Italian Escape with Her Fake Fiancé

by Sophie Pembroke

  Well. Maybe she could live with him keeping the jeans on just a little longer, Daisy decided as he lowered her onto the bed, one knee on the mattress beside her as he covered her body with his and kissed his way down her body.

  Just not too much longer.

  * * *

  Jay woke up the next morning to the strange sensation that he was being watched.

  He tensed under the covers, eyes still tightly closed, until his brain caught up with his intuition.

  Last night. The bar. Kissing Daisy against the door.

  Daisy.

  God, Daisy.

  His mouth curved into a smile at the memory. Sex with Daisy had been every single bit as amazing as his imagination had told him it could be. From the moment they first kissed for real, her spiky, keep-out persona had dropped away, showing him the passionate woman underneath. Oh, she was still smart-mouthed and sarcastic, keeping him laughing even as he kissed every inch of her body. But there was a softer side, too. One that wanted. One that let him give.

  And now she was watching him sleep. He loved that.

  Smiling, he opened his eyes to wish her good morning—and found himself eyeball to eyeball with a goat.

  Letting out a decidedly unmanly shriek, he jumped up to standing on the bed, a pillow clutched to his groin, as Genevieve chewed contently on the corner of the sheet.

  ‘What the...?’ Daisy swore sleepily, then sat up, brushing her dark hair out of her eyes. ‘Jay? Oh. Good morning, Genevieve.’

  ‘The builders fixed all the doors.’ Jay sat cautiously back down on the mattress. ‘How is she still even getting in?’

  Daisy shrugged, the sheet falling away from her deliciously bare shoulders with the movement. ‘Maybe she’s a magic goat.’

  He shot her a look, and she laughed.

  ‘Okay, what will you give me to get rid of her?’ she asked, wrapping the top sheet around her, toga style. It was too hot to sleep with any of the blankets—and they’d definitely kept each other warm the night before.

  Jay raised an eyebrow. ‘What would you like?’

  Tilting her head slightly, Daisy pursed her lips, considering. ‘Coffee.’

  ‘Just coffee?’

  ‘And pastries?’

  ‘That’s seriously all you want?’ Perhaps last night hadn’t been as good for her as it had for him, if she wasn’t already desperate for a repeat performance. If it wasn’t for the goat watching them, he’d definitely have been suggesting it by now.

  Daisy nodded. ‘Breakfast in bed. With you.’ Her grin turned wicked, and his heartbeat kicked up a notch. ‘After all, a girl needs sustenance to keep her stamina up.’

  Jay grabbed his jeans from the floor and pulled them on. ‘Deal. I’ll make breakfast, you handle the goat, and we’ll meet back here.’ He leant in to kiss her swiftly on the lips—a kiss that turned rather more lingering as Daisy grabbed the back of his head and held him to her. Not that he was complaining.

  ‘Breakfast,’ he repeated, a little dazed, when they finally parted. ‘Goat.’

  ‘Then sex,’ Daisy said, bouncing out of bed in her sheet toga. ‘Definitely more sex.’

  * * *

  It was just as well that Matteo and Lorenzo had fixed the windows and the shutters, Jay mused the following night as he lounged in the shuttered cocoon of Daisy’s bedroom. Their bedroom now, he supposed. He certainly hadn’t been back to his for longer than it took to pick up a fresh box of condoms from his case.

  ‘And what, exactly, made you think to pack those?’ Daisy had asked, eyebrows arched where she’d sat in bed, as he’d returned with them.

  ‘Nico put them in my case as a joke.’

  Daisy had shaken her head. ‘Knowing Nico, that was not a joke.’

  ‘You’re probably right.’ He’d crawled back up the bed, tugging on her ankle to bring her flat on her back under him, knowing that it wouldn’t take her long to kiss away his defences and flip them so she was on top. ‘And you definitely weren’t complaining when you found that strip of them in my jeans pockets after we made it back from the bar.’

  ‘True. But I’m pretty sure Nico didn’t put them there that night,’ she’d pointed out.

  Ah. Caught. ‘Maybe I was just very, very hopeful. Or wishing very hard.’

  ‘You’re saying I make your wishes come true?’

  He’d caught a bare nipple between his lips, and run his tongue around it, loving how she’d shivered under him. ‘You make all my fantasies come true,’ he’d murmured against her skin.

  They’d had better things to do than talk after that.

  In fact, after two whole days spent exclusively in bed with each other, they’d managed to not talk about anything of importance at all. Not what they were doing together, not the awards ceremony in Rome they had to leave for tomorrow, not the songs they were supposed to be writing...they’d just been lost in each other’s bodies.

  Not that he was complaining about that, either. But tomorrow morning there’d be a car, and a plane, then Rome, and other people. And at some point they really needed to talk about how this was going to work. Would they still be doing...this back in the real world?

  ‘You look like you’re thinking too hard,’ Daisy murmured beside him. ‘You should stop that. You might strain something.’

  ‘I’m more worried about you breaking me than a little bit of thinking.’

  ‘Worried you can’t take the pace, old man?’ Daisy’s naked body slid over his in the dark, her mouth moving across his collarbone with light, butterfly kisses in a way she knew drove him crazy. ‘Don’t worry. You just lie back and let me take care of you.’

