Chapter 6
CHAPTER SIX
Ben
N o hope of ignoring the incoming messages.
@WhitGranthamOfficial: Are you around today to meet?
@TheRealBenHolder: Meet? Are you passing me secret information?
@WhitGranthamOfficial: Ha ha. No. I need to talk to you about something.
@TheRealBenHolder: Sounds serious. I won’t be home ’til around seven tonight. I can be available then, or I’m around this weekend too.
@WhitGranthamOfficial: Tonight please. I’ll come to you. Send me your address.
And just like that, I was going to see Whit Grantham again.
In my house.
“Holder! Eyes up.”
Major Flint was in a mood , and though I shouldn’t have been looking at my phone, when it dawned on me that Whit had messaged, no way could I calmly flip the device over and ignore it until after this interminable meeting.
Yeah, no.
So I checked. And looky there, Ms. Grantham wants to talk. But what about? And why did she want to come to my house? Because she didn’t want me in her house, maybe? Had she gotten the impression I’d be one of those freaky people who stalked her or showed up at her house uninvited? My deeds hadn’t shown that, surely. But I could understand not having some man she hardly knew in her home. She’d probably had to learn to be cautious.
My attention returned to Flint, but my mind was traveling through the apartment—not horrible. I’d vacuumed recently because Thatcher had been over for a movie, and that meant popcorn. I’m not sure if the man had a hole in his lip or what, but when he left, there’d been a blast zone of crumbs surrounding where he’d sat. It was almost as bad as my two-year-old nephew. Guess I could thank him that his sloppiness had resulted in my being at least one step closer to having an appropriately clean house for Whit’s visit.
I grew up in a house of women. My mom stayed home, and my two older sisters treated me like the baby of the family, which I happily complied with, relishing being showered with their love and attention. They’d given me advice about women over the years, but I had yet to tell them about my interactions with Whit, particularly because my oldest sister Bridgette would freak out when she heard.
One happy side effect of growing up with women was the habit of keeping things clean. I’d been lectured within an inch of my life about putting the lid down, cleaning up “pot shots” as Bea, my middle sister, called them, and picking up after myself. Honestly, I was thankful I’d learned those habits early. Some of my buddies never had, and going into their houses was like walking into a gas station restroom—ultimately not a place you wanted to spend time.
“Have a good weekend, and we’ll see you all back here Monday. Don’t be idiots!”
Sergeant Major Trask called out his typical send-off, making eye contact with as many soldiers as possible with his usual ferocity, and the men and women of the Rambler Battalion fled the meeting room like it was five o’clock on a Friday. Because it was.
“What’s the deal, Holder? You got a hot date?” Thatcher Wild, in all his tall, dark, muscled glory, sauntered up to me and slapped me on the back.
As much as I wanted to tell Thatch about Whit, it didn’t seem right. We weren’t dating, and even though he was a good guy, rumors always begin somewhere. Keeping my mouth shut was the only way to guarantee nothing started up.
“No, just messaging my sister. She has a hot date.”
That was true. Bea had started using an online dating app, which just about killed me, even though I had plenty of friends who did the same.
“Beatrice? I can’t imagine her needing a dating app,” Thatcher said.
If it had been anyone else, I might have flown into protective brother mode and told him to stop imagining anything about my sister, but he was Thatch. And even though he didn’t think I knew, he was interested in our friend Bec Jones. There was no chance his statement had been meant in any way other than complimentary.
“You might not think, but she’s super shy. Always has been. Anyway, man, I’ve got to meet with Major Flint, and then I’m heading east. I’ll catch you sometime this weekend?” I waved while walking to Flint’s office.
The knock on the door came at five minutes after seven. Thank goodness I’d made it back early and had had a few minutes to tidy up. Most of the people Whit spent time with probably had nicer places than mine, but I wasn’t ashamed of my home. I chose to live in Nashville upon redeployment from Afghanistan—partly to have some distance from the base, and partly because it enabled me to drink and Uber home more cheaply.
It hadn’t been a great few months.
Once I got a grip, I figured out other benefits of living closer to the city, but for a while there, my motivation had been to get through work so I could get through the week so I could get through the weekend, all as numb as possible.
Enough about that.
I tossed a kitchen towel on the counter and shuffled to the door. The surreality of what was about to happen struck me then, and a twinge of nervousness crept between my shoulders. I pulled open the door, and with it came the sweet, distinctive scent of Whit Grantham.
And then came the sight of her.
