by Elena Aitken
“So that wasn’t so bad, was it?” Damon stacked another load of dishes next to hers as he followed her into the kitchen. “Your mom actually handled things better than I thought. She seems excited.”
“She is.” Katie turned to look at him. “Did you know she actually told me that she’d always expected us to end up together? Isn’t that crazy?”
“Is it?” He shrugged so casually that for the slightest second Katie actually thought that Damon felt the same way. But then he quickly laughed. “Ha! Can you imagine?” He shook his head. “That’s crazy talk.”
“Right?” It was beyond strange, but Katie felt a flash of disappointment go through her. It wasn’t really crazy to imagine them together, was it?
“And it sounds like Faith is going to handle all the details.” Damon had already moved on in the conversation. “And…well, Logan is…”
“Logan is Logan. He wasn’t going to be happy no matter what.” She turned around to face him and was startled by how close he stood. A shiver went through her body at his nearness, but he didn’t seem to notice. And if he did, it didn’t bother him to be close to her.
Not that it bothered her. Quite the opposite.
She shook her head quickly in an effort to clear her thoughts. This is fake, Katie reminded herself. It’s all fake.
Even if the kiss they’d shared earlier had felt very, very real.
She’d tried to laugh it off because what else could she do? It’s not as if she could tell him that when his lips touched hers something had happened inside her. Something that had never happened before. It was like a full-body shiver, but instead of being cold, it was the exact opposite. His lips had lit her up in a way that had sparked a very dangerous fire within her. And even though it had only lasted a moment, she was certain that if she closed her eyes right now, she would still be able to taste him.
But nothing about that would be a good idea, so Katie forced herself to keep her eyes open and directly on Damon, who looked at her strangely.
“Are you okay?”
She nodded and smiled. “Fine. It’s just that all this is so…” She sighed. “It’s a lot and I still have to pack.”
Pack. Yes. She had to pack. It was the perfect way to get a little space and clear her head.
“You know what?” She wiggled to the side and moved toward the hall. “If you start the dishes, I can go throw a few things in a bag so we can get out of here a little faster. I think it’ll be easier to…well, you know…lie,” she whispered the last word, “if we limit the time we spend around my family.”
He nodded, but if she didn’t know better, Katie might have thought that he looked a little disappointed. “No problem. I’ll take care of the cleanup. You pack.”
“Pack for what?” They both spun around to see Logan in the door with the remaining dishes stacked in his arms. “Where are you going?”
It was clear that Logan still wasn’t happy about their engagement. The last thing she needed to deal with was a scene with her big brother. “Damon’s dad has generously offered us the guesthouse to stay in.” Katie grinned and tried to keep her voice light. “There’s just so much more room up at ElkView. We thought it might get crowded here and well, with the wedding in a few days, it doesn’t really make sense for Damon to stay at the hotel, so…”
Damon and Katie waited and watched Logan carefully. Katie was half convinced that her brother might actually take a swing at Damon, but to her surprise, he shrugged.
“Makes sense.”
“It does?”
Logan forced out a chuckle. “Of course it does.” He waved at her. “Go. Pack. I’ll help Damon with the dishes.”
A sliver of panic threaded through her, but Katie had no idea how to get out of leaving them alone together. Not without it looking suspicious. She looked to Damon, who nodded and smiled.
“Okay,” she said on an exhale. “Sounds good.” Right before she turned to leave, she had a thought and took two quick steps across the room to press her lips to Damon’s cheek. “I’ll see you soon.”
His eyes held hers for a beat as she pulled away. Something in the way he looked at her caused a fluttering sensation low in her belly.
Stop that!
She really needed to get that under control. The last thing she needed to complicate everything even more was to actually have any kind of romantic feelings for her husband-to-be.
The moment she was alone, she dropped her head and took three quick breaths, forcing herself to calm down. It was just Damon. The same Damon he’d always been. Their relationship was exactly the same as it had always been. Friends. There was nothing between them. It was pretend. That was all.
And that’s what she kept telling herself as she threw her clothes and her school books into a duffel bag. By the time she was done packing and had rejoined the others in the living room, just in time to say goodnight, she’d actually convinced herself of it. They were only friends. There was nothing between them. Nothing real. Just a little lie that they needed to keep playing at for a little bit longer and then they could go right back to being Damon and Katie, best friends.
They said their good-byes and were almost home free as they walked away from the house toward Damon’s truck and freedom from what had been the hardest part of the whole deception so far when Damon paused with his hand on the truck door he’d been about to open for her. “They’re all watching,” he said through his smile. “Let’s give them something to watch.”
Before Katie could ask him what he meant, he pulled her close with one hand while the other cupped her cheek. And then he was kissing her. Really kissing her. In an instant, everything fell away and Katie forgot about the fact that her family was watching them, or that it wasn’t supposed to be real. Her knees actually buckled a little, but Damon held her tight. He tasted faintly of the coffee they’d had after their meal as his tongue slipped between her lips and found hers. There was nothing pretend about this kiss. Absolutely. Nothing.
