Sexy Bad Valentine

by Misti Murphy

  “I’m sure.” I can hear her smile inflecting on her words, but they still sound slightly condescending. I probably shouldn’t be surprised. The woman knows from my application that I’m desperate and dateless. “Now, we’ll shoot the video in several pieces. There’ll be an interview, and then you’ll spend an afternoon with each of the dogs separately. After that we’ll shoot your decision. And then part of your Valentine’s date, and your thoughts on the guy. And his opinion of you. Just so we have a nice rounded segment.”

  “Okay,” I agree. “But I do have an engagement I have to attend on Valentine’s Day. I’m not sure that you’ll be able to film that.”

  “Actually, we’ve set you up a table at Greco Nova early in the day for your date. That’s where we’ll shoot. After that, you’ll be free to spend the rest of your day however you want.” For a second, she drops her serious tone, “Maybe it will be with your chosen guy.”

  “That’s great.” I breathe out in relief. What would be the point of all this if I wasn’t able to make it to Hannah’s party?

  “Excellent,” she says. “Now let’s book in the schedule so that nothing holds up our timeline.”

  “Okay.”

  We go over the dates and times for each shoot, adjusting them to fit in with my job as Abby’s nanny. With only three weeks to shoot, I’ll have no time to myself. No time to flirt with Max. Or go shopping for appropriate date night underwear, or a costume for Hannah’s party. Deanna Holt leaves me with instructions to meet with Kelly on the first day of shooting. She’s one of the senior assistants from the pet supply company the show is named after.

  “Good luck with it all, Evie,” she says. “Have fun. Hopefully I’ll be back in the country to meet you before it airs.”

  “Looking forward to it.”

  ***

  “Hey.” Max steps out of the house that must be his sister’s, shutting the door part way behind him. “Thanks for bringing Barclay over.”

  “Any time.” I hand him the end of the lead. “He’s been a real sweetheart. Abby adores him.”

  “I’m glad.” He smiles sheepishly, his fingers lingering on mine for a few seconds longer than necessary. “Any chance you’re available tomorrow?”

  “For dog sitting?”

  “I was thinking more along the lines of sharing a walk with me,” he says.

  Oh how I wish I had time to explore whatever this energy between us is. “I don’t think I can.”

  “Is it because of our texts earlier? Did I say something to offend you?”

  “No. It’s not that,” I reassure him. “It’s just I have quite a bit on my plate in the next few weeks.”

  “Anything I can help with?” he asks.

  “Um, no.” I shake my head. “Honestly, this evening is the only free time I have until after Valentine’s Day. Perhaps we could—”

  “Maxwell,” a female voice coos from inside. “What are you doing out there?”

  “Nevermind.” I rush the words, walking backwards. “You’re busy. I’m busy. Perhaps I’ll see you around.”

  “No. Wait up,” he calls out as I spin around to hurry down the path.

  What was I thinking? Of course he would have company.

  He catches up to me before I get to the road. “Don’t go.”

  “What?” I stop to glare at him, check myself. What right do I have to be annoyed that he has a woman with him? After all, he did when I met him. “You have company.”

  “No.” He grabs my hand in one of his. “That’s my sister’s friend. Caroline. She’s not, we’re not…” He expels a breath. “I’m not interested in Caroline. She’s only here because my sister sent her to check up on me.”

  “Truly?”

  “Yes.” He squeezes my hand. “I’m interested in you.”

  “Crap,” I say.

  His eyebrows shoot up to his hairline, like two bangs from a starter pistol. “That’s not exactly the reaction I was hoping for.”

  “No, I didn’t mean it like that,” I backpedal. “It’s just—”

  “Give me five minutes,” he pleads. “I’ll get Caroline to leave and then perhaps we could open a bottle of wine? My sister has a wine cellar to make Napa Valley jealous.”

  “One.” I hold up a finger. “A glass. That’s all.”

  “Okay.” He smiles. How could I ever have thought I would say no to his request?

