Let's Pretend (Romantic Comedy, Contemporary, Second Chance, Sensual)

by DeVere, Monique

  “Perhaps it wouldn’t hurt to share our decision with your family, babe.”

  Belle stopped breathing, turned startled eyes to Luc, trying to convey an anxious question with frantic eye movements—what are you doing? If he was thinking this instant was a good time to tell her family of their divorce, she was thinking the complete opposite. Now that she’d embarked on her deception, she couldn’t bring herself to face the humiliation of ’fessing up just yet.

  Even though Gran had reassured them she was fine, Belle found she couldn’t bear to witness the inevitable disappointment in her grandmother’s eyes when she and Luc told her they’d quit their marriage.

  “What do you mean, honey?” She gave a tiny headshake, praying he got the message—not now!

  He dropped a kiss on her mouth, ignoring her startled gasp. “Belle and I have decided—”

  “To buy a new car!” Belle cut him off. Allowing Luc to finish would be too shaming.

  “—to have a baby,” he continued without as much as a hint of remorse for the blatant lie.

  A baby? They’d never talked about children. At least not properly. Belle hadn’t experienced the biological alarm that the women she knew talked about—that little carnal nudge to the female hormones that said it’s time to reproduce. When she thought about it, Luc had never seemed bothered about starting a family, so why would he deliberately dig them a deeper hole?

  Why was she surprised? She’d heard the mockery in his voice when he’d promised to act the devoted husband.

  “Bless my soul.” Gran clapped. The huge smile stretching her red lipstick-painted lips stabbed a dagger of guilt right into Belle’s heart. Shock tilted the room. Even the antique vase of fresh cut Alstroemeria Red Lions from Gran’s garden appeared as though it was about to topple off the mantle.

  Why had Luc said such an outrageous thing? Was this his way of seeking revenge for her placing him in this situation? Whatever the reason, he was going to have to make it right immediately.

  Just one look at Gran’s face told her it was already too late. The little woman was bearing down on them. It was all Belle could do not to run crying from the room.

  How did she get into this mess? And why was she even bothering to ponder the question, when the culprit sat next to her, grinning as though he’d just done something great?

  “What is the matter with you, Luc? Are you out of your mind? Fix this!” she whispered in an aside just as Gran grabbed her hands and pulled her to her feet with surprising strength.

  “You don’t know how happy you’ve made me, Belle. I’ve been waiting for this news for the last five years.” She closed her arms around Belle and squeezed her to her bosom.

  In a haze of activity, she found herself in the middle of a group hug, getting the last ounce of breath squeezed out of her as the three other women in the room—her sister, Mia, and Tommy’s two sisters Alana and Julianne—all rushed forward to hug and congratulate her.

  She was a fraud, that’s what she was—a big, reprehensible fraud. And the worst thing was that now he’d put the idea in her head, she actually wished she and Luc were indeed planning to have a baby.

  6

  By the time Belle got Luc alone, it’d been a good hour. The only reason she now paced her room with her hands holding her head in frustration—while he lay back on her bed—was because Gran had insisted they relax in their room while the other women prepared dinner.

  She was fuming. “Tell me again why you would say such a thing?”

  His mesmerizing hazel eyes followed her progress past the foot of the bed.

  “You were drowning out there.”

  Belle stopped midstride and spun around. “And ‘Belle and I have decided to have a baby’ was your life preserver?”

  “I admit it wasn’t a genius idea. I guess we now know off-the-cuff isn’t my forte.”

  Belle huffed out a contradictory sigh. She was yet to meet a more quick-minded man. Luc could think on his feet better than anyone she knew. To agree with him would have been spiteful, but she was too annoyed to contest his statement.

  “Evidently, stopping to think isn’t either.” She resumed her pace to the en suite’s door, heaved in a deep breath, then blew it out. “What are we going to do?”

  When she turned, she almost bumped into Luc; she hadn’t heard him move from the bed or his light footfall as he came up behind her. He clasped her shoulders, sending warmth tingling over her skin.