It was as real as it got and when he finally pulled his mouth away from hers, she was completely speechless. Her breath came in short bursts and her heart raced.
“That was perfect,” Damon whispered against her lips before pulling back, and opening the truck door for her. He helped her up and inside, and somehow she managed to regain her senses long enough to buckle her seat belt and wave out the window as they drove away.
It was perfect, all right. Katie swallowed hard and forced herself not to look at him.
And that was going to be a problem.
Okay, maybe he didn’t have to kiss her.
But with her family standing there watching them, it wasn’t a bad idea to make sure that they really looked like a young couple in love, right?
That was the story Damon told himself all the way back up the mountain to ElkView while they drove in silence. He’d kissed her just to keep up the act. Nothing more. It had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that ever since the first time his lips touched hers, his entire body had yearned to have her in his arms again.
No. It had nothing to do with that.
And he was a big fat liar.
Damon bit his lip and said a series of completely inappropriate things to himself in his head as he punched in the code for the gate and steered the truck the short distance to the cottage. He was being an asshole. A selfish asshole, which, as far as he was concerned, was the worst kind. It was bad enough he’d asked Katie to participate in this ridiculous lie for his personal benefit, but to confuse the situation even further by being so completely attracted to her? That was over the line. He needed to rein himself in. And fast. It wasn’t fair to Katie.
“Here we are,” he said in an overly cheerful voice that sounded brash and obnoxious in the silence of the truck. “Can I grab your things?”
She looked at him for the first time since they’d left the ranch and shook her head slightly, as if she’d just come out of a daze. “It’s okay. I’ve got it.”
Damon jumped out of the
truck and ran around to the back to grab her bags, at the same moment that she got there.
“I’ve got them, Damon. Really.”
“No.” He reached for her duffel at the same time she did. “I in—”
His hand touched hers and a shock went through him at what should have been an innocent touch. Her fingers lingered on his hand. He looked first at her hand, and then into her brown eyes, wide with shock. Did she feel it too? Was it…what…
“Okay,” she said quickly as she pulled her hand back and broke whatever little spell had come over them. “If you insist. You’re welcome to do all the heavy lifting.” Her voice was light and teasing and totally normal.
Maybe he’d imagined it. Maybe there was nothing there.
It had been years since he’d actually been in the cottage, but it was almost exactly as Damon remembered it. The entire guesthouse consisted of one large room with a small but well-equipped kitchen tucked into one corner, with a table and two chairs that would be perfect for Katie to set up a studying station. The rest of the room was filled with a large couch and two oversized chairs facing the glass doors that looked out to a large covered deck and the view that was worth a million bucks. Behind the kitchen was the one bedroom and bathroom that completed the space that was really the size of a small apartment.
It would have been perfect for one, or even a couple. A real couple. But as Damon pushed open the door to let Katie enter first, the problem with the space became clear immediately.
One bedroom. And they were definitely not a real couple.
“I’ll sleep on the—”
“You take the bed—”
They spoke at the same time.
Katie laughed. “I’m not taking the bed while you’re out here. It’s your house. That’s silly.”
“You’re doing this for me, Katie. There’s no way I’m going to make you sleep on the couch.”
He watched as Katie walked through the kitchen. She ran her hand along the backs of the wooden chairs as she moved slowly and Damon was hit with a blast of deja vu. She’d done exactly the same thing, the last time they’d been in the guesthouse together. They’d been teenagers and they’d been looking for alcohol they could sneak out to a bush party that was happening that Friday. Damon was sure his parents wouldn’t notice any extra they had in the cottage if it went missing, so together, they’d snuck in. Even back then, Katie had walked through the small space with a dreamy look in her eyes.
“Could you imagine if this was your house?” She’d spun with her arms outstretched. “Like, all yours? You didn’t have to share with anyone.”
“It’s pretty small.” Damon had laughed.
“Are you kidding?” She turned on her heel to stare at him. “It’s perfect. I can imagine it now.” She squeezed her eyes shut and a small smile crept up her face. “The perfect apartment, with no annoying big brother barging in when I’m listening to music, and no parents telling me what to do or when to go to bed.” She opened her eyes again. “Maybe one day, right?”
Damon shook his head clear of the memory. “One day” was upon them.
He closed the door behind him as Katie walked through into the bedroom and flicked on the light. “It’s a king-sized bed,” she called out. “We could share.”
His body reacted immediately and dramatically at her suggestion. There was no way. “Share?” He hoped his voice didn’t betray every racing thought going through his mind because the moment she’d offered up the suggestion, his brain had gone directly to imagining her in the middle of that king-sized bed, her arms behind her head, her long, dark hair spread out on the pillow beneath her, and her perfect little body completely naked and—
“Sure,” she said, interrupting his thought before he could get carried away with it. “Why not? We’ve shared beds before.”
They had. That was before.
