Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
brOOKS
The problem with the cottage isn't the square footage. It isn't the lack of an actual separate bedroom. It isn't even the pillow wall that Ivy reconstructs every night with the dedication of a civil engineer.
The problem is the rain.
A summer squall has rolled in off the Atlantic, hammering the roof with a relentless, rhythmic drumming that effectively traps us inside. The beach is a wash. The main house is a no-go zone because my mother is currently auditing the household staff.
So, we are trapped.
It is 9:00 PM. We are three glasses of Pinot Noir deep into "Operation Backstory."
Ivy is sitting on the plush Persian rug in front of the stone fireplace. She has kicked off her shoes, those terrifyingly high wedges she wears like combat boots, and is curled up in a pair of grey joggers and a tank top. She has a notebook balanced on her knees and a pen tucked behind her ear.
She looks soft. Accessible.
It's a dangerous look.
I am sitting on the sofa above her, ostensibly supervising, but mostly watching the firelight play off the curve of her neck.
"Okay, focus," I say, leaning forward to refill her glass. "The reporter from Hamptons Magazine is coming at 10 AM. Her name is Tabitha. She smells fear and cheap cologne. We need a narrative."
Ivy sighs, taking a sip of wine. "It's a simple question, Brooks. 'How did you meet?' Why can't we say we met at a coffee shop? It's classic. Low stakes. We reached for the same oat milk latte, our hands touched, sparks flew."
"Too cliché," I counter. "And I don't drink oat milk lattes. I drink black coffee. If we say coffee shop, Tabitha will ask which one. You'll panic and say 'Starbucks,' and my mother will read the article and have an aneurysm. Taylor men do not meet their wives at franchise establishments."
"Fine," Ivy says, rolling her eyes. "Then we met at a gallery opening. Very high-brow. We bonded over our mutual hatred of abstract expressionism. You made a snarky comment about a red dot on a white canvas, and I laughed."
"Better," I muse, swirling my wine. "But it lacks... passion. It sounds cold. Transactional."
Ivy looks up at me. "Brooks, we are cold. We are a transaction."
"The magazine's readers don't know that," I remind her. "We need a hook. Something visceral. Something that explains why a man known for calculated risks chose this one."
Ivy looks at me, her eyes dancing with wine and mischief. She taps the pen against her lips.
"We could tell the truth," she suggests. "We met when I assaulted you at a wedding, knocking you unconscious into a piece of garden statuary. When you woke up, you blackmailed me into servitude. It was love at first felony."
I laugh. It's a real laugh, one that rumbles in my chest. It's becoming a habit, laughing with her. It's a bad habit.
"Headlines," I say, sketching a box in the air. "'Love Hurts: How a Concussion Led to Diamonds.'"
"Absolutely not," Ivy says. "That sounds litigious."
She flips a page in the notebook, thinking.
"Okay," she says. "Serious version. We need a story that survives daylight."
I nod. "One that doesn't rely on the tackle."
"Correct." She taps the pen. "So here's the framework. We met through Mark and Laurie while they were planning the wedding. Professionally. Over months. That part is believable."
"It holds," I say.
"The wedding is when people noticed," she continues. "Not when it started."
"Important distinction."
"And if anyone insists on a moment," she says, "we give them one. Something quiet. Public. Unremarkable enough to be believed."
I lean back. "Laurie's bridal shower."
She glances up at me. "That works."
"It does," I say. "Set it."
Ivy closes her eyes, not to remember, but to assemble. When she opens them, she isn't looking at the notebook. She's looking at the fire.
"You were bored," she begins.
Her voice drops a register, becoming smoother. Storyteller mode. "It was three months before the wedding. The bar was crowded. You were standing in the corner, away from the toasts, checking your emails. You looked grumpy."
"I am rarely grumpy," I protest. "I am focused."
"You were scowling at an iPhone," she corrects. "You looked... separate. Like you were in the room, but not part of it. You were wearing a grey suit."
"Navy," I correct automatically. "I wore navy to the shower."
Ivy looks at me. Her gaze drops to my chest, then back up. "Grey," she insists. "Charcoal grey. With a blue tie. I remember."