  Then her kisses started to move lower, and Jay decided that maybe talking wasn’t that important. They could discuss everything on the plane.

  Right now, he just wanted to feel.

  * * *

  ‘Urgh, clothes.’ Daisy threw her favourite short black dress back into her suitcase on top of a few other essentials, along with a pair of biker boots, and called it good. Just getting dressed felt like a challenge that morning. Not that she’d admit it to Jay—especially after her old man jokes—but her whole body ached, in a pleasurable way, from the last few days.

  Nearly three days in bed with one man. She’d never done that before. Never wanted that before. And that was the part that made her nervous.

  The idea had been that they’d get it out of their system, break the stupid tension, then carry on with their lives. Instead, she’d fallen into the best sex of her life, lost two full days and three nights in a haze of lust, and now she had to put on actual clothes and get on a plane to Rome.

  Not ideal. Especially since they still hadn’t talked about any of it, beyond their tipsy reasoning in the bar.

  ‘The car’s here. Are you ready?’ Jay asked from outside the bedroom door, and she tensed. Which was ridiculous. She’d literally laid herself bare for the man for the last three days. What on earth did she have to be nervous about now?

  She took a breath and opened the door.

  It was weird to see him in clothes again, she realised. To see him dressed like Jay Barwell, lead singer of Dept 135, not the guy she’d been living in a crumbling villa with for the last week or so. The man she’d been kissing and touching and making love with for the last seventy-two hours. He’d worn her out so thoroughly she’d even slept through his snoring.

  Jay had also confessed, somewhere in the middle of all the sex, that some photo of them at the airport on their way out there had gone viral, and that, according to Kevin, the whole world knew they were off in some Italian love nest. Daisy was almost certain that Kevin had set up the photographer himself. And the worst part was, she couldn’t even reasonably object any more, since it was technically accurate.

  So now they were going back to the real world, where the public apparently believed they were a couple and
their friends knew that they weren’t, and she had no idea which one of those things was actually true.

  Which meant they were going to have to Talk. With a capital T. About emotions and expectations and stuff—and Daisy hated those talks.

  At least she already knew how this one would go. They’d agree that this was fun, and good, but they had to keep in mind that it was just for show. That he still loved Milli. That she didn’t do relationships and love and all that anyway. She had too many dreams to chase.

  As long as she still knew what it was that Jay wanted from her, she’d be okay. She just had to keep her eye on that. The transactional details of the affair, so to speak.

  And not deck Nico when he figured out what was going on and started teasing her.

  God, she really didn’t want to go to Rome.

  ‘I’m not sure we should leave Genevieve alone,’ she blurted out, earning herself an amused look from Jay.

  ‘Really? The goat is the best excuse you can come up with? I was expecting at least something about leaving Matteo and Lorenzo unattended working on the villa, or how you hadn’t paid them yet, or something.’

  ‘Yeah, that would have been a better excuse,’ Daisy admitted.

  ‘As it happens, I’ve already spoken with Matteo. He and Lorenzo will keep working while we’re away, and they have my number if any problems come up. I also insisted on transferring some money over for them for materials or what have you.’

  Daisy froze. ‘You shouldn’t have done that. I should have done that. It’s my villa.’

  But Jay just shrugged. ‘You can pay me back some time. It wasn’t much, Daze. Just a couple of thousand.’

  Pocket change to him, of course. But even now she knew, logically, she could afford it, Daisy’s heart started to race at the idea of owing anyone that money. She fumbled for her phone, trying to open her banking app. ‘I’ll pay you now.’

  ‘Save it for the plane, or we’re going to be late.’ He grabbed her suitcase and lifted it without obvious effort, but Daisy thought she saw a slight wince as he twisted, and realised she knew exactly which of last night’s amusements had caused that muscle strain. ‘Oh, and I asked Lorenzo to look after Genevieve, too,’ he added, seemingly as an afterthought.

  Daisy beamed. ‘Thank you!’

  ‘I knew you’d worry otherwise,’ Jay said, with a soft smile. ‘Now, come on, or we’ll miss our flight.’

  Maybe she was overthinking this. Maybe they could just carry on as before, now that all the sex was out of their system. Go back to being friends without ever having to discuss it.

  Her hand brushed against his as she tried to reclaim her suitcase, and sparks sizzled up her arm as her body reacted to his touch—instinctive, automatic, and undeniable.

  His gaze met hers and she knew he was feeling it too.

  She swallowed. Hard.

  ‘Car.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Now?’

  ‘Yeah.’ He stared a moment longer then shook his head. ‘Now. Come on.’

  * * *

  The car bumped back down the hill towards reality. Daisy kept to her side of the back seat, staring out of the window, remembering all too well that this was where it had started. It wasn’t that kiss onstage in Philadelphia that had kicked things off, not really. She’d been too certain that the kiss was just for show, so she’d been more annoyed than turned on.

  But that moment when she’d fallen into his arms in the car up to the villa, when it was just the two of them and an oblivious driver. That was the first time she’d truly looked at Jay Barwell and thought, Yes.