Before he’d kissed her. Before she was Katie.
Katie appeared in the doorway with a smile on her face. “I’m sure we can handle it,” she said. “After all, we’re getting married in a few days.” She waved her ring in the air.
Damon forced a lightness into his voice. “Of course we can. We can handle anything.”
Chapter Seven
We can handle anything.
Damon’s words, like a bad joke, repeated themselves over and over in Katie’s head the next morning, dominating her thoughts as she drove into the city when what should have been in her thoughts were the terms and definitions for her last exam.
We can handle anything.
They could. She could.
Of course Katie could handle anything. Like focusing on her exam.
She was strong. She’d always been strong and independent, and when she made her mind up about something, she did it. No wavering.
She could handle anything.
Except sleeping in a bed with Damon Banks.
And it was driving her crazy. Or maybe that was the lack of sleep or the stress of the pending exam—never mind the wedding—talking. But whatever it was, even after only one night sleeping next to Damon, only inches from his hard, toned body, Katie knew for a fact that it was going to make her crazy. For whatever reason, maybe it was the kiss…or the other kiss…or…whatever, she had somehow become completely and totally illogically attracted to her best friend. Not that her body cared at all about logic. Not when it came to Damon.
Because whenever Damon laid down next to her under the feather duvet in that king bed, that might as well have been a single for how small it felt with both of them in it, her entire body lit up like a firecracker ready to explode. The only way she could deal with her full-body betrayal was by squeezing her eyes shut and taking deep breaths as she ran through economic theories and calculus functions in her mind while pretending to sleep. She certainly hadn’t gotten much sleep that way, but the extra studying—if you could call it that—would hopefully pay off at her exam.
By the time she left the exam center a few hours later, she felt confident that even with her complete lack of sleep, she’d totally nailed it. The sense of relief she felt as she walked to her car was immense. She’d done it. She was going to get her degree!
And now, with her degree, and Damon’s investment…she was finally going to have her store! Katie didn’t want to dwell on the reason she’d have the funds to start up her shop because if she thought about it too long, it made her feel a little seedy. Not that what she was doing with Damon was wrong. Not really.
Okay, the lie was probably wrong. And maybe taking money in exchange for helping him lie was technically wrong. But it’s not as if Damon were just anyone. He was Damon. He was her best friend. She’d help him out even if there were no money involved, just like she knew he’d help her.
The fact that she couldn’t seem to get him off her mind for completely unrelated reasons was…well…just a thing.
Not that there was any time to either celebrate her achievement or think about the thing. She glanced at the time on her phone.
She was supposed to be meeting Faith and her mother at a bridal store in less than thirty minutes.
Out of the pan and into the fire.
She shook her head with a laugh. Might as well get it done with.
The final exam seemed like a small hurdle compared to what was in front of her: buying a wedding dress.
A few minutes later, Katie found the store and paused before pulling open the heavy glass door and stepping inside. It seemed completely surreal. She was just about to chicken out completely when Faith’s voice rang out.
“Hey. There you are.”
Katie spun around, saved from her thoughts as Faith and her mother joined her in front of the bridal shop. “Sorry we’re a little late. We got a late start.” Faith looked pointedly at her mother, who shrugged.
“What? I wanted to get coffees for the road. You can’t road trip without coffees!”
Katie laughed. “I’m glad you’re turning it into an occasion.”
“Of course we
are! It’s not every day my daughter gets married.”
“No.” Katie looked down. “It’s not. Okay, let’s do this.”
“Before we do…” Faith tilted her head up by her chin. “How about a congratulations? You’re done your exams, Katie! That’s huge.”
“How did I forget?” Her mother pulled her into a hug. “I am so proud of you, kiddo. This is turning out to be quite a summer for you.”
Faith eyed her suspiciously. “You okay?”
Before Katie could answer, her mother jumped in. “You definitely have that look.”
“What look?”
“The look of love.” Debbie grinned. “I mean, I didn’t see it at first. Probably because I was just so shocked by the whole thing. But now…well, it’s all I can see.”
Katie looked to Faith for help, but her friend assessed her with a knowing nod. “Yup,” she said. “I see it.”
“You do not!”
“I do,” Faith continued. “A little flushed, a little dazed…I mean, not that I’m very familiar with it. But…it’s there all right.”
Katie dismissed her with a shake of her head. “This wedding business of yours is definitely going to your head. You don’t see anything.”
Faith laughed. “Just like no one saw the two of you actually ending up together? Ha. You weren’t fooling anyone, Katie Langdon.”
Katie did a double take. “What are you talking about?” She looked between her mother and Faith. Her mother had already told her as much, but no one else had ever said anything about Damon and her ending up together.
“Oh, for sure, Katie. The two of you were always so close, we all kind of knew something else was going on there.”
“You did?”
They did?
She hadn’t. Had she? Not that there was any point in denying it too much. Instead, Katie shrugged. “Well, I guess we weren’t very good at hiding anything.”