Chapter 20
PEYTON
I drop my box of comfy clothes on the bedroom floor and yank the stupid suit jacket off. The fabric is slippery and cool against my overheated skin, and it smells like him—expensive and masculine and entirely too present. It fills my nose, settling deep into my lungs.
I pick up the box again and move it to my side of the walk-in closet.
My reflection assails me from a full-length mirrored pane.
I’m flushed, chest heaving, eyes wide and bordering on manic.
I look like I’ve been chased through the woods.
Or like I’ve been pressed against a window by a billionaire who smells really, really good.
I dive for the box of clothes. I need layers. A cushion between my skin and whatever madness possessed me downstairs.
I pull on a comfy pink bra, black leggings, and an oversized sage-green sweatshirt.
I hug myself, pacing the length of the closet.
What’s gotten into me? Why did I have to poke the bear just to see if he’d bite?
And oh, he bit.
I’ve spent the last two years with Matt learning to smooth my edges, to swallow my sharp retorts, to be agreeable and pleasant and small. And now, less than forty-eight hours after escaping that suffocating relationship, I’m picking fights with my fake husband in my underwear.
I provoked him. Taunted the beast and acted surprised when it snarled.
A knock on the bedroom door makes me jump a foot in the air.
“Peyton?” Liam’s voice comes through the wood, calmer now. Stripped of the edge it had downstairs. “May I come in?”
“Sure,” I call out, pacing to the closet door without fully stepping into the bedroom.
The door opens, and Liam steps inside. He’s loosened his tie, and his top button is undone, exposing the hollow of his throat. He looks tired. The arrogance that usually rolls off him in waves is dialed back to a guarded uncertainty.
He doesn’t come near me. Instead, he walks over to the bed and sits on his side, resting his elbows on his knees, hands clasped.
“I’m sorry,” he says to the floor. “I’m not even sure what happened downstairs. Or why I snapped like that. I shouldn’t have crowded you the way I did. I was out of line.”
I stay where I am, arms locked across my chest, watching him.
“You were a prick,” I say flatly.
Liam doesn’t argue. He doesn’t defend himself or make excuses. He looks up, the corner of his mouth lifting in a dry, humorless smirk. “I was.”
The acknowledgment disarms me more than any justification would have.
“But you provoked me.” He tilts his head, studying my face with genuine confusion. “Why?”
Ah. Good question.
I have no idea.
Why did I do it? To regain control? Because I felt small and naked and wanted to make him feel off-balance too? Or because some dark, reckless part of me craved to see what he’d do if I pushed?
I drop my arms, deflating. “I don’t know,” I admit. “But you… Something about you drives me up a wall. You get under my skin in a way I can’t explain or control.”
Liam watches me for a long beat then gives me that humorless smirk again. “Yeah, same.” And he goes back to looking at his palms.
The admission hangs between us, fragile and weird. We’re strangers bound by a contract and a mutual need, admitting to an attraction that wasn’t supposed to be part of the deal.
Liam flexes his fingers. “It’s been… a while for me,” he murmurs, like he’s confessing to a capital crime instead of a dry spell. “I haven’t been with anyone in over a year. Since my last relationship ended badly.”
I lean against the closet doorframe, keeping the distance between us. “The meme one?”
“Yeah.” A muscle ticks in his jaw. He lifts his head, and the gray of his eyes is like smoke. “And having a beautiful, half-naked woman walking around my house, challenging me… is not helping me keep my cool.”
Beautiful.
The word slips past my defenses like a blade between my ribs—sharp, precise, and landing too close to the heart of things.
The way he says it—resentful, factual, frustrated—makes it feel real. The compliment threads itself into me, spreading heat through my veins.
I swallow the flutter in my throat and fire back. “You’re one to talk, Mr. Towel.”
His lip twitches, and the tension in his shoulders breaks. “Fair point. I promise to use a robe from now on.”
“Good. You also can’t wear glasses or sweatpants.” I tick off items on my fingers. “No tailored suits. No tight jeans. No sleek cashmere sweaters. And no leather jackets.”
His smile breaks through, and it’s not the mocking, arrogant smirk or the performative grin he wears around his parents. It changes his entire face, erasing the sharp edges and making his eyes crinkle at the corners in a way that’s… cute.
He chuckles. “That doesn’t leave me many options.”
I tilt my head, considering. “Those too-short polyester pants you wore at the gala were deeply unsexy. Wear those.”
He shakes his head. “Absolutely not. I’d rather go naked.”
I half choke on an involuntary gasp.
His smile fades, replaced by that searching look again. Liam stands up from the bed and takes a step toward me.
“Are you attracted to me?” he asks.
The directness of the question almost knocks me over. He’s asking as if he genuinely doesn’t know the answer.
I could lie. I should lie.
“Yes.” The word escapes before I can stop it. “Against my better judgment. Because I don’t even like you.”
“You don’t know me,” he says softly. “You might like me if you gave me a chance.”
Is that meant to be reassuring? Because the concept of me liking him has the opposite effect. The only way to survive years living with this man is to keep my distance.