  “Five minutes.” He walks backwards, taking my hand with him until we’re both standing there with our arms fully outstretched, only our fingertips touching. Then he turns around and jogs back inside, Barclay on his heels.

  I don’t stand around outside his house, because one, it feels awkward, and two, I don’t want to know if that woman has been something more than just his sister’s friend. Sometimes ignorance is bliss, so I walk at a leisurely pace around the block. By the time I get back to our street, he’s waiting for me at the end of the driveway. Hands in pockets, he scans both ends until he sees me, then he hurries toward me.

  “I thought you changed your mind,” he says.

  “I considered it,” I admit.

  “Caroline really is just my sister’s friend.”

  “Has she always been?” Ugh, I hate that I ask. “Never mind, it’s none of my business.”

  “Do you mean have we slept together?”

  I nod. Don’t want to say the words out loud. Curiosity and cats and all that. The way he narrows it down to an act is telling.

  “Once,” he admits. “Big mistake.”

  “Do you do that a lot?”

  “Make mistakes?” He holds the front door open for me.

  “One night stands?” I pass him, so close that I catch a whiff of his cologne. Sugar and spice makes my mouth water.

  “Used to,” he says.

  Used to? Until when?

  “But not anymore.”

  “Me too,” I sputter. “One night stands R us, right here. So many one night stands you wouldn’t believe it.” Why am I rambling? Why can’t I shut up? “The amount of times I had one night stands in the back of my coupe; heck not even nights. Just like hours, during the day. So many.”

  He’s standing there with his lips pressed together, his brown eyes sparkling with amusement.

  I hold my hands out in front of me to indicate a large amount. Can’t seem to help myself. “So, so many.”

  “How many?” He walks toward me.

  “Um.” I have to concentrate. “In total?”

  “Yes.” He takes my elbow, guiding me through the house to the kitchen where a bottle of white is open on the counter. Beside which there are two wine glasses. Barclay is asleep, spread across the middle of the floor like a shag pile rug.

  “One.” I exhale, my shoulders dropping. “One slutty adventure in my car one time.”

  “But you dated?” He pours me a glass, holding it out for me to take.

  “Of course.” I swallow the light and sweetly fruity vintage. “In high school. A little in college, but I dropped out. Now who has time?”

  “I’m glad you don’t.” He rests his butt against the glossy white kitchen cabinets and bestows what must be his very best panty melting smile. “Otherwise how would I get to spend time with you?”

  It kind of works. I’m not sure my panties wouldn’t entirely dissolve, except for the fact... “About that.” I take another swallow, hide my words in the rim of the glass. I regret not giving the contract more thought right about now. “I just signed up for a dating show.”

  “What?” He frowns. “I don’t think I heard you correctly.”

  “I signed up for a dating show. Puppy Love. I’m not going to have time for anything between nannying and the show. That’s what I was trying to tell you earlier.”

  “You signed up for Puppy Love?” He gapes at me.

  “Yes. I sent back the contract this afternoon.”

  “The contract?” He walks toward me.

  “Are you okay? You’re repeating everything I say.”

  “Am I?�
� He’s close enough to touch now, near enough that with one more step, his scent could once again fog my brain and his breath flutter my hair. But he stops before any of those things can happen. His arm is fluid muscle as he rubs his hand over his mouth, and I consider asking if he’s ever been photographed for forearm porn, because they make me all gooey inside. Dropping his hand back to his side, he seems to shake off whatever has grabbed him. “Sorry. That was unexpected is all.”

  “What do you mean?” Is he weirded out by the idea that I would go on a dating show? Do I not seem like the kind of girl who would put her fate in the hands of some game?

  “I didn’t... I have to make a phone call.” He turns around abruptly, picking up his cell from where it rests beside the half empty bottle of wine. “A work thing. I forgot about it. I’m sorry.”

  “Sure.” I put down my still close to full glass. “Do you want me to go?”

