Chapter 7
“You’re lucky I don’t press stalking and harassment charges against you.”
Elliott paid me no attention as he walked behind me into my office and took a seat in the chair facing my desk.
Clearly, Dr. Delicious wasn’t used to being told no because after I laughed in his face and called him insane for suggesting a fake dating plan, he followed me back to work trying to persuade me to go along with his mad idea.
I plonked myself at my desk and flicked my computer into life. “Don’t you have lives to go and save?”
“Currently off duty.”
“Well, why don’t you spend your off-duty time doing something to relax, something you enjoy, something that is far from here?”
Elliott chuckled, the low rumble reached across the desk and awoke a tiny flutter in the depths of my stomach that I thought I’d never feel again.
Out of all the doctors in Pinevale Hospital who could have treated me, of course, it had to be the one who looked as if he was pulled straight out of a hospital television drama.
Dark, thick hair with a slight wave. A facial bone structure that plastic surgeons would envy. Thin rimmed glasses that framed his sharp hazel eyes. A five o’clock shadow of stubble. Strong, veiny arms with even stronger hands that still echoed on my skin.
And after spotting the goods he was hiding underneath his T-shirt earlier in the park, I was certain he was the whole freaking package.
Step aside, McSteamy, you have nothing on Elliott Dade.
“Give me one good reason why it won’t work,” he said. “Because from where I am sitting, I can’t think of one.”
“How about we don’t know each other? Or that it’s a stupid idea and everyone will be able to sniff out the lie from a mile away?”
“Not if we fake it right.”
“Elliott, it won’t work,” I said bluntly. “You don’t know my family, and honestly, I don’t think I could willingly subject you to them in good faith. I love them because I am biologically programmed to love them, but they are literally the worst, and that’s not me being dramatic this time.”
“I’m well-versed in dealing with difficult families; I have years of experience. My own is unique to say the least.”
“My mother isn’t unique. She is impossible, and it wouldn’t be fair to inflict her on your life.”
He chuckled again, warming the soles of my feet. “Trust me, I’ve had my fair share of difficult. I have three brothers.”
Wait a second.
How could I have not spotted it before? Dark hair. Envious bone structure. Surname Dade—oh holy fucking shit, no way.
“Your older brother is Jaxon.”
Elliott nodded slowly. “Correct. You know him, right?”
Heat crept into the base of my neck as I prayed for it not to reach my cheeks. Swallowing against the sudden dryness in my throat, I grabbed a bottle of water from the mini-fridge behind me and gulped half the bottle in one go.
Aside from planning his wedding parties, I knew Jaxon pretty freaking well.
It was years ago and the most that happened was a heavy make-out session with some dry humping before the two of us passed out in a drunken state.
Not my finest night, though not my worst either.
Neither of us were interested in each other enough to try and pick it up again, convinced it was down to the sheer amount of alcohol in our systems and our own self-loathing that made us kiss in the first place.
But it was exactly another reason why Elliott’s plan was a no-go.
How could I pretend to be his fake girlfriend when I almost fucked his older brother?
“Livi?” Elliott leaned forward, his hands resting on my desk. “Everything okay? You’re a little pale.”
I really liked how he said my name, how naturally it rolled from his tongue, and how it made the heat spread from my feet up into my stomach.
“Listen, I just don’t think us pretending to be together is a good idea,” I said. “My sister’s wedding isn’t for another four months. That’s a long time for us to fake date.”
Speak of the devil.
An email from Maya flashed onto my screen, full of new ideas for her wedding. It turned out there was someone out there in the universe more demanding than Ursula. Between the two of them, I was going to have my work cut out for me.
Or possibly go insane.
After my mother bundled me into the back of an ambulance, she kindly informed Maya that I agreed to plan the wedding. Not like it was ever going to be my choice.
When the hospital discharged me, I found my own way home and was instantly greeted by my sister’s voicemail thanking me for being the ‘bigger person’ and that she was happy that, and I quote, ‘had finally seen sense and moved on’.
Honestly? I was too exhausted to argue with them anymore.
It was easier to give in, especially when my mother held the business I had grown into a success in the palm of her hand.
Truthfully, it was my own fault for not reading the contract properly, for missing the hidden condition that meant I allowed Fernando to hand over majority control to my mother.
Otherwise, they’d demand the $8.5 million back or remove me from my own business.
It’s why I sucked it up and put on a brave face with Ursula. Her money, the full amount I was charging her that my mother wasn’t privy to, was going to help me repay the loan and free me from the invisible leash my mother and Fernando put around my neck the second I took their money.
“Four months, I can do that,” Elliott said, pulling me back from staring blankly at my computer screen.
“The wedding will be in Montana.”
“No problem. I have plenty of holidays to take at work. I mean, unless you want to date the old Viagra popping guy.”
