Fake It

by Jennifer Chance

Anna stilled for just a moment, then stretched up toward him to make the kiss more complete. She tasted of dark coffee and lip gloss, and her body squirmed into his hold, all silk and curves and softness. A flip switched in Jake’s brain, and he gathered her hard against him, pinning her against the counter, feeling her back arch beneath his wide palm as her hips tilted more fully into his groin, sending his already taut nerves into overdrive. She had to feel him, because she exhaled on a pant, her own urgency clear, her heart pounding so loud even he could hear it, her body full and ready and begging for his touch. He lifted one hand to cup her right breast in his palm, and he felt her nipple go instantly hard and tight even through her bra.

  “Jake,” Anna gasped, and he smiled against her mouth, knowing he was going to have her, knowing that sweet, sexy body was going to be his, but wanting to extend the moment.

  “Yeah, baby?” he asked.

  “You don’t have to do—ohhh.” She groaned the words as his mouth left hers and drifted along her jawline, up to the sensitive curve of her ear that sported a sparkly teardrop earring. He tongued the earring, relishing her shuddering response.

  “Do what, sweetheart?” he asked against her ear. “Do this?”

  Chapter 6

  Oh my God. Anna clung to the front of Jake’s shirt and tried to stay upright as he tilted her backward, exploring the hollow of her neck. She knew he was hard, she could feel his erection pressing into her belly, and she had never felt so dangerous, so sensual, so—

  So unbelievably scared in her entire life.

  This was the man she’d briefly, insanely, outrageously thought about inviting to spend the weekend with her—as her boyfriend? This was the man she thought she could pass off as a guy who had spent more than two minutes in her company—let alone a whole six months—in the most intimate way possible? This was a—

  “Were you going to say something, Anna? Because now you have me curious.”

  Both of Jake’s large, capable hands were palming her breasts, and the off-the-shoulder sleeves of her little pink dress were definitely off the shoulder now, along with her bra straps, which left him hefting the full weight of her. He dragged his thumbs over her nipples and, even through two layers of material, Anna felt the tips tighten even further as a damp heat seemed to blossom at the base of her abdomen and spread through her entire body. “Ahh,” she said, shocked to hear the lust in her voice, but unable to stop it any more than she could stop the buckling of her knees.

  “That seems like a promising start.” Jake slid his hands down over her waist until they found the curve of her ass. And then he went farther, splaying his fingers against her, groaning as he pulled her hard up against him. She felt herself go up on her toes, and then she was sitting on the counter, her breasts now bare to Jake’s mouth, his tongue, his—

  Anna fisted her hand in Jake’s T-shirt and tried to regain control of herself. What was her problem? She wasn’t a virgin—she’d been having sex since she was eighteen, for heaven’s sake. And she had no emotional connection with Jake Flynn, no matter what he was doing with his hands, with his body, and, oh God, with his mouth. So why was she acting like she’d never been touched by a man before?

  Her brain spontaneously found a circuit and plugged in, and her thoughts began to make sense again. “Jake,” she began, almost desperately. “I meant to say, you don’t have to do this. The weekend, I mean. I’ll be fine—more than fine.” She was gasping now, but Jake had lifted his mouth away from her skin, his strong fingers back to kneading her breasts, making her head spin. He had fitted himself up against her intimately and Anna realized her skirt was hiked up around her hips, but all she could do was stare at Jake staring back at her with a grin playing across his sexy, teasing lips.

  “You don’t think we could have fun for a weekend?” he asked, and he shifted his hips just slightly, nudging his erection against the vee of her legs. She practically felt her pupils dilate at the motion, and from the darkening of his eyes, Jake hadn’t missed her reaction.

  “It’s not that,” she said quickly, so quickly, trying to keep her brain online. “You’re very … sweet for offering, but these people, they’re not a lot of fun, really. They all talk about their fabulous lives and their fabulous relationships and jobs, and they look at me as if I need to be equally fabulous, and so I have to act like everything is amazing while all I want to do is just get through whatever social event we’re all at, until I can be all by myself again, doing my thing until the next time I have to fake my way through.”

