Chapter Thirty-Four
Bella
New York
By the time Wednesday lunch rolled around, I should have been back in peak operational form. Meaning: efficient, armored, and focused entirely on the latest catastrophe my father had manufactured in Firebrook Valley.
Instead, I was walking around looking dazed because I’d woken up with Drew’s arm draped over my waist and a sense of quiet contentment that made me want to audit my own sanity.
Drew had started my day with a long, tender romp then kissed my forehead as if I were precious to him, made me breakfast, and headed back to Boston.
It was all so perfect. So surreal. I should have been panicking. Instead, I was replaying the way he’d kissed my forehead like it was a signature on a contract only he understood.
I need help.
Serious help.
Sloane was already seated at our favorite restaurant. Her wave when she spotted me was elegant, but her expression was warm.
Jax was dropping into her chair with a heavy thud after slinging her leather jacket over the back. I slid into my seat and immediately reached for the wine Sloane had already ordered.
“You look flustered,” Sloane observed, her eyes scanning me.
“Thank you?” I said, taking a healthy sip.
Jax narrowed her eyes. “Oh, hell. Something happened.”
“Nothing happened.”
Sloane’s mouth curved into that knowing smile. “You only use that tone when something significant has happened.”
Jax leaned in, her eyes sparkling. “You’re glowing, Bells.”
“I am not glowing. It’s the lighting.”
“Honey, it’s either sex or you’ve just left a high-end spa,” Jax said, tilting her head.
I choked on my Chardonnay. Sloane didn’t flinch; she took a slow, elegant sip of her own drink.
Jax pointed a finger at me. “It’s sex. Definitely sex.”
“It’s not—”
“Bella,” Sloane interrupted, her voice soft but firm. “Tell us.”
I looked at them both and realized I was outgunned. I set the glass down. “Okay. I’ll give you an update. But it’s an update, not a confession.”
Jax’s eyebrows shot into her hairline. “An update. Right.”
I gathered myself as if I were addressing a board of directors. “Drew Burke calls me every morning. Just a minute or two to check in. And,” I added, before they could interrupt, “he calls every night. Just to see how the day went.”
The silence that followed was heavy.
Jax leaned in, her voice dropping to a whisper. “Every. Night.”
“Yes. He’s consistent.”
“And why is that an issue?” Sloane asked.
“It’s not an issue, it’s just—”
“It’s the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard,” Jax cut in. “It’s practically disgusting.”
I glared at her. “It’s strategic. He sent flowers too. And root beer barrels.”
Jax’s eyes went wide. “He found a supplier for your weird candy? The man gave you a dealer?”
“He gave me the address of a local shop,” I corrected.
Jax fanned herself with the menu. “I’m overheated. Sloane, tell her she’s in trouble.”
Sloane stayed calm, her gaze steady. “Bella, why are you presenting this to us as if it’s a problem?”
Because Drew was behaving like a man who actually liked me. And I had no manual for that. “Because it’s fake,” I insisted. “It’s a strategy.”
Both of them froze. Sloane blinked slowly. “Fake.”
I was breaking my own rule, but dammit, I needed them to understand.
“Yes. We agreed. It’s a staged relationship to take the heat off Brady and Nora and force our fathers into a ceasefire.
” I gave them the condensed version of the Firebrook Valley punch, the law office trap, our truce as well as our plan.
When I finished, I reached for my wine again. Jax sat back, processing. Sloane looked like she was about to deliver a verdict that would ruin my life.
“So,” Sloane said slowly. “You’re pretending to be together so your fathers will stop acting like feral teenagers.”
“Exactly.”
“And you’re doing this for Brady and Nora?” Jax asked.
“Mostly. And to end the thirty-year war.”
Sloane leaned forward. “And how is the ‘staging’ going?”
I swallowed hard. Jax’s eyes lit up. “Oh, here it comes. The ‘something happened’ part.”
I exhaled a long, shaky breath. “I accidentally . . . slept with him again.”
Jax choked on her beer. Sloane paused her fork midair.
“Accidentally?” Jax asked, slamming a hand on the table. “Did you trip and land on him?”
“It wasn’t planned!”
Sloane’s voice was dangerously calm. “Bella. Did you kick him out at two a.m.?”
My chest tightened. I looked at my plate. “No. We were at my place.”
Jax whispered, “He stayed. Oh my god, he stayed for breakfast.”
“It was late!” I snapped, mortified.
“It was morning,” Jax countered, grinning like she’d won the lottery. “Bella Holliston, this is huge.”
Sloane’s tone softened, losing the sharp edge. “Bella . . . what are you doing?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted, my grip tightening on my fork.
“You do know,” Jax said. “This is good, right?”
Sloane snorted into her wine. I stared at them, horrified. “It’s not real.”
“Bella,” Sloane said, her voice soft and deadly. “He calls you twice a day. He sends gifts. He plans dates. He sleeps over. Those aren’t optics. That’s effort. Men don’t put that kind of energy into things they don’t care about.”
“And you’re having repeated, voluntary, enthusiastic intercourse with a man you claim isn’t your boyfriend,” Jax added gleefully.
Heat rushed to my face and lower as I remembered exactly how enthusiastic that intercourse had been.
Drew’s low groan when I’d clenched around him.
The way he’d held me afterward like I might vanish if he let go.
I pressed my thighs together under the table.
Traitorous body. “Stop saying it like that.”
“We can call it what it is,” Sloane said elegantly. “You’re falling.”
“I’m not falling.”
Jax’s grin turned feral. “You’re sprinting. You’re at a full Olympic gallop.”
I glared at them both. “You’re enjoying this way too much.”
My face was on fire. I could feel it. I, Bella Holliston, was blushing in a public restaurant because my friends were right and my body was a traitor.
“So, what are the rules now?” Sloane asked.
“The rules are the same,” I snapped. “It’s temporary.”
“Then why does he keep calling?”
I had no answer.
Jax leaned closer. “Okay, here are your options. One: Do the mature thing. Ask him on a real date and tell him how you feel. Or Two: Keep calling it fake and keep the phenomenal sex.”
Sloane actually laughed. “Honestly, both sound like a win.”
I looked at them, feeling my walls crumble. “You’re both horrible.”
“We’re relieved,” Sloane said, her voice dropping into a register of pure sincerity. “I’m glad someone is finally taking care of you, Bella.”
The words hit me so hard my throat closed up. A least with my family, I wasn’t used to being the one cared for. I was the caretaker. The fixer. The shield.
Jax raised her beer. “To Bella Holliston, falling for the one man she swore she’d never touch.”
“I’m not falling,” I whispered.
Sloane clinked her glass against Jax’s. “To breaking all those rules.”
Jax winked at me. “And then inviting us to the wedding.”
I groaned, but a small, terrified laugh escaped me. Because the truth was sitting right there on the table between us, as undeniable as the wine in my glass: I was breaking all the rules.
For someone who always had a plan for what to do next, I was now flying by the seat of my pants—plan-free.
And not hating it.