Chapter 18
WHEN SHE LOOKS AT YOU LIKE SHE’S ALREADY PLOTTING YOUR DEMISE AND YOU’RE WEIRDLY EXCITED ABOUT IT. #REDFLAGATTRACTION
AXEL
Was pranking Dakota a good idea or a bad idea?
Hopefully a good one.
Two nights ago, everything changed. The moment we learned about the danger, I caught something in Dakota’s eyes, just for a second. Terror, quickly buried under her usual confidence.
Yesterday only confirmed what I’d seen. We’d had another scripted public appearance as the happy couple, this time lunch at some trendy bistro.
Dakota played her part perfectly, smiling at all the right moments, but I knew her tells.
She was quieter than normal, picking at her salad instead of devouring it.
Every few minutes, her gaze would drift to the entrance or sweep across the other tables, those beautiful eyes just a little too watchful.
When our server appeared suddenly at her elbow with the check, her fingers tightened on her water glass.
Back home, where she should have relaxed, she still seemed on edge.
I noticed her checking her phone obsessively, standing by the window a beat too long.
When I accidentally bumped into her in the bathroom doorway while she was brushing her teeth, she flinched.
Just slightly, but enough for me to notice.
I’d been racking my brain all night trying to figure out how to make it better.
Talking about the danger would only make it worse, force her to acknowledge the fear she was working so hard to hide.
What Dakota needed was to laugh, to forget for a while, to feel normal again.
The only thing I could think to do was lighten her mood.
Maybe a prank would accomplish that? After all, the last time I’d seen her genuinely smile was when she’d pranked me with her public display of—let’s call it what it was—soft-core porn disguised as yoga.
I smirked, remembering those batting eyelashes as she pretended she didn’t know exactly what she was doing in that barely there tank and panties. If we’d just entered some sort of prank war, I doubted anything would ever top her using my libido as a weapon of mass destruction.
God, that ass. The way she’d bent over, giving me a perfect view of curves that had haunted my dreams for the past two nights. The memory alone was enough to make me shift uncomfortably in my chair.
Before Ryker had dropped the world’s coldest shower in our lap, I’d been imagining burying myself in—
Nope. Not going there again.
Point was, I had to give it to her. Dakota had a wicked sense of humor. At the prospect of losing her business and being forced into a fake engagement with someone she hated, she didn’t curl into a ball and cry like many people would.
In fact, she’d never even cried after Ryker warned us our lives might be in danger. Not once. Which was strong as hell.
Add that to the things I definitely shouldn’t admire about Dakota Blackwood.
Another shocking thing about the cold slap of fear from a possible danger was how it lowered my anger wall toward Dakota.
You know, the one that kept me so busy, mentally cataloging how right I was and how wrong she was for curating her perfect online image?
Yeah. Turns out, realizing my best friend’s little sister might be in danger made me hate what she did at least ten percent less.
Okay, maybe twenty.
In fact, Blake’s words from moving day had been echoing through my head ever since.
“We all put on masks sometimes. But Dakota’s not your mother. She’s not crafting some perfect facade to hide the fact that she’s falling apart. She’s building a brand, running a company. It’s performance, yeah, but it’s not the same kind of performance that killed your mom.”
And she was different, wasn’t she? In my time with Dakota, it was becoming clearer that she didn’t normally outright lie to people.
Not like this fake-engagement situation anyway.
And let’s remember, she wasn’t thrilled about that either.
Hell, she’d explicitly said she hated lying to her followers.
She wasn’t lying the way my mother had. Dakota was simply showing the best version of herself, the one she felt safe with showing, I guess.
But why did she think that’s all people would accept?
Ugh!
See? This kind of thought was exactly what I was avoiding today. I still loathed Dakota Blackwood. I did. So what if she was funny and sexy and apparently made of titanium? That didn’t change my feelings.
My animosity was still there, buried under all this … whatever this was. And I’d hold on to it like a life preserver—that was for damn sure.
She was just Knox’s sister. That was all. He wasn’t here to protect her, so it fell on me to watch out for my best friend’s little sister. As soon as this blew over, we’d go back to hating each other.
Wait. Go back to? Present tense, Pierce. Present tense.
