earn that million first.”
“Okay, but she’s got a pretty mean death glare, too.”
“Does she? She seemed quite sweet.”
Mackenzie shook her head in disbelief. “That’s because she loses all of her brain cells when you open your mouth.”
“It’s a common affliction. I’ve really only met one woman who can keep half of them working in my vicinity.”
She blinked, her eyebrows rising up to her hairline. She said slowly, as if she hadn’t heard him correctly, “Half?”
“I’m tempted to say three-quarters but I’m also a little afraid of what you’d do if I did.”
“Good. I like you a little afraid of me.”
“Afraid is maybe too strong a word. Worried? Cautious?”
“Worried works.”
He stared at her, wondering if maybe she should stay in a hotel, after all. She did have a healthy level of rage inside her, and he did seem to provoke her a little too much for comfort.
She smiled slowly and he shook his head at her. “I’m not worried about my safety. . . nearly at all.”
“Good. I wouldn’t want you to be worried.”
He cleared his throat. “Yes. Well. Shall we? We can be in New York in time for bed. “
She sighed. “You know at least one thing about me, Ethan.”
He took her elbow, leading her out of the office and down to the waiting car. “And what is that, Mackenzie?”
“How to push my buttons.”
“It’s my favorite pastime.”
“As long as it’s not dressing up in women’s skin.”
He smiled down at her. “I think you’ll be okay. My closet’s full at the moment.”
Six hours later, Ethan took a deep breath of New York air, happy to be back home. He enjoyed traveling and that west coast culture, but New York was home. The sights, the sounds, the smells. Both cities might be on the coast but even the air was different.
And he always missed that wonderful New York stench that proclaimed people lived here. He wasn’t ever sure when he was in Los Angeles. Sometimes he thought it was a city inhabited by driverless cars.
Mackenzie strained to see the tops of the buildings through the window and he patted her knee. “We’ll do a proper tour once you’re settled in.”
Their driver pulled up to his building and he helped Mackenzie out. She looked straight up, then took a deep breath. Whether she was testing the air, like he had, or if she was fortifying herself for untold travails ahead, he wasn’t sure. Maybe it was both.
They rode the elevator to the top and Mackenzie glanced at him. “What is it about you being at the top of every building?”
“It’s the best. Once you see the view, you’ll understand.”
“I doubt it.”
He crossed his arms, turning towards her. “Are you afraid of heights?”
“I didn’t think so. But you keep testing me.”
She eyed him as they stepped out. “Your family doesn’t live on the same floor as you, right?”
He grinned. “Different building. Across town.”
She tried to hide her relief but he laughed anyway.
He unlocked the door, opening it in a grand gesture. “Welcome.”
“I really would prefer to have my own place.”
“I don’t think so. Besides, it’ll be fine. We get along great.”
She looked at him as if he didn’t know how to define great and muttered something about gaining weight.
She stepped in. “You’re a workaholic, right? Gone from dusk til dawn?”
“I am usually fairly busy.”
She took a look around and he wondered if she would be impressed. Nothing much seemed to, a fact that he found refreshing. And annoying.
She glanced over the furnishings, nothing about the beige and blue room seeming to grab her attention, and then her eyes caught the window. She walked toward it slowly, looking at the skyscrapers, the lights blinking on in the setting sun.
He followed her and said, “Worth it, isn’t it?”
“Doesn’t it make you feel small? To be one of so many?”
He nodded. “And amazed that it works so well.”
She looked at him. “So says the man at the top.”
He couldn’t argue with that. “So says the man at the top.”
She turned back to look out the window and he headed for the kitchen.
“Hungry?” He opened the fridge and laughed. “It looks like the housekeeper stocked up.”
He pulled out a bottle of chilled champagne and wiggled his eyebrows at her. “There’s even some chocolate-dipped strawberries in here for us.”
Mackenzie turned away from the window and folded her arms across her chest. “I’m going to unpack.”
He laughed. “Maybe later, then.”
“Not in a million years, O’Connor.”
He put the champagne back. Maybe he could talk her into it after she’d gotten used to living with him. A million years was an awfully long time.
He showed her to her room and said softly, “Make yourself at home, Mackenzie.”
He smiled charmingly at her. And she slammed the door in his face.
Mackenzie looked around the bedroom, noting the king size, four-poster bed. The door to the walk-in closet was open and her eyebrows rose as she peeked into it. Maybe she would do some shopping here after all.
She walked into a bathroom larger than the one back home, grateful that she wouldn’t have to share with Ethan. And sat down on the rim of the whirlpool tub. She longed for a good bubbly soak, but no way was she going to lay around naked and wet when Ethan was just in the other room.
Next time he left though, she was going to enjoy herself.
She quickly unpacked, her small wardrobe looking even more pathetic hanging in a small corner of the gigantic closet.
She wasn’t normally much of a shopper, had too many other plans for her money, but decided she’d have to give herself a clothing allowance. Might as well avail herself of everything New York had to offer.