Liam scratches the back of his head. “I didn’t consider the consequences of living together when I proposed this,” Liam admits, his voice dropping to a register that vibrates in my toes. “I’m feeling the attraction too. But it wouldn’t be wise to follow through on it.”
“No,” I whisper. “You’re right.”
“We have to be a team.” He holds my gaze. “Partners in this deception. Getting physical would complicate everything. We can’t afford for it to go wrong and then really hate each other when we still have years of this charade ahead of us.”
“Your logic is impeccable.” I take a step back. “But you should say your wise, rational things in a less seductive voice.”
His lips twitch again. “Noted.”
“But I agree with you. I’m fresh out of a wrong relationship. The last thing I need is to jump headfirst into another complicated situation before I’ve even processed the first disaster.”
“What happened with your ex?” he asks gently.
I stare out the window; only dense forest lines this side of the house. “It’s a long story.”
“We have time. If nothing else, we should become friends. Partners. We’re going to be living together for years. We should be able to trust each other.”
Friends. The concept feels both safe and disappointing.
I slip away from him, crossing to the bed. I flop onto my side of the mattress, staring up at the ceiling with its recessed lighting and crown molding.
Liam kicks off his shoes and lies down next to me. He keeps a respectful distance, bending one arm under his head and waiting. Without pushing or prodding.
“It was small things in the beginning,” I say to the ceiling.
“Little comments I brushed off as jokes or misunderstandings. He’d make a remark about the dress I was wearing.
Say it was ‘a bit much’ or ‘trying too hard.’ So I’d change.
I thought it wasn’t a big deal.” I shrug on the bed.
“He started criticizing my friends next. He’d ask why I needed to get coffee with my best friend, Emma, when I’d seen her the day before.
He said she talked too fast. That she was loud.
That she didn’t respect our relationship because she texted me late at night.
He’d suggest I skip girls’ nights to come to dinner with his parents instead.
He made it sound like I was being selfish for wanting a life outside of him. ”
Liam has gone still beside me, but I can tell he’s listening.
“Then the small things became bigger. Matt would call me multiple times a day, getting annoyed if I didn’t answer immediately.
He got upset if I had to stay at work late for a project, because it cut into our time together.
He’d say things like, ‘Don’t worry, once we’re married, you won’t have to work so hard.
’ It sounded supportive but felt like a threat. ”
I turn my head, glancing at Liam.
He’s watching me, his gray eyes intense. His jaw is tight, a muscle twitching beneath the skin, but he says nothing.
“We’d discussed my desire not to stop working once we had kids multiple times,” I continue.
That gaze locked on me should intimidate me, should make me want to look away.
Instead, it gives me the strength to go on.
“At the rehearsal dinner, Matt’s mother asked how soon we planned on starting a family.
I reiterated my stance. I wanted kids, but I also wanted to keep my job.
Maybe part-time, or with flexible hours, but I would not be a stay-at-home mom.
” I swallow. “Everyone nodded. Matt smiled and squeezed my hand. Said whatever made me happy.”
The memory of that moment—his sticky fingers over mine, his studied tender expression—makes my stomach turn.
“Later that night, I was coming back from the restroom and I overheard Matt talking to his mother around the corner. She asked if he was really okay with me being a working mom, adding it wasn’t how things were done in their family.
And Matt laughed.” I cringe just thinking about it.
“He told her not to worry. He said he’d make sure it didn’t happen.
That he could ask for a favor and stall my career.
Make me want to stay at home, which, given how fast he got me fired, he wasn’t joking about. ”
Liam’s eyes are dark pools of shadows.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers.
“I didn’t sleep that night,” I say. “My only comfort was that I wasn’t with Matt as per the tradition that the groom shouldn’t see the bride the night before the wedding.
” A bitter laugh escapes me. “And the next day, standing in that dressing room, suffocating in the corset, I just… couldn’t do it. ”
“So you ran.”
“Yep, climbed out a window, boarded a bus to a random town, and almost got run over by a reckless driver.”
He smiles as silence settles over us. The quiet isn’t uncomfortable. But the prolonged eye contact is becoming unsettling.
Liam exhales on a ragged breath.
“Your ex is a piece of shit,” he says. The venom in his voice surprises me.
It’s dangerous, vibrating with a protective fury I haven’t earned.
“He’s a small, insecure, controlling coward.
My lawyers are going to destroy him. By the time we’re done, he won’t be able to get a table at a Waffle House, let alone sue your parents. ”
Despite everything—the exhaustion, the fear, the weight of the last two days pressing down on me—I laugh.
“We already got the wine opener.” I sniff.
Liam shifts, turning onto his side to face me fully. His midnight-black hair is mussed against the white pillow. His gray eyes are intent on mine, dark and serious beneath the humor.
He doesn’t touch me, but his gaze feels like a caress.
“Matt will never have power over you again,” he says. “I promise.”
The vow lands in a cold, hollow place inside me and sparks a fire. Flames sear their way to the surface. The heat seeps in. It fills the fissures. Spreads through my body, reaching the darkest places.
I have no reason to trust any promise this stranger makes to me. But I do anyway.
“Thank you,” I breathe.
He holds my gaze for an infinite second, then he nods once, and rolls off the bed.