I do not like Dakota Blackwood. I do not like her in a vest. I do not like her goddess-like chest.
I wasn’t going to slip into non-loathing territory just because we were in danger. Being in danger didn’t change the fundamental dynamics of our relationship.
So I wanted to make her a little less scared. So what? It was basic human decency. Contrary to popular opinion—specifically her opinion—I wasn’t a complete raging asshole.
Plus, she freaking deserved this prank, that evil little vixen. How dare she give me the blue balls from hell?
Dakota’s coffee maker gurgled to life, right on schedule. The thing was programmed to go off at the ass crack of dawn so the princess’s coffee was ready when she emerged from her beauty sleep. Because God help the person who had to deal with her before she’d had her caffeine fix.
If there was one thing I’d learned from sharing mornings with Dakota, it was that the woman was usually grumpier than a wet cat when she first woke up.
I suspected it was because she spent half the night working on her business, but whatever. She had her perfect coffee maker scheduled to brew the perfect blend, designed to suck that bad attitude right out of her and replace it with liquid humanity.
Next to her coffee maker sat her perfect little container of sugar, complete with a neat label because Dakota labeled everything.
The fun thing about sugar? It looks exactly like salt.
I slid the sugar container back into place, checking to make sure it didn’t look conspicuous. Then I moved on to the kitchen clocks: stove, microwave, and counter. I fast-forwarded all of them by exactly twenty-seven minutes.
Let’s see how Princess Punctual handles being “late.”
I settled into my usual seat at the table, scrolling through morning news on my phone, when the queen herself emerged at the exact same time she had yesterday. Down to the minute.
And, damn, she looked good. Her hair was tousled from sleep, falling in soft waves around her shoulders. No makeup, just smooth skin that practically glowed in the morning light streaming through the windows.
“Morning, Sunshine.”
When she glared at me, I couldn’t contain my smirk.
That was, until my traitorous eyes went on an unauthorized scouting mission all over her body.
They cataloged how her gray cotton shorts hugged her hips like they were painted on, how her tank top with no bra showcased her toned abs and the curve of her breasts.
The thin cotton did absolutely nothing to hide the fact that she was cold, her nipples clearly visible through the material.
“Stop staring at me,” she grumbled, padding to the cabinet to retrieve her mug.
And the way she said it, all husky and rough from sleep, sent heat shooting straight to my groin.
“Don’t flatter yourself.” But damn if the woman didn’t look hot in nothing but cotton and a bad attitude. Like some kind of sexy, grumpy goddess who’d just rolled out of bed.
The thought of her actually rolling out of my bed, all warm and sleepy and naked, hit me like an ice-bucket challenge. I shifted in my chair, grateful the table hid my body’s immediate and enthusiastic response to that particular mental image.
She reached for the cabinet where she kept her favorite mug. The one with the little cat on it. The one I’d moved to the top shelf this morning as part of my multi-pronged prank strategy.
“Where’s my …”
Her frustrated eyes narrowed at it, and then with a huff, she stretched up on her tiptoes, trying to reach the higher shelf. And as she did, two things became apparent:
First, her tank top rode up to reveal skin on her lower back that made me lose complete focus. I had to clear my throat to remind myself to pay attention. Second, it was clear I’d moved the mug too high for her to reach.
Like a whipped puppy, I found myself standing up.
“Here, let me.” I was up and behind her before I could think twice, my chest pressing against her back as I reached over her head for the mug. My other hand automatically settled on her hip.
The contact sent lava coursing through my body, and any doubt she felt it, too, was answered when she went completely still beneath my touch. Hell, we both stilled. To the point that I could feel the rise and fall of her breathing.
We were alone. No cameras, no audience, no reason to sell anything to anyone. But here I was, touching her like it was the most natural thing in the world.
The hand on her hip seemed to have developed a mind of its own, my thumb tracing small circles through the thin cotton. The movement was unconscious and instinctive, like I’d done it a thousand times before. Like some part of me had memorized the shape of her without my permission.
That thought stopped me cold, as if I’d stepped off a cliff I hadn’t seen coming.
I jerked back, nearly knocking over the mug as I set it down, putting distance between us before I could think too hard about how much I didn’t want to.
“There you go.”