  “Stop panicking. Look at it this way; you just need to get through this weekend, right? After that, you...we...will tell your family the truth—together.”

  “But you’re making it worse, Luc. Now you have a poor old lady getting her hopes up over an event that will never happen.”

  An unreadable expression flickered across his face. “May never happen, Belle. Who knows, perhaps you’ll find a man you can love enough to settle down with and have lots of babies.”

  A lump rose to Belle’s throat; she couldn’t envision life with any other man but Luc. The trouble was she couldn’t face the uncertainty, the constant dreading to hear he’d been badly hurt...or worse.

  An image of Will Eton—one of the firefighters on Luc’s crew—filled her mind. Belle had felt physically sick when she’d walked into the hospital theatre and seen him with a large piece of glass sticking out of his stomach, his firefighter’s uniform soaked with blood—the same uniform Luc wore. She’d nearly screamed as she’d realised that, but for a slip of fate, it could have been Luc lying on that table, waiting for an emergency team of surgeons to save his life.

  Tears pricked her eyes. Up to that point, she’d never really equated Luc’s job with death. The realisation had brought back all the pain of losing her father when she was eight, had forced her to face Luc’s mortality and her own weakness. Surely it was easier to end their marriage and learn to stop loving him, than to live every day with the constant fear that this might be the day she became a widow? Luc deserved someone stronger—a woman who didn’t let sirens paralyse her whenever he was on duty.

  A woman who would be able to continue her life knowing she’d never see Luc again. Never make love or babies with him. She was doing the right thing in ending their relationship...it would be too torturous not to. She stepped away from him, straightened the hem of her white tank top as an excuse not to meet his gaze.

  “I don’t think that’s going to happen, Luc.” She’d never love another man the way she loved him.

  He let her keep her space. “The man...or the babies?” His words carried a deep intimacy that fizzed through her as effectively as if he’d closed the small distance and whispered them into her ear.

  Heaven help her, both! But to admit that to Luc would be cruel. Especially because she saw his pain when he thought she wasn’t looking. Though he’d never argued or begged her to reconsider, she knew the divorce was as shattering to him as it was to her. She also knew his experience of his parents’ messed-up marriage would force him to let her go for fear of them ending up hating each other. Little did he know she could never hate him. It was her overwhelming love for Luc that scared her, kept her fear’s prisoner.

  With the delicious smell of sautéed onions and herbs wafting from downstairs came Belle’s excuse to make a hasty exit from Luc’s penetrating scrutiny.

  “I’m going to freshen up before dinner.” She didn’t wait for his response as she hurried into the en suite.

  His quiet laugh told her he was fully aware she was avoiding his question.

  ~*~

  DINNER TURNED out to be a noisy affair.

  Belle glanced down the wide table at her mum, Vicki, who had turned up an hour before they were due to sit down to eat. She and Gran had shut themselves in Gran’s room for the better part of that hour, only venturing out when everyone was seated and waiting.

  Belle hadn’t been surprised to find herself seated next to Luc. What had amazed her, though, was how close he sat beside her. His chair was nearly touching hers, and she couldn’t see
m to get away from the hard male thigh pressing against hers. The warm muscle teased her senses to an elevated height of responsiveness. Belle was aware of every breath he took. And when he laughed at something Alana said, it seemed to rumble right through her.

  Nerves stretched taut, she nearly yelped when Luc folded his arms across his chest as they waited for the main course of coq au vin and stroked his finger in a slow secret caress along her right triceps. She looked down and realised no one would notice him touching her. When she glanced at him, he produced one of his fake innocent smiles as he stroked her arm again, his eyes teasing.

  A charge of excitement zinged through Belle to settle as heat low in her belly. She plastered on a phony smile of her own, leaned close to him in an effort to ensure they weren’t overheard.

  “I thought I told you not to overdo the touchy-feely stuff, darling,” she whispered.

  Luc turned his head toward her, his lips suddenly very close to hers as he gave her a little smile that matched the teasing expression in his eyes.