I blink. I was wearing charcoal grey. I'd forgotten. But she remembered.
The suit color has no strategic value. It doesn't help her play the fiancée or impress my mother. She noticed it the way people notice things about someone they're actually paying attention to—not for the performance, but for the person underneath.
"Go on," I say quietly.
"I was behind the bar," she continues. "The florist had messed up the arrangements, peonies instead of ranunculus, and I was trying to fix a centerpiece before the bride noticed. I was muttering to myself. You looked up from your phone and asked if I was talking to the flowers."
"And what did you say?"
"I said, 'Someone has to encourage them, they're wilting under your negativity.'"
I smile. "That sounds exactly like something you'd say."
"And then you laughed," Ivy says. She shifts, turning her body toward me. "You put your phone away. You realized you were tired of looking at screens. You asked me if I wanted a drink. I told you I was working. You told me the bride wasn't looking."
She pauses. The rain drums harder against the roof, sealing us in.
"We sat on the patio," she says softly. "We missed the speeches. We talked for three hours. We talked about... everything."
I lean forward, resting my elbows on my knees. The wine has made everything feel hazy, warm.
"What did we talk about, Ivy?"
She holds my gaze. The firelight reflects in her eyes, turning them into pools of liquid amber.
"We talked about how tired we were," she whispers.
"Not sleepy-tired. Soul-tired. We talked about the pressure of always being the person who fixes things.
You with your family, me with my clients.
We talked about how lonely it is to be the one holding the ceiling up, so it doesn't crash down on everyone else. "
My chest tightens. It's a physical sensation, a squeezing of the heart muscle.
"We realized," Ivy finishes, "that we were the same."
She stops.
Silence stretches between us, weighted and pregnant with things unsaid.
It is a good story. It is perfect. It hits every demographic beat, the chance meeting, the vulnerability, the shared burden of competence. Tabitha from Hamptons Magazine is going to eat it up with a spoon.
The problem is, it doesn't feel like a lie.
It feels like a memory I wish I had.
"That's good," I say. My voice sounds rough to my own ears. "That works."
"Yeah," Ivy says. She looks down at her notebook, aggressively circling a word. "It's believable."
"Ivy."
She looks up.
"Quick fire," I say. "If we talked for three hours, I need to know the details. Tabitha will ask. What's your favorite color?"
"Emerald green," she says instantly. "Like the dress. Yours?" She studies me. "I'm guessing navy blue. It's reliable. Traditional. But secretly? I bet it's something weird. Like... orange."
I blink. "It is orange. How did you know that?"
"Because you have an orange Hermes notebook on your desk, and you ordered the sweet potato fries at Marvin's just to look at the color. You like vibrancy, Brooks. You just hide it."
I stare at her. She sees too much. It's unnerving. It's intoxicating.
"Favorite food?" I ask.
"Cheeseburgers. Obviously."
"Same. Favorite movie?"
"The Princess Bride," she says. "And before you judge me, it's a cinematic masterpiece. It has fencing, fighting, torture, revenge, giants, monsters, chases, escapes, true love, and miracles."
"I'm not judging," I say. "Mine is Casablanca."
She smiles, a soft, quiet thing. "Of course it is. The cynic who runs a bar in the middle of a war zone, pretending he doesn't care, until the right woman walks in and proves he's the biggest romantic in the room."
"I'm not a romantic," I protest. "I'm a pragmatist. Rick Blaine was a businessman."
"Rick Blaine gave up the girl to save the world," she counters. "That's not business. That's martyrdom."
"Maybe he just realized she was a liability," I say, testing her.
"Maybe," Ivy whispers. "Or maybe he realized she deserved better than a man who lived in a casino."
The air in the room shifts. The playful banter evaporates, replaced by a tension that hums in the air like a live wire.
I slide off the sofa.
I don't make a conscious decision to do it. Gravity just seems to pull me down. I sit on the floor next to her, abandoning the safety of the high ground.
We are close now. Too close.
