My Fake Forbidden Boyfriend (Heartbreakers Book 1)

by Lindsey Hart

  Rin’s lips part. Disbelief skitters over her face. “Seriously?”

  “I’m serious if you are. I happen to know a decent pizza place a few miles down the road. It’s not very good because they suck at grilling their pineapple properly, and their basil tastes like licking someone’s armpit, so I never get it, but it’s passable. I’d take one for the team if you wanted to give it a try.”

  Rin doesn’t hesitate. She nods. She nods so hard her ponytail does that crazy whipping thing again. “I’d like that.” She slowly unfurls her hand from her side. Her dainty, perfect, marvelous hand. She’s painfully shy, but it’s adorable. There’s trust there in her eyes. Hope too. It’s all wrapped up together, this crazy wonderful package that is somehow standing right in front of me.

  And I’m the lucky one who gets to take this crazy, wonderful woman out.

  I reach up and take her hand, entwining our fingers together. I squeeze gently. “One sub-par pizza coming right up.”

  Rin’s eyes sparkle. Her smile is more potent than a thousand LA suns. “I’m sure I’ll never enjoy anything more.”

  “Oh, and Rin?” She studies me, her eyes burning into me the same way they always have. “Just because I said feelings make things messy doesn’t mean I don’t like messy. I think messy might be alright, as long as it’s with you.”

  EPILOGUE

  Rin

  I can finally say, for the first time in my life, that I’m happy.

  It’s been a year. Fourteen months to be exact. Fourteen. Incredible. Amazing. Months. A year where Aiden sold his house, and I sold my condo. A year where I gave up the reins of my mother’s company. A year where I said goodbye to my two best friends in the world. A year where we both confessed to everyone who loved us that we might be crazy, but we needed to do this. A year of tears, laughter, joy, bumps in the road, more tears, but way more laughter. It’s been a year of discovery.

  We decided on a city that neither of us had any connection with. Denver. Not only is it beautiful, but it also has an abundance of rustic cabins. Aiden wasn’t kidding when he said he wanted to make a change. We settled on one that has running water and indoor plumbing because I wasn’t quite ready for that level of rustic.

  Aria and Cassie both told me I was crazy but that they loved the shit out of me anyway. I know it’s not normal, selling your house a month after you meet a guy and buying something else. With him. I know. I’m pretty sure the entire world thought I’d lost it. The tabloids did indeed have a heyday, but that’s okay. I wasn’t around to read them. Neither was Aiden.

  We were too busy being happy in our log cabin.

  Okay, there might have been a few fights along the way. The growing pains of getting to know another person, of living with another person, of opening up your life and heart and allowing someone else in.

  But I wouldn’t change it.

  I wouldn’t change all the livid voice messages my mom left on my phone before I finally threw it in the lake in front of our cabin and got a new, unlisted one. I wouldn’t change it for all the fancy dresses I’ll never design. I wouldn’t change a single thing. We might have moved too fast. We might have moved way too fast. We might have been crazy. We might still be crazy.

  Honestly, though…that’s okay with us. With Aiden, it always felt right. Even if no one else gets that, we get it. We’re still learning. We still have our good days and our bad ones. We still have our arguments and our growing pains. Most of all, we still love the heck out of each other.

  “Aiden!” I exclaim in mock annoyance as I brush the love of my life away from me. I’m standing at the counter, textbook open, trying to cram for my final coming up.

  “You’re giving the textbook an awful lot of attention. A man could get jealous,” he complains, good-natured as ever.

  I roll my eyes. “Let me study. I can taste your horrible pizza another time.”

  Aiden’s hand freezes on the can opener. He stares at me in mock horror. He’s currently working to open a can of pineapple to put on the pizza he made for dinner. He’s actually a pretty good cook. I might have even learned to like pineapple. A little.

  “Horrible? My pizza? Never! At least my mom is coming in a couple of days. She can vouch for the fact that it’s not terrible at all.”

  We arranged his mom’s visit around my finals. She’s coming in a few days, right after my exam. I’m excited that this is my last one. Going back to school has been an amazing experience, but it’s also been pretty damn hard. I don’t remember exams and papers being this stressful the first time around, but maybe I’ve just forgotten.

  “I’m sure she will. And I’m sure she’s going to love the place.”

  Aiden lets out a breath. “I hope so. I think she’s the only person who didn’t have something to say about me leaving LA and moving in with some unknown woman.”

  “Hey! I’m hardly unknown! I met your mom before you even sold your house in LA.”

  “You did. And she loved you instantly.”

  I sink my teeth into my bottom lip and straighten, leaving the textbook for now. The truth is, Aiden’s mom is the best. She’s not the typical crazy mother in law—even though we’re not married—who judges me harshly or holds me to some impossibly high standard just because I’m dating her son. She accepted me right from the time I stepped through her front door. She hugged me like she’d known me for a lifetime. It meant a lot. More than I could ever say.

  Aiden gets it. He’s always got me. I would have laughed if people talked about soulmates before, but I really feel like he is. Or at least life mates or heart mates. We fit. Aiden would say we go together like how barbeque sauce compliments pineapple pizza.

  “We’ll get a test ride with your mom. Cassie and Aria won’t be so easy.”

  Aiden groans. “I’d ask you to marry me, but I’m afraid of them finding out when they get here. They already think this whole thing is nuts.”