  “Would you believe me if I said my finger slipped?” His breath carried a hint of wine as it tickled Belle’s lips, tempting her to lean in and close the hairbreadth separating them.

  “Hey you two, come on, not at the dinner table.” Julianne’s voice interrupted Belle’s mad impulse as she and Mia wheeled two silver serving trolleys up to the table.

  Grateful for her cousin’s intrusion, she pulled back, scooting her bottom along her chair until she sat perched on the edge farthest from Luc.

  Mia lifted a serving spoon. “They’re married, Jules. They’re allowed to do stuff like kiss at the dinner table. I don’t know about you, but I envy them that great relationship.” Belle found her gaze held hostage by her little sister’s meaningful stare. Before she could protest her innocence, Mia continued. “If I ever snag a guy even halfway as decent as Luc, I swear, I’ll never let him go.”

  “Whoa, cuz, you sound a little loopy there.” Alana reached for her wine glass. “Let’s hope the poor guy doesn’t have a rabbit.”

  “Alana. That’s gross.” Julianne served Gran while giving Alana the scolding glare she’d perfected over many years of dealing with her talk-first-think-later younger sibling.

  She then continued to serve one side of the table while Mia served the other.

  Mia moved to their mother’s side, placing a serving of the chicken dish onto her plate while Gran and Vicki continued their hushed conversation, ignoring the banter between the girls.

  Pointing the serving spoon at Belle and Luc, Mia said, “All I’m saying is that my wonderful, talented sister and her gorgeous husband have got a beautiful marriage, and they should celebrate it.”

  Luc slid Belle a glance that told her he knew guilt gnawed at her insides. He unfolded his arms and caught one of her hands, keeping it from twisting the linen serviette on her lap. Soothing his thumb over her knuckles, he offered her a wink of solidarity to go with the quick lift to the corners of his mouth. Something in his expression struck her, made her feel as though nothing apart from the two of them existed in that moment.

  She didn’t want to feel things like that. Didn’t want to indulge in comradeship with him. Fresh nerves assailed her, and she began a rapid bobbing of her knee in a telltale sign of stress. Luc released her fingers and grasped her knee to stop the nervous bounce. Only his touch didn’t soothe her as much as heat her up.

  Tommy—who sat across from Belle—snorted. Obviously sick of the present conversation.

  “So, I heard you made assistant fire chief,” he cut in, moving his hands when Mia got to him so she could dish coq au vin onto his plate.

  Tensing at the news and not wanting anyone to notice she was hearing about Luc’s promotion for the first time, Belle reached for the string beans. Luc’s hand slid a few inches up from her knee and rested on her thigh, his fingers moving in a slow glide on her inner thigh.

  Belle clamped down on a whimper she hoped no one noticed. She shot forward in her seat and surreptitiously knocked his hand off.

  Taking the hint, he placed his hand back on the table.

  How could Luc not tell her about his career advancement? She began transferring the thin green pods onto her plate. Didn’t he think it was something she should know? Assistant fire chief...did that mean he no longer had to go in with the crew? She had to fight the impulse to drag him away from the table to ask.

  What if his new position meant his run-into-a-burning-building days were over? Her stomach knotted with jittery tension. What if...? The thought was downright dizzying. Even though she should know the tiers of his job, she didn’t. They’d decided long ago the little time they managed to spend together was too precious to waste talking about work. As a result, she had no idea what an assistant fire chief did.

  “Hey, Belle. How about leaving some beans for the rest of us?” Alana broke into her reverie. She looked down to find a heaped helping on her plate.

  Luc took the bowl from her and passed it to Alana, who sat to his right. “News travels fast.” He forked half of Belle’s beans onto his plate.

  “You know how it is.” Tommy flashed a smarmy smirk. “Someone who knows someone, who knows someone...so, Belle, how come you didn’t tell us about your husband’s promotion?”

  Belle waited for Julianne to finish dishing food onto her plate while she tried to make a swift recovery from her fluster at Tom’s question and think of a plausible response.