I can smell her properly from here. Not just the expensive shampoo provided by the house staff, but her. Vanilla. Rain. Warm skin.
She doesn't pull away. She watches me, her breath hitching slightly.
"You pay attention," I say softly. "To the notebook. To the fries. To the suit."
"It's my job," she whispers. "Details matter."
"Do they?" I ask.
I reach out. My hand moves on its own, bypassing the logic center of my brain. I tuck a loose strand of dark hair behind her ear. My fingers brush the sensitive skin of her jawline.
She shivers. The shiver ripples through her.
"Is this just the job, Ivy?" I ask, my voice low. "Because you're very good at it. You're terrifyingly good at it."
She leans into my touch. A fraction of an inch. But it's enough to send a shockwave through my system.
"I don't know," she breathes. Her eyes drop to my mouth, then back up to my eyes. They are wide, dilated. "The lines are getting blurry, Brooks. I don't know what's the script and what's... us."
"Clause 4," I remind her. It's a weak defense. A crumbling wall. "No touching without an audience."
"There's no audience," she says.
She challenges me. She always challenges me. From the moment she tackled me in that garden, she has been the only person in my life who refuses to let me stay safe.
"No," I agree. "No audience."
I lean in.
The pull is magnetic. It's inevitable. I want to kiss her. I want to taste the wine on her lips. I want to pull her into my lap and ruin the carefully constructed boundaries of this contract. I want to take the "fake" out of "fake fiancée" and see what happens when things get real.
Her eyelids flutter shut. Her lips part slightly.
I am an inch away. Her breath is warm on my face.
Bzzzzzt.
The sound is loud. Jarring. Violent.
My phone, sitting on the coffee table behind me, vibrates against the wood like an angry hornet.
Bzzzzzt. Bzzzzzt.
Ivy jerks back. Her eyes snap open, filled with sudden, stark clarity.
I pull my hand away from her face as if I've been burned.
I turn and grab the phone. The screen lights up the dim room.
Assistant
Early morning video call with Tokyo partners. 6 AM. Review the Holloway diligence files.
I stare at the screen. The time glows back at me: 1:47 AM. Numbers. Clean. Logical. Numbers don't kiss you back, but they don't break your heart either.
Tokyo. The board. The deal.
The reality of my life crashes back in, washing away the fire and the scent of her.
I am Brooks Taylor. I have a plan. I have a deadline. I have a name to protect.
And Ivy Sullivan is a liability. She is a distraction. A beautiful, brilliant, intoxicating distraction who is here for eight weeks and not a second longer.
If I kiss her, I complicate everything. If I kiss her, I give her leverage. If I kiss her, I might not want to let her go when Labor Day comes, and I cannot afford that kind of weakness.
I stand up.
It takes every ounce of willpower I possess. My legs feel like concrete. My chest aches.
I look down at her. She is flushed, disheveled, clutching her wine glass like a shield. She looks hurt.
Good. Hurt is safe. Hurt keeps the distance.
"We have the story," I say. My voice is tight, clipped. Professional. "Rehearsal dinner. Grey suit. Shared ambition. It works."
Ivy blinks. I watch the vulnerability in her eyes harden into something cooler. She puts the mask back on.
"Right," she says, her voice flat. She scrambles to her feet, grabbing her notebook. "We're good. I should... I'm going to go to bed. I have to prep my wardrobe for the interview."
"Good idea," I say, turning away to check an email I don't care about. "Big day tomorrow."
She walks to the bathroom door. Her eyes are on my back. I wait for her to slam the door and the inevitable snarky comment.
She pauses.
"For the record," she says softly.
I don't turn around. "What?"
"It was a navy suit," she says. "At the wedding. You looked good in it."
The door clicks shut.
I stand there in the silence, staring at the dying fire, listening to the rain hammer against the roof.
I look down at my hands. They are shaking.
I pick up the orange Hermes notebook from the side table, the one she noticed, and throw it into the fireplace.
It burns bright and fast.
I turn off the lights and lie down on the couch. I told her I'd take the bed, but I can't. Not tonight.
If I sleep next to her tonight, I won't sleep at all.