She stood on my porch in sneakers, jeans, a plain light blue hooded sweatshirt, and a gray baseball cap on her head. When I stepped aside and gestured for her to come in, she moved past me quickly. Her hair had been pulled back through the cap into a ponytail. She removed her sunglasses as she entered the place, then tucked them and her keys into the front pocket of her sweatshirt .
“Did you find it okay?”
Now that she was here and taking in everything in the room with a sweep of her eyes, I wasn’t sure what to do exactly.
“Yes. No issues, thanks.” She turned to face me and pushed her hands further into that front pouch. “Could we sit and talk?”
“Of course. Can I get you some water?”
“Yes, please.”
She sat on the worn, brown leather couch that took up the majority of the living room while I walked to the kitchen and pulled out glasses, filled them, and returned to her. I set one down on the coffee table in front of her and took a drink of mine before setting it down, all while waiting for her to speak. She’d called the meeting, after all.
Finally, right when I was going to break the silence and ask why she was here, she pulled her phone out, swiped a finger to clear it of a notification, then looked up at me.
Her irritation calmed as she said, “Hi. It’s good to see you.”
“Oh. Yeah, it’s good to see you, too.”
I hadn’t been expecting that.
“Thank you for letting me come to you. I would have asked you to come to me, but I didn’t want you to feel uncomfortable. I have something to ask of you, but I want you to do something before I even ask. Can you do that?”
She smiled brightly, encouragingly, like you might at a child or a Golden Retriever you were willing to learn a trick.
“You’ll have to tell me what it is.”
“Of course.” She smiled down at her lap, then looked up at me. “I need you to promise me that you’ll answer honestly to what I’m about to ask you. I need you to promise me that you’ll tell me no if it’s asking too much, and that you won’t be offended I’m asking in the first place.”
The worry was clear on her face, her eyebrows pinching and her jaw flexing as she closed her mouth and waited for my response.
“That sounds ominous, I must say.”
“It’s not horrible.” She faltered then, her gaze flickering around the room, then back to me. “Not too horrible, anyway.”
“I think maybe you should just tell me what’s going on.” If she kept toeing around it, whatever it was, she’d drive me insane.
She was this tiny person, and she filled my entire apartment. I had no chance of being completely clear-headed with her near.
She took a steadying breath and released the air slowly on a count of five. I recognized the pacing of her exhale because I’d been taught the same method for calming down after a panic attack. Had she also dealt with them?
“I’m wondering if you’d be my boyfriend,” she said on a rush.
My back hit the cushion behind me. “Uh?—”
“Not really , though. Just… pretend to be,” she added quickly.
I watched her face, waiting for her to crack a smile or laugh or something , but nothing. She ran a hand over her hat and let it slide over the length of her ponytail. She was completely serious.
“Um…”
The blank space that filled my mind was somehow loud. Could she be serious? Had she somehow realized just how magnetic I found her and decided to taunt me? She couldn’t be that cruel .
“That sounds strange. I know. And I get it. You’re thinking this woman is crazy , or that I’m trying to trick you into actually dating me, or something else totally weird. But that’s not it. And I don’t know how to tell you this without it sounding like I’m using you, because that’s what this is—entirely and completely me using you to make me look better.”
Her cheeks flushed, but she didn’t turn away, didn’t curl into herself. She met my eyes head on, no faltering.
“I’m not sure how me dating you makes you look good.” It was all I could think to say, then took another drink of water as she explained.
“The drama with Jamie makes me look bad. I can’t tell you the deal there other than to say I did not, nor would I, cheat on him or anyone. I want to work for John Smith Johnson, who you met at the event last weekend. He is extremely picky about who he works with, and he’ll flat out deny anyone with a whiff of controversy on them. Obviously enough, I’m having issues convincing him and his team to work with me.” She pulled out her phone, cleared the screen, and shoved it back into her pocket.
“He won’t work with you because the press accused you of cheating on Jamie Morris? Wasn’t that months ago?” I sat back and ran a hand along the back of the couch.
“Right there shows me you have a perspective most people don’t. If the press says it happened, it might have happened. And the possibility, the potential of being a woman with a reputation , is all that Johnson needs to point to the fact that I’m not up to snuff.” She clenched her jaw, then sipped her water.
“You think that by fake-dating me, that’ll change?”
This was ludicrous. Why wouldn’t Johnson want to work with her? The idea that a rumor would keep her from working with anyone she wanted to was insane.
“Nikki seems to think so, and I can understand why she’d say it. You’re a soldier, which is one of the most respected jobs in the US. It’s very sympathetic. You’re very handsome, and you’ve got that all-American Southern boy thing going for you, but you’ve also got this angelic, sweet quality that keeps you from being too forbiddingly attractive.”