  Whatever she had been babbling, it seemed to be working, but Anna suddenly wasn’t sure that “working” was a good thing. Jake had shifted minutely away, and his grin had turned into the slightest of frowns. “What are you talking about, Anna?” he asked. “What do you mean, fake your way through?”

  Dammit, she’d done it again. Spilled too much, too soon. “I’m just trying to say this isn’t something you want to be a part of, that’s all.” Anna tried to backtrack, but Jake suddenly seemed to loom over her—not in an alarming way, but resolutely, like he wasn’t going to let her talk herself out of this one, not this time. She just had to say something, anything, the truth but not the whole truth, and then he’d see how silly all of this was and agree to drop the whole wedding thing, and she’d hop down off the counter and they could go back to … whatever they had been doing before.

  Anna sucked in a breath, then let the easy stuff out in one long flurry of explanation. “Truly, it’s not all that dramatic,” she said. “I just don’t feel like I’ve made it yet, that’s all. I feel a bit like a fraud. When I was in high school my mom and I didn’t have a ton of money. I mean, we survived and everything, but money was … tight. And once I understood that, finally, I tried really hard to balance an after-school job with all the right classes, and I went after awards and scholarships, anything I could think of. I had to get into a really good college, so my mom wouldn’t ever have to worry about me or money or anything, ever again. Well, so I did all of that. And then I worked all the time through college to land this job, which is where I met Todd. We started dating and he was everything I thought I wanted. He realized I wasn’t rich or any of that, but he thought he could make me better, which I appreciated, I really did.” Anna dragged in a strangled breath, desperately trying to wrap up her increasingly long-winded explanation. “Anyway, whatever, it didn’t work out between us, but he did introduce my friend Kristen to this guy, Scott, and those two did fall in love and now they’re getting married. And so Todd will be at their wedding, and apparently these other people Kristen wants to fix me up with, as well, except now it seems like Todd is into me again so I’ve got to figure that out, all the while faking like I’m totally in control and awesome, and … yeah. It’s all kind of dumb.”

  “Let me get this straight.” Jake’s expression was now completely not what she wanted. He was grimacing—not a pitying kind of grimace, thank God, but still a definite grimace. God knew she was ready to grimace at herself, too. Would she ever learn to shut up?

  He shifted a bit farther back away from her, creating space between them, and it was all she could do not to whimper. “You worked your way all through high school and college to get into this job, and once you’re there you hook up with a guy who thinks you still need to be better—”

  “Well, we didn’t just hook up—,” Anna said, but Jake kept going.

  “And then you guys broke up. Who dumped who again?”

  “It wasn’t like he dumped me but—”

  “And then he dumped you, only now he’s sniffing around again, and you’re thinking about letting him back in despite the fact that he’s clearly a dick. That about cover it?” He scowled at her, seeming entirely too annoyed about something that really had nothing to do with him. “And your friends think this is a great idea?”

  “Not all of them,” Anna said quickly. “Kristen can take him or leave him, and Dani and Lacey and Erin—they haven’t even met him and they don’t like him. But he’s no
t a bad guy, really. We just … we didn’t work out. And I really don’t want to revisit that situation, which is why having a date for the wedding was kind of a big deal to me. I just sorted of wanted to hide in the background and get through it all unscathed.”

  “Wanted?” Jake shifted a little closer to her again, and Anna’s sensitive nerve endings stood up and did a little cheer. “You don’t still want that?”

  “Well, I—”

  “You don’t want to show up to the party with a guy who’s seriously into you and not afraid to show it? Who can barely keep his hands off you?” As if to punctuate his words, Jake rubbed his hands along Anna’s arms, up over her shoulders. He threaded his fingers through her hair and teased her head gently back until she was staring up at him again. “That wouldn’t show your friends—and this Todd guy—that you were happily involved somewhere else? With someone else?”