  “I asked her to keep it between us until I had a chance to formally accept the position.” Luc’s smooth answer saved her from having to reply. “As it happened, I only found out a fortnight ago that I’d gotten the job.” He slid his arm along the back of her chair and absently massaged her nape, sending delicious sensations through the tight muscle.

  Belle got the feeling the last part of Luc’s sentence was for her benefit.

  “Well congratulations, Lucas.” Vicki raised her glass and indicated that the rest of them should too.

  “Congrats!” rang out around the table.

  When Belle met Tommy’s eyes, she saw undiluted malice shining from their depths. “Yeah, congratulations, Lucas.” He emptied his glass and reached to top it back up. “Onwards and upwards, right?”

  Evidently, Luc chose to ignore the underlying snipe to Tommy’s tone as he tipped his own glass before taking a sip of the white wine. “Thank you.”

  “So what does this promotion mean, Luc?” Mia asked, reclaiming her chair next to Tom.

  Yes, Luc. What does it mean? Desperate to know the answer, Belle waited with as much nonchalance as she could dredge up while her heart took up a rapid tempo that echoed in her ears.

  “It means he gets to sit around all day long, giving orders.” At Tommy’s words, delivered on a resentful note, Belle wanted to throw her arms in the air, yell—yes—and do a happy dance.

  It was possible that Luc had a desk job!

  “It means I get to help provide leadership to the department. Develop policies, procedures, and head up training. Oversee fire suppression activities, supervise personnel, and perform budgetary duties.” Luc forked up some food. “In essence, it’s a desk job with all the politics to go with it.”

  Belle was dizzy with excitement. If Luc wasn’t going to be involved in dangerous situations, she no longer had to fear for his safety. And if she no longer had to fear for him, she didn’t have to take the final step to end things between them. She tried to hide her glee. “So you don’t go out with the crew to fight fires?”

  Luc swallowed the food in his mouth. “Not unless it’s a serious incident.”

  Belle’s stomach pitted out. It was as if he’d given her a pretty gift box, but once she’d torn off the paper, she’d discovered a booby prize inside. The injury Will had sustained had resulted from a “serious incident”.

  She forced a smile. “I see.” Then shovelled a forkful of sawdust-tasting chicken into her mouth, grateful when her mother changed the subject to the latest talent to show their art coll
ection at her small gallery.

  With the exception of Tommy—who claimed to be meeting up with friends—they took coffee in the lounge. Wine and laughter had flavoured the dinner conversation, and the same merriment followed them into Gran’s plush lounge.

  “Are you okay?” Luc asked as he pulled her onto the sofa beside him.

  Noticing a few eyes on them, Belle forced a light, “Yep.”

  Luc tipped her chin so she had to meet his gaze. Why did he have to look at her as if she were the only woman in the world?

  His brows pulled together. “Sure?”

  She stretched her lips across her teeth in what she hoped was a convincing smile as she nodded. “Um-hmm.”

  He released her but didn’t seem persuaded. Perhaps the stiffness with which she held herself when he slipped his arm around her had something to do with it.

  7

  Luc leaned back against the window seat, enjoying his position. It provided the perfect location for him to catch glimpses of one of his favourite places on Belle, as her top rode up—the sexy part of her lower back where it met the top of her butt. He could imagine kissing the two little dimples either side of her spine, and not having the freedom to do so was driving him crazy.

  Tonight had been torment. He didn’t know which was more so—Belle ignoring his secret touches, or the permanent state of arousal he’d managed to get himself into with no foreseeable release. “Are you sure you don’t want me to help you with that?”

  Belle tossed him a glance over her shoulder. Was it his imagination, or did she give him a quick but thorough onceover?

  “I’m sure.” She turned her attention back to the task of making up the little cabin bed he had the privilege to sleep on. He was certain he heard her mutter, “You’ve done more than enough today.”

  Luc smiled. He wasn’t alone in this ordeal, then. His mind went back to the little moan she’d let slip before she’d shot forward in her seat at the dinner table, and cleared her throat. Belle was not immune to him.