  “Um.” He glances at his watch. Damn, those chiselled forearms must be worth their weight when it comes to the fairer sex. “I don’t know how long I’m going to be. It might take a while.”

  “I’ll just let myself out then,” I say. That’s probably for the best anyway. Is he uncomfortable that I’m doing the show, or that I’m talking about dating other people while we’re hanging out? Either way it’s odd that a man who clarifies his own encounters with women as an act would not make a move based on my dating situation. I would have thought it wouldn’t have mattered that much.

  “That would be great.”

  He’s almost out of the room, already tapping on the screen of his phone. With a shrug, I turn in the opposite direction, toward the front door. Really, what expectations did I have for tonight? That I might get to finish my wine? That he might have tried to seduce me?

  “Evie?” He calls out after me, and I pause. “I’m going to text you tomorrow, if that’s okay?”

  I nod my head, twice in sharp succession. I bet he says that to all the girls.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  MAX

  “What did you do, Dee?” I growl down the phone line. The front door claps shut behind Evie as she leaves before our evening could manage to start. “First Caroline, and now I find out you cast the woman for Puppy Love.”

  “Hello to you too, brother,” Deanna says snottily. “And yes, I cast the role.”

  “You were leaving that to me. The least you could have done is tell me about it. Instead I had to hear the news from...” I bite the inside of my cheek and glare at the wall, imagining it’s Deanna I’m looking at. “You did this on purpose.”

  “You promised to leave my neighbors alone.”

  “I haven’t done anything to your damn neighbors.”

  “No?” She says in a sugary sweet way. “I had Kelly send me the application forms since you were taking so long. And what do I find? One of my neighbors applied, and where are you now? At my house, probably sniffing around this desperate and dateless girl.”

  “Don’t talk about her like she’s pitiful, Dee. She’s not. I can’t believe you didn’t at least discuss this with me.”

  “Maxwell.” She sighs as though I’m a teenager again. A sound I haven’t heard since I actually was in my teens, and she was raising me. “I love you. You know that.”

  “I know, Dee.”

  “But you have a track record. A long, long, long track record of only being interested up to a point when it comes to pretty girls. And this one; I looked her up. She’s pretty. I can definitely see that. But she’s also my neighbor. As is her employer, Garrett Frost, and his brother Paynter, and their other brother, James. Can you see why I had no choice but to put her on the show and out of your way? At least I know you’ll behave where business is concerned because you won’t risk the company.”

  “Sometimes your mind works in devious ways, Dee.” I shake my head at how thoroughly outmanoeuvred I am, and sag into an armchair.

  “It’s for your own good,” she says. “Besides what am I really taking away from you? One measly night’s entertainment?”

  I’m not so sure one night and Evie belong in the same sentence.

  ***

  I check my watch for the twelfth time in ten minutes. Another five and I’m due to meet up with Evie for the first part of shooting. The interview. She doesn’t know that I’m going to be here, that I’m one of the people who put this damn program together. I was too shocked when she told me she’d taken the role to come clean. And texting her? I hadn’t had the guts to tell her why I’d reacted so badly to her announcement, because I don’t know that I could have kept things professional.

  “Almost time,” Kelly says, coming up behind me.

  “Is it?” I glance at my watch again before turning to my admin.

  “You seem out of sorts,” she says. “Is there anything I can get for you before we begin?”

  Unless you can somehow deliver me out of this mess, not really. “It’s nothing.”

  “Of course.” She nods as her attention moves to her iPad. “Okay, Miss Lane is here now. You’re supposed to meet with her. Go over a few details of what’s expected from her in this interview, and then it’s all up to the crew.”

  “I know that,” I snap.

  She lifts her gaze from the device, stares at me as though I’ve suddenly grown an extra head. I’ve never barked at her before, never been wound up so much over a girl I barely know before.

  “Sorry.” I roll my neck, try to loosen the knot forming in the middle of my shoulder blades.