  “You wouldn’t have to do all of that, seriously,” whispered Anna. His eyes were hot and dark, and his gaze roamed over her face as she spoke, as if he was memorizing every inch of her. “If you could just … if you could simply—”

  “Tell me what you want, baby,” Jake said quietly, a soft smile on his lips. “Tell me what would make this weekend perfect for you.” He shifted his body toward her again, drawing her close to him. He leaned down and nuzzled her lips with his mouth, and she felt another knot of tension unwind within her. “A weekend at the beach, remember?” he murmured. “All the sun and surf you can handle?”

  She smiled as he echoed her own words. “It’ll be very pretty down there,” she allowed.

  “Mm-hmm.” Jake’s mouth was roaming along her jaw again, and she closed her eyes against the sensation. “What are you expected to do?”

  Anna tried to focus on the schedule she’d had imprinted in her brain for the last six months. “We get there Friday … she wanted us Thursday, but I had—”

  “Work, I know,” Jake supplied for her. “Friday’s better anyway for me, but … she’s okay with you showing up late?”

  “Everyone will show up late. It’s how we all keep score.” Before Jake could comment on that, she rushed ahead. “So Friday day is casual,” she said. “Friday night is the rehearsal dinner, Saturday the wedding. We’ll be staying at the guesthouse. I mean I’ll be … I mean—”

  “We will be,” Jake clarified for her. “Together.” He paused for the slightest of beats, a faint frown marring his brow. “How many people will be there?”

  “The whole wedding party? Twenty people, maybe.”

  “Big group,” he said. “Is your ex part of that crowd? No, no, no you don’t, sweetheart.” Easing her off the counter, Jake slid around and settled himself against the cabinetry, then pulled Anna into the crook of his thighs, effectively switching their positions. He put his hands on her shoulders and stared down at her. “You’re not allowed to tense up every time I mention the guy, or I’m going to get jealous.” He smiled at her stricken expression. “That’s better. So okay. We’ve got a couple of official parties, and what else? Any stupid games or luncheons or any of that bullshit?”

  “Yes. A brunch, Sunday morning. Everything else is optional—golf outings, shopping excursions …” She glanced up at him. “I don’t suppose you golf?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t suppose you shop?”

  “I do,” Anna laughed. “But not in Charleston, South Carolina. I am not really in the market for seashells or whatever. Honestly …” She bit her lip.

  “Honestly …,” he teased back.

  What the hell. It was her fantasy. “I’d rather just hang out at the beach, away from all of them,” she said. “If you would want to. I mean, I don’t even know if you’d like the beach, but if you did and if you wanted and if that seemed like—”

  “That seems like a good time,” Jake said. “But that brings up a key point.”

  She looked up at him. “It does?”

  “Mm-hmm. What are the rules for this weekend? Who is it I’m supposed to be, exactly? Some guy named Dave, right?”

  “Oh, yeah. Yes. I guess.” Anna’s cheeks heated again. “God, it’s so crazy, but that’s what I’ve set up, and now … now it just doesn’t seem reasonable to carry on that charade. I mean, I could say I broke up with Dave and met you, or—”

  “Or we can just roll with it.” He shrugged. “It sounds like Dave was a pretty stand-up guy. When you guys weren’t getting it on anyway, which from what you were saying earlier seems like you were doing a lot.” He kissed her forehead. “Why don’t you tell me about it on the way back to your place?”

  He stood up away from the counter, pushing her away as he did, and Anna frowned up at him. This definitely wasn’t where she thought this evening was going, but she couldn’t deny the relief. “Had enough of me?” she said with a small smile.

  “Anna …” Jake guided her hand to where his erection still strained, hard and insistent, against his jeans. She touched her fingers to the rough cloth and he shuddered beneath her hand, sending a thrill spiraling through her.

  “But—”

  “I don’t want to bang you up against a wall the first time we do it, sweetheart, but that’s exactly what will happen if it’s tonight. However, from what you’ve told me, you’ve got this whole made-up guy in your head, and I don’t see why you shouldn’t have him. And if I’m going to be that guy, I can behave for a few days. I can wait for it.”

  “You can …” Unaccountably, Anna felt her body react with a warm rush of interest, as if he hadn’t just said nothing was going to happen. “A few days?”