“Why?”
A small muscle in his jaw twitched. “What do you mean?”
“Why do you want to do this? I get it helps me out, but why do you want to help me? We’re practically strangers.”
“Can’t me wanting to help you be enough?”
“In my experience, people are rarely selfless,” I countered. “People do things because they want something in return.”
“Not always.”
“Oh, really?” My eyes narrowed, elbows resting on my desk. “You’re telling me that out of the goodness of your own heart, you want to give up your precious free time to help a stranger for no other reason than wanting to be a good citizen? Do you think I’m na?ve?”
“Can’t it be that simple?”
“Doubtful, but hey, if you can look me in the eyes and swear that you are one of a kind, a truly selfless human being with the only intention of helping me out, be my guest and prove me wrong.”
His Adam’s apple bobbed as the muscle in his jaw twitched again.
Bingo!
“That’s what I thought,” I said. “I’d be more open to the idea if you were honest with me.”
Elliott’s shoulders tensed for a moment before he let them sag. “You’re right. I’m not being honest with you.”
Although it was obvious to me now that he was Jaxon’s younger brother, it became apparent that Elliott was completely different from his brother.
Jaxon was the type of man who answered everything with a grunt or a scowl—sometimes both if you were lucky.
Elliott, on the other hand, was quiet in a gentler way. He didn’t seem the kind to react without thought, reserved yet strong in a way that made me want to trust him.
“If you go along with this plan, I am hoping it will help me get the promotion I need at work.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “My new boss isn’t exactly my biggest fan.”
“And how will a fake girlfriend fix that?”
“Dr. Lorenzo wants doctors who have roots outside work. She believes her staff should have lives beyond the hospital, that those doctors who spend their whole lives working with nothing else to ground them are at risk of burning themselves out and potentially making a dangerous mistake.”
“So, this little arrangement would show your boss that you have a life outside work?”
He nodded. “I only moved to New York seven months ago and have spent the entire time working non-stop to prove myself. Turns out it had the opposite effect.”
“Why not ask some other woman then? Someone you actually know?”
“Like I said, I’ve been living in the hospital. It’s not like I’ve had time to go out on a date, never mind have a girlfriend.”
“You sound like a workaholic.”
“Something like that,” he replied tightly. “Lorenzo wants well-rounded, balanced, and not work-addicted doctors. If you agree, you might be exactly what I need to prove I’m the right person for the promotion.”
It felt too good to be true.
“A couple of appearances at work and she’ll buy it,” he continued. “In return, I’ll do all the boyfriend stuff you need between now and the wedding.”
“It feels wrong.”
“You don’t have to make a decision right now.” Elliott reached across my desk and grabbed a pen. Without warning, he took my hand, his touch sending a million and one shocks through my nervous system.
His fingers were softer than I remembered, yet firm enough for my mind to imagine them touching many inappropriate areas of my body and finding that one spot that made most women cry out in delight.
Freaking hell, one touch of my hand and I’m horny? I need to get laid.
“Here’s my number.” The tip of the pen pressed into the flat of my palm. “Sleep on it and let me know your decision, but I honestly think we could help each other, Livi.”
He didn’t say anything else as he dropped the pen into my hand and walked out the door.
No matter how hard I tried to focus on arranging Maya’s engagement party and Ursula’s latest demand for trained doves at her daughter’s birthday celebrations, I couldn’t stop thinking about Elliott’s offer.
Having him at my side for the next four months would be the perfect way to stop my mother’s constant mission to make me get over Daniel.
Truthfully, I was over Daniel—for the most part.
Being near him felt like someone was reaching into my chest and clawing their stubby fingernails at my fractured heart. And most hateful of all was how my body still burst into life when he so much as glanced in my direction.
Yet, this was the man who broke up with me on a Friday and announced he was in love with Maya the following week.
The only reason I found out about their love affair was because of my mother.
She let that little secret slip after one too many white wine spritzers, which was right after she spent half an hour telling me that my ‘little party planning job’ was the reason I had been neglecting the diet she had me on since I was a teenager, and was now two dress sizes bigger.
I shouldn’t feel anything for Daniel except resentment and hatred.
But every time I was around him, I couldn’t make sense of the tornado of feelings swirling within me.
There was too much unresolved between us, too much that I never got the chance to say to him.
After sending Maya confirmation of the engagement party plans, I shut down my computer and stared at the handwritten number scribbled on my palm.
The rational part of my brain told me to wash the number from my skin. Nothing good ever came from lying, and this ludicrous plan of his was the humdinger of lies.
Blame it on the handsomely cute doctor who stirred something inside me for the first time in a year, but something was screaming over the rational voice in the back of my mind to say yes to Elliott’s plan.
After all, how did the saying go?
Fake it till you make it, baby.