  “Perhaps you would like me to step in for you?” she offers.

  “Yes,” I agree, ready to retreat so I don’t have to see Evie’s face when she realizes the reason I’ve gone silent is because finding her someone else to date is now my priority. “That would probably be for the best.”

  “I’ll handle it,” Kelly says as she marches down the hallway toward the room where the interview will take place. “It’s going to go off without a hitch.”

  Forty minutes later, I’m sitting in my office staring out the wall of windows behind my desk. It’s impossible to concentrate with Evie two floors below me. I pick up my phone, fiddle with it, put it down. What am I going to do? Text her? There’s no point when I can’t see her again. I pick it up again and scroll through the messages we shared like I have been doing these past couple of days. Can’t put my finger on it, but something about her makes it impossible for me to not want more time with her. I have to know who she is. I bounce out of my chair, unable to contain the urge to go to the interview. If I’m going to avoid her I need to leave the office.

  A short elevator ride later, I stride across the lobby and out into the frigid air. A walk will clear my head. I’ll grab a coffee or something. I’ll chat up some girl who will batt her eyelashes and wait for me to initiate something more. Perhaps this one with the holey white beanie and flowing blonde hair and hips that make her cute little ass bounce as she walks. “Evie?”

  She glances over her shoulder. Wide eyes blink, long dark lashes sweep the curve of her cheeks. “Max?”

  “Right.” I thrust my hands in the pockets of my overcoat. Her hair is blindingly shiny. I bet it would feel like silk in my fingers.

  “You didn’t text me.”

  “I wanted to,” I tell her. “Does that count for anything?”

  “I don’t know. Perhaps it shouldn’t. I just finished the interview for Puppy Love.” She turns to face me once we’re out of the drag of the crowd moving around us. “What are you doing here? Are you one of the guys? Oh, I’m not supposed to know that, am I?”

  “I wish,” I say. “No, my role at Puppy Love is different.”

  “Wait.” She gapes. “You actually work at Puppy Love?”

  “Well, yeah. Didn’t you know? You just asked—”

  “I was joking.” She bites her lip. “But you really do work in the building?”

  “I do.”

  “What do you do then?”

  Owner. Co-owner. CEO. “Dog walker.”

  She la
ughs and it’s like honey covered bubbles. “No, really? How did you pull that off?”

  “I’m friends with one of the higher ups.” Friend? Brother? Great now I’m lying to her. What is my plan here? Deanna will kill me for continuing to flirt with her, but I just don’t want to stop talking to her.

  “But dog walking. You don’t even like dogs.”

  “That’s not true. Beelzebarclay is more of an exception.” I grin.

  “Uh-huh.” She wiggles her eyebrows. “Not sure if I believe that.”

  “Think about how you met me,” I offer.

  “Chasing him around the park.”

  “See.” I thumb my chest. “Dog walker. I’m great at it.”

  “Okay.” She smiles and those pretty eyes light right up. “I guess you’re believable.”

  “Coffee?” I ask, offering her my arm.

  “Sure. I have a little time.” She places her hand in the crook of my elbow, and I want to cover it with my own, holding her there for as long as she’ll let me while we stroll down the street to my favorite coffee cart.

  “Are you still dogsitting Barclay?” Evie clasps her coffee between her gloved hands while we stand in the shelter of one of the buildings near the coffee cart.

  I nod. “Until my sister comes home from her travels.”

  “Oh, what does she do?”

  “Not a lot, actually,” I say. “She started this out-of-her-kitchen company while she was raising me that took on a life of its own and made her quite wealthy. Now she mostly travels and works from wherever she ends up.”

  “That must be nice.”

  “She enjoys it,” I agree, sipping my coffee that’s already starting to cool. “She deserves it. Put a lot of work in when she was younger.”

  “And looking after you. What happened to your parents?”

  “Plane crash. When I was eight.” It was so long ago, the emotions I feel when I think about them are muted now, the memories a little intangible.