  “You’re thinking about it, aren’t you?” He pulled her toward the kitchen door, and she somehow got down the stairs in the dark with his hands on her breasts, her ass, her hips, her—

  “God, baby, I can feel your heat,” he breathed into her hair as they paused at the bottom of the staircase and he slid his hand up under her dress, pressing against the vee between her legs. She let out a small, appreciative moan, and then she did find herself pressed against the wall. “Mmmm,” he breathed out. “You’d like me to take you like this, wouldn’t you? You’d like me to stretch you wide as I buried myself in you, filling you up.” He chuckled as Anna gaped at him, unable to find the words to respond. “So, just who is this guy Dave you’ve made up in your head? What does he do when he’s not having sex with you?”

  “He’s a consultant, high-end finances,” Anna managed, moving against his hand—which still cupped her there, the scrap of her panties not even remotely sufficient to protect her against the onslaught of Jake’s questing fingers. “I, ahhhh.” She lost the ability to speak for a moment, then tried again. “I don’t suppose you know anything about business finances?” Jake shrugged and she bit her lip, leaning back against the wall as Jake slid his fingers up, tracing the thin strand of her panties over her right hip. Focus. “Okay, well, you also, um, like Italian food.” He had hooked his finger under the string of her bikini panties now, and was going slowly, so slowly—

  “I can work with that,” he said, and she could hear the smile in his voice as he watched her in the dark. He shifted another inch toward her center, and she squirmed beneath him.

  “And sushi,” she breathed, and he stopped for a long, harrowing moment.

  “That’s a little questionable.”

  Anna smiled, hoping he couldn’t tell how wet he’d made her. “And you go with me to romantic-comedy movies.”

  “Now that’s where I draw the line. But I think you’re skipping something important here, Anna.” His fingers moved that final inch, touching the edge of her most sensitive point through the thin shield of her panties. “What about the sex? I thought you said this guy was good in bed.”

  “Yeah,” Anna groaned. “That’s … actually a problem. I was sort of graphic one night when I got drunk and called Kristen, and she told everyone else, even Todd, and they have never let me live it down.”

  “Graphic is good,” Jake said softly, and he leaned his head into her neck as his coo
l fingers slid slowly up her overheated flesh, then down again. “I can work with graphic.” He fluttered his fingers against her and Anna gasped, causing him to chuckle low and deep in his throat. “Well, well, well, Ms. Richardson,” he said. “Maybe you should tell me a little more about these fantasies you have occupying your feverish little mind. We could make some of those wishes come true next weekend, you know. Would you like that?”

  “I—what?” Anna said, and she felt herself losing control of the conversation. How had he … how could he—

  “How long have you been carrying on this charade with a fake boyfriend again?” he asked.

  “What? Why is that important?” Anna asked. When he spread his fingers wide against her, her knees almost buckled. “Six months,” she gasped. “Which suddenly seems like a really, really long time.”

  “It definitely does,” Jake murmured. “A lot of memories we’ve created that I’ve got to catch up on.” With that whispered promise, Jake withdrew his torturing fingers, and smoothed down Anna’s skirt. Then he straightened and drew her up, leaning forward to claim her mouth. It took the urgency off her need, but something else flowed through her at his searching kiss. Something she didn’t want to explore too closely.

  Then her brain caught up with his words. “I have a list!” she said, brightening. “I’ve been working on documenting everything you’ll need to know. I can deliver it to you tomorrow. Maybe we can discuss it over coffee, or …” Anna bit her lip, wondering how she’d actually carve out the time to give him everything he needed to know about the incomparable Dave.

  But Jake was already shaking his head. “No can do, sweetheart,” he said. “I’m leaving tomorrow to deliver a bike, and the owner’s got about three more for me to clean up before he’ll let me out of his garage. Either way, I’m figuring I won’t get back here till sometime on Thursday.”

  Anna blinked at him. “But we leave Friday!”

  He smiled. “See? Perfect timing.”

  Anna opened her mouth, then shut it. Tried again. “Jake, this just shows you that this really isn’t a good idea. We should drop this. I don’t even know you, and you don’t know me.”