  Before that, she’d known he was gorgeous, but nothing more. After that...she’d had ideas.

  And now? Now she knew exactly how he felt against her, inside her, and she wasn’t likely to forget in a hurry. And given the sparks still between them, if they didn’t want to give the driver a free—and probably very distracting—show they needed to keep their distance.

  On the other side of the back seat, Jay appeared to be employing the same strategy, staring at his phone screen as if he cared what was on it and wasn’t imagining dragging her back to bed again. Good. At least he couldn’t distract her then. And he probably wouldn’t notice her sneaking looks at him...

  ‘Kevin sent me another email.’

  Oh. Maybe he really was thinking of other things.

  ‘What does it say?’ Maybe the awards ceremony had been cancelled and they could go home.

  Wait. Home?

  Before she had a chance to analyse that thought further, Jay answered.

  ‘Apparently there’s a special live link-up planned from LA for the award I’m presenting, and Kevin wanted to give me a heads-up.’

  Daisy frowned. ‘Why would you care about that?’

  ‘Because Milli is doing it, and they want me to do some scripted banter with her. Apparently we were both booked before we broke up, and now she’s decided not to come to Italy but still needs to honour the contract, so...’

  ‘Oh.’ All the passion drained away from her as she realised how firmly back in the real world they were already. The world where Jay Barwell loved Milli Masters, and where she was just a fake distraction for the press.

  At least she knew where she stood, and without even having to have that messy emotions conversation. That was a good thing.

  Besides, it wasn’t as if Jay’s prowess in the bedroom had made her fall in love with him or anything. He was a good friend and a great lay and a fun fake almost-fiancé. That was all.

  She forced a smile as the cogs in her brain started turning. ‘Then that means she’ll be watching tonight. We should put on a show for her.’

  Jay raised an eyebrow at her. ‘A show?’

  ‘Sure. I mean, we’re going tonight as a couple, right? A fake couple, I mean,’ she added hurriedly, in case he got the wrong idea. ‘So we act up to it a bit. Should be even easier now—’ She broke off.

  ‘Now we’ve spent significant time together naked?’ Jay finished for her.

  ‘Basically, yeah.’ If she was going to be his fake girlfriend, she was going to be the best one he ever had.

  Jay looked out of the window for a long moment, before turning back to her. ‘Okay. Say we were going to do that. What would it entail?’

  Daisy grinned. Acting, that was all this was. Performing. And she’d been doing that for most of her life. As long as she didn’t let messy emotions get involved, this should be easy.

  ‘Well, for starters, I’m going to need a ring.’

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  JAY THREW HIS stuff onto the king-size bed of the hotel suite, then fell onto the mattress next to it, face first. He was exhausted. Never mind that his poor body had seen more exercise in the last three days than ever before—that, he could have coped with. Celebrated, even.

  It was trawling around the jewellery shops of Rome that had finished him off.

  He could hear Daisy pottering around the other bedroom of the suite, probably getting ready for the awards show. They should have had hours at the hotel to prepare, but their detour en route from the airport to procure her an engagement ring had taken much longer than he’d expected.

  ‘It doesn’t have to be a real diamond or anything, but it does have to be big,’ Daisy had said as they’d trawled the racks at the first jeweller’s their incredibly patient driver had taken them to. ‘We need to make sure it shows up on the cameras from the first moment we step out of the car. We want people talking about it before the awards show even starts.’

  ‘And then we just smile coyly and look adoringly at each other, right?’ He knew how this was played. He’d just never actually done it before—with Milli, he’d been so besotted he hadn’t needed to act at all. But now, with the benefit of hindsight, he could see all her actions and behaviours for the performance they were.

  ‘Could
do.’ Daisy had looked thoughtfully at the tray of rings in front of her. ‘Or we could just play to our strengths. Coy has never particularly been one of mine.’

  ‘Dare I ask what our strengths are?’

  The look she’d given him had scorched him to the bone. ‘If I need to tell you, then you really haven’t been paying attention the last few days.’

  Of course, after that he hadn’t really been thinking about rings.

  He had, thankfully, noticed the photographer trawling around behind them after the first couple of shops. He’d suspected the driver had tipped someone off. Probably Kevin, who’d tipped off the paparazzi. Perfect.

  ‘Think it better had be a real diamond,’ he’d murmured to Daisy as they’d leaned over the latest tray of jewels. ‘We’re being watched.’

  She’d casually glanced over to where he’d indicated, then turned back to the shopkeeper. With one hand possessively placed on Jay’s back, she’d pointed to the largest—and most expensive—ring in the tray. ‘Let’s try that one.’

  Of course, it couldn’t be quite that easy. They needed a ring that was the right size for her to wear to the awards ceremony that night, plus Jay suspected that Daisy had been enjoying leading the photographer a merry dance around Rome, so it had taken another three jewellery shops to find the perfect ring.

  Well, perfect for the ruse, anyway. To Jay’s mind it hung too big and heavy on Daisy’s delicate fingers, clashing with her natural style. It was too sharp, too sparkly, too overwhelming to suit Daisy.

  But he had to admit, it would definitely show up on the cameras tonight.