  “They’ve made their peace with it,” I say automatically. “They were just worried about me. It doesn’t mean they weren’t behind me a hundred percent. They definitely wanted me to be happy. Wait—what?” My voice becomes screechy at the end. “Marry me?”

  “I know it’s only been a little over a year since we bought the house and moved in together, but so many people waste so much time on what they think they should be doing. We just got right down to it. We didn’t need three years of bullshitting each other before we figured we were mature enough to give shared living accommodations a try. It was like that with everything. I knew I wanted you. I was incredibly blessed, and you decided you wanted me too. We cut all the other bullshit out. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I am madly in love with you. I’d be beyond honored if you’d be my wife because I know I don’t even half deserve you. If you’re not ready for that, though…” He trails off as he produces a small black box out of his back pocket. I freeze. My mouth goes completely dry. My hands start to shake. “If you’re not ready, though, that’s alright. If you’re never ready, that’s okay too. I can put this box in my sock drawer, and we can forget about it until you want to remember.”

  “You—you really want to get engaged?”

  “I want you. That’s it, Rin. I just want you. Always. Forever. I don’t need a ring to make it official or to tell you I love you. To tell you that you’re the best part of my everything. My life. My day. My minutes and my seconds. You don’t need to wear my ring to be perfect because you’re already so far beyond that. I just thought I’d put the offer on the table. And leave it there. It can stay there for years if it needs to.”

  My eyes fill up with tears, and I’m moving before I even realize I’m doing it. I fling my arms around Aiden’s neck and let the tears flow. “Oh, Aiden, you’re crazy. The best kind of crazy!”

  “Of course it’s the best,” he whispers against my hair as his arms envelop me. “I’m your crazy.”

  “I—I guess we could always get engaged. Have a really long engagement. Or a really short one. Whatev
er we decide. I’m open to it. I’m open to it just like you’re open to traveling the world with me when I’m done with school. To tell all the stories I wanted to tell. And to make our own.”

  “Our story is already the best one I’ve ever heard. However you want to write it, I’m down.”

  “I’m down too,” I breathe past the ball of tears clogging my throat. “Yes, I’ll marry you. Whenever, wherever, and however we decide. I’m really excited that I get to spend the rest of my life trying to convince you that pineapple really doesn’t belong on pizza.”

  Aiden laughs. He laughs so hard his shoulders shake. Pulling back, I laugh with him until we both sober up, and he kisses me with all of the blistering heat mingled up with his signature tenderness, which I’ve come to know so well.

  “And I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to convince you it does.”

  “Sounds like a deal,” I breathe against his lips. “Better practice your cardio because you’re going to need all those long-winded speeches.”

  “I promise to give you said speeches, even if pineapple is my last word.”

  I take his face in mine and kiss him right back. A promise. My promise. With all the happiness in the world. It took me a while to get here, but eventually, I got my head on straight and did a few things for myself. A few things that changed my whole world. And now? I’m pretty dang happy with my life.

  Pineapple and all.

  The End

  Thank you for reading.

  Hope you enjoyed the book. You can leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads to let us know what you thought about it. All reviews good or bad are most welcome.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Lindsey Hart specializes in sweet to extra hot and dirty romances and strongly believes in happily ever after. If you are looking for a page turner, then you are in for a wild and naughty ride with feisty heroines and alpha male heroes.

  Check out all her books on Amazon:

  https://www.amazon.com/Lindsey-Hart/e/B077PZPNF6/

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  ALPHALICIOUS BILLIONAIRES

  The Box Set Volume 1

  Books 1 - 4

  Available in Kindle HERE

  Cozy up with this Box Set full of delicious Cocky Alphas who will settle for nothing less than the girl they want… though they might have to struggle a little bit… Ok, scratch that… they will have to up their game BIG TIME if they want to seduce their sassy confident leading ladies.

  Married by Mistake

  What do you do when you wake up in bed next to an Adonis god with a wedding band on your finger and no recollections of the night before?

  Well, you sure as hell do not agree to stay married to the Greek God and be his wife!

  I mean what if he had a crooked dick or something. There was bound to be a catch, right?

  Faking It

  A stranger agreed to be my one-day boyfriend.

  And really, I was not prepared for him to charm the pants right off my parents…

  Well, unfortunately for him, my pants are not going anywhere soon, thank you very much.

  It’s a one day arrangement only and that’s it.

  Nothing more!

  Baby Mistake

  We are sworn enemies but she's having my baby.

  How you ask?

  Well, I’m also wondering the same thing.

  How the hell do people in that stupid fertility clinic mistake MY sp*rm and inject it into the wrong woman…

  The same woman I fired just the day before for running her mouth off at me.

  Seducing My Best Friend

  Never get so drunk that you end up posting on social media that you want your best friend to marry you.

  You might get kidnapped and flown away in a private jet to get hitched to said best friend.

  The best friend who took your V-card in college and promised to marry you if you were still single in ten years...

  The best friend who made you come so Unicorntastically that it ruined you for all other men…

  The best friend you did not talk to in ten years and is now a big a$$ billionaire…

  EACH BOOK IN THIS BOX SET IS A FULL-LENGTH STEAMY STANDALONE ROMANTIC COMEDY WITH AN HEA THAT WILL LEAVE YOU WANTING FOR MORE. CHECK IT OUT IF YOU LOVE HOT NAUGHTY BILLIONAIRE BAD BOYS.