Chapter 12
TWELVE
Travis
I awoke to the sound of familiar bare feet descending the loft stairs. Even though the light in the windows was cloudy with drizzle, I knew I had slept late, because apparently I wasn’t as young as I used to be.
“Travis.” Katie’s hiss-whisper was loud enough to be heard by the neighbors. “Are you awake? It’s working.”
I rolled over on the sofa—this fucking sofa, that I had slept on alone while Katie slept upstairs every night for the past week. It was a comfortable sofa, but the fact that it didn’t include a naked Katie Armstrong was incurring more and more of my resentment. “What?” I asked as my brain stuttered to life.
Katie dropped onto the sofa near my feet. She was wearing her pajamas, and her hair was sleep-tousled. She’d been self-conscious on her first morning, but that was gone now. She leaned over me as I drew my feet back, holding her phone out for me to see, her eyes sparkling. Her shoulder pressed the inside of my bent knee, and her top dipped dangerously at this angle, giving me a glimpse of creamy skin.
I scrubbed a hand through my hair while making sure the blanket covered my lap. “Woman, why are you awake? I thought I wore you out last night.”
Her cheeks flushed red. We’d gone to a club last night to check out an indie band. It was loud, the music was good, and we’d had a few drinks each. We hadn’t gotten home until after one. I’d planned to wake up slowly today and stay as lazy as possible.
Katie decided to ignore my flirting and waved the phone in my face. “Look,” she said.
I took her phone. TikTok was open, and there was a cell phone shot of Katie and me leaving the club last night, our hands clasped tight as we brushed through the crowd to the curb. I helped her into the Uber and closed the door.
It wasn’t an overly interesting clip, though we both looked good. Katie had worn her hair down around her shoulders, and by the end of the night, it was curled and damp with sweat. It was sexy.
I glanced at the stats and did a double take. The clip had eight thousand likes and counting, not even twelve hours after the clip was posted. There were over seven hundred comments. The account that had posted it was called KatieWatch.
“What’s this?” I asked aloud. I tapped into the KatieWatch page. “You have a TikTok account with twenty thousand followers?”
“It isn’t mine,” Katie explained. “It’s a fan account. A week ago, it was a fraction that big. It started growing after the basketball game, and it’s been going crazy since we followed each other on Instagram.”
Social media was wild. I scrolled through the other videos on the page and saw the things Katie and I had been doing for the past week. We’d gotten dinner out a few times, we’d gone to a music store to buy me a guitar, and we’d gone shopping for an afternoon. It was all there.
“Is this person following us around?” I asked, concerned.
Katie punched my shoulder. “No. People send her their videos and she posts them. Look at the comments.”
I tapped back into the video from last night and scanned the comments.
OMG, I am living for these two.
I don’t know what’s going on, but I am HERE FOR IT.
Have they made a statement yet? I want to know what’s happening!
Katie is winning. Look at him!!
Our girl is getting it from the hottest man alive, and I couldn’t be happier for her.
Is that Travis White? Holy hell.
I’ve never seen Katie look this hot! She’s always gorgeous, but now she’s smoking!
Where has Travis been? Looks like he’s cleaned up his act. I’ll bet Katie is a good influence on him.
He’s got so many problems. I hope she doesn’t get her heart broken.
I frowned at that last one, then handed the phone back, unable to read any more comments. “You’re right,” I said. “It looks like it’s working.”
“It is.” She was vibrating with excitement, oblivious to the press of her shoulder against my knee. My knee was not oblivious, and neither was the rest of my body.
Over the past week, my mummified body had most definitely emerged from oblivion. Apparently, the one thing that could wake me up from the neck down was this beautiful woman who didn’t want me except as a prop—a woman who had climbed me like a tree, then hadn’t made a move since. My confused synapses veered from flirting to lustful pining to despair, sometimes in the course of a minute. Like now.
I wanted to make a move, but there was too much at risk. If Katie turned me down, we’d look tense together, and we didn’t need that right when the plan was starting to work.
While I tortured myself over all of this, I ran out of time. Katie had to go back to L.A. today for promo shoots for The Love Fix-Up , as well as other obligations she had in her busy career. We hadn’t planned out when we’d see each other again, because it was my stupid idea to play it loose and improvise this thing. I was kicking myself. I really did have a talent for screwing myself over.
“I think this is the perfect time for me to go back to L.A.,” Katie said, putting her phone away. “We want it to look like I had a fling, but not like I’ve given up my whole life for a guy. Don’t you think?”
“Right,” I said, wishing I could push up that pajama top, press her back into the blankets, and fuck her until she couldn’t breathe.
“Besides, I need to meet with Stella,” Katie said. “To strategize. Travis, this has been amazing. I couldn’t have hoped for a better fake boyfriend. You’ve been perfect.”
Panic clutched in my chest. “Wait. Are we breaking up already?”
“Of course not.” She smiled, leaning back, no longer pressing against me. It made me happy and sad at the same time. “It’s just more believable if I go back to L.A. I think we should do an official PR announcement soon, and we should each do Instagram posts. Let me think about how to do it right.”
“Okay,” I said weakly.
“What time is it?” She was gearing into full professional mode now. “I’ll shower, get dressed, and call a car for the airport.”
“No,” I countered, not ready to let her go just yet. “I’m driving you.”
She shook her head. “You don’t have to.”
“I do,” I argued. “My soon-to-be-Instagram-official girlfriend just spent a week with me. You think I’d kick her out to go to the airport alone? What am I, a monster? I’ll drive you myself. I’ll see you off.”
Katie nodded. “Okay.”
“And I’ll kiss you,” I added impulsively. “Be ready.”
She went red again. “You said we’d discuss it first.”
“We’re discussing it now. Do you have an objection?”
She finally looked uneasy, as if she’d just noticed she was effectively in my bed with me. “Well—no. I don’t object. I think—I think it works well with the script. You’re right. If we’ve just spent a week together, it’s romantic for you to see me off and kiss me goodbye.”
“I’m glad you see it that way,” I said. “It’ll be a good one, I promise. Tongue or no tongue? I take requests.”
“ Travis. ” She hesitated. “No tongue. This kiss is supposed to be romantic and sweet, not foreplay.”
“Got it. Though for the record, I don’t think it’s fair that the pasty guy in The Christmas Date got foreplay, and so did the cowboy in Bakin’ Love , but I don’t.”
Katie made a face. “Do you want the truth?”
“Always.”
“The Christmas guy tasted like mustard, and the cowboy was gay.”
I slapped my thigh. “I knew there was something off in that one. I should have guessed.”
“He was a decent kisser.” She shrugged. “But his boyfriend hanging out on set made it weird for the romantic scenes.”
She had kissed a lot of men. I would have to up my game.
I was motivated, though. I thought that counted for something.