She tossed this out like her saying I was handsome wasn’t a highlight of my month.
My eyebrows rose, and a small laugh escaped my mouth.
Whit Grantham thinks I’m pretty!
I bit my bottom lip and pressed my mouth together to lock down the all-too-pleased smile that threatened to blast her. She didn’t seem to notice the pleasure coursing in my body, because she kept ticking away the reasons how fake-dating me would help her.
“Me with you would show I’m not jaded, that I’m not out of touch with normal people, as though that makes any sense. And having a steady relationship is always better than being single in terms of making women look good.” She watched me, squinting a bit. “What are you thinking?”
I gave her a grin. “I’m… I have a lot of thoughts. I’m not sure how to verbalize them.”
Good grief, right out of a therapy session .
She chuckled and shook her head. “I get it. This is more than a little odd.”
“It is. I guess my biggest question is, why not actually date someone?” With my arms crossed over my chest, I leaned back to watch her.
Her eyebrows flashed up and down before she responded. “Sounds nice. But I’m no good at it, for one, and I haven’t met anyone I wanted to date in a long time.”
“Well, I guess that answers that.”
She pulled out her phone once again, then angrily flew through the process of shutting it down.
“Do you need to make a call or something?” Whatever was going on with her phone seemed persistent.
“No. But listen, what do you think?” She sat up straight, angled to face me.
“I think… sure. I guess my gut response is, why not? But I suspect you’ve thought about this a whole lot more than I have.”
She nodded. “I have, and my team has. And it’s not without benefits for you. I want you to understand that. It’s going to be a big fat hassle dealing with the press, and essentially lying to your friends and family—because you cannot tell anyone the truth, and I’ll need you to sign some legal documents to that effect—but I have some bonuses.” She gave me a determined look.
What bonuses and incentives would I want from this woman? That train of thought was a dangerous one…
“Okay. Good to know…”
“So, for one, you’d probably come on tour with me in a few weeks, if you can swing that with your work. I know that’s not always possible, but Reese usually gets a few weeks at Christmas. He’s always traveling over Christmas.”
“True. We usually have block leave at Christmas. Since I had last year at home for it, I’m guessing my mom will survive my absence. I was going to go home at Thanksgiving, so maybe we can just celebrate early.”
“Think about that. Really think about it, okay? I don’t want you to say yes to this and then regret it. My biggest fear is doing something like this and having it come out as a negative for either of us, but especially you because you don’t have much to gain from this except a few fun events and some travel.”
“I’m sure I’ll?—”
“Listen. I want you to think about it tonight. If you can, I want you to come to the house tomorrow, and I’ll have the contract drawn up so you can see what you’d be signing. And we’ll go through all of the boundaries and rules or whatever—both mine and yours. And if any of it makes you uncomfortable or you feel like it’s a raw deal for you, we bag it. Does that sound okay to you?”
She’d stood, and so had I, so we were standing a foot apart. Since she was wearing sneakers, I got to appreciate how small she was, but even though I was staring down at her and she was looking up at me, she seemed larger than life.
“Sure. Okay. Give me directions to your place, and tell me what time. I’ll think it over, and we’ll figure it out tomorrow.” A dazed quality tinged my voice.
Standing up and facing her had sharpened the dream-like sensation of the last few minutes. If it were a dream, I’d probably lean down and steal a kiss, just to see if she tasted minty and sweet like she smelled. But this wasn’t a dream, and nothing about our interactions had told me she’d welcome the advance, never mind the fact that I couldn’t imagine actually making a move on Whit Grantham.
There was that, and the promise I’d made myself. I’d respect myself and women enough not to do the things I’d done when I first got back—when I did anything I could to block out the misery of Jones’ loss. Knowing I’d cut the drinking to virtually nothing and never for self-medicating, that I’d given up losing myself in women whose names I never knew—that helped the risk here feel less intense .
But even now, I could guess that just being in a room with Whit would test that promise to keep the physical element of a relationship out of the equation—at least that most intimate act—until I’d committed for life.
“Okay. Good.”
She moved to the door with keys in hand and pulled her hat lower over her eyes. “Make a list of questions. Make a list of things you’d want or wouldn’t want. Think about what would make this worth it to you, and just… think about everything. I’m sorry I have to go, but this is good. Think, and message me with questions if they come up, and we’ll talk tomorrow, yeah?”
“Sounds good.”