Chapter 6 Never Trust a Man with a Cleft Chin #2
“I’d do just about anything for decent health insurance and a way out of this town, but I’m not saying yes to this unless you can convince me why it wouldn’t make more sense for you to just pack it in and go home, and if you mention the legacy of that dead philanderer one more time—”
“I don’t take risks,” he cut in, his expression serious.
Nervous. Suddenly, he had her full attention.
“Risks require hope and optimism. I don’t do that.
I don’t need to wait for the next shoe to drop, because, in my mind, it’s already on the floor.
But taking on this project—moving here—for a minute, I believed that I could have a different life.
And if I don’t find a way to make something good out of this, I’m genuinely scared I’ll never try for anything ever again. ”
Elliot stared back at her with firm, unblinking eyes. There was something so vulnerable about his wide gaze. The slight tremble of his full mouth. The scratch of his stubble along his palm when he rubbed his jaw.
“I actually believe you,” she finally answered after a prolonged perusal of his features.
What were her options, really? Carry on as she had been, trying her absolute hardest just to make it to the next day? What if, for a minute, she let herself believe she could have a different life, too?
He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing slowly up and then down. “You believe me?” he asked. His lips tilted sideways, like a kid getting away with nabbing a cookie from the jar.
“Don’t act so pleased, or I’ll have to take it back.”
She turned against his groans of protest, heading for the door until, suddenly, she felt the tug of his hand yanking her backward.
He bent down to look at her, holding her hand in both of his warm ones.
The movement stole the air from her lungs.
She met his eyes, his pupils saucers in the low light.
“I don’t even get a real answer?” he asked, a smile curling at the corners of his lips.
“After you charged into my bedroom in the middle of the night?”
She lolled her head side to side, relishing teasing him.
She pinched her eyes shut, though it offered no relief from the way every part of him curled around every other part of her.
“Yes,” she whispered, trapping her bottom lip between her teeth.
She blinked open her eyes to find that his were scanning every inch of her face—her lips, her nose, her ear, her lips again—like they were searching for clues. “I guess I’ll marry you.”
“Yeah?” He straightened and swept a strand of her hair over her shoulder, his eyes glued to his hand as his finger glided over her collarbone and down the blades of her back with surgical precision.
“Mm-hmm,” she answered, her skin tingling beneath her T-shirt. It took everything in her power not to shiver as his hand flexed against the dip of her spine. He leaned closer, his eyes pouring over her skin like warm syrup.
What kind of game was he playing? Did he want her to admit that, once upon a time, she’d felt something for him?
That perhaps she still did, in a purely chemical sense that had nothing to do with the more unfortunate aspects of his personality?
Would that make him feel like he’d finally gotten something over on her?
Her gaze drifted down to his lips. His breaths had turned short and expectant.
He looked so sure of what she was about to do next.
His eyes were daring her to do it. She couldn’t help but picture it.
The tilt of her chin. Her hands on the hard ridge of his stomach.
The way he’d pull her flush against his body as his hand skimmed up the back of her shirt.
She’d tug his bottom lip between her teeth and listen for the sounds he made when her fingers scraped through his hair.
Just to know. Just so she could stop imagining it.
But she didn’t do any of that. Instead, with a deep, shaky breath, she pressed two fingers to the center of his lips. “If we do this, I think it’s really important that we keep our relationship strictly business.”
For several seconds, he stared at her motionless—frozen. Then he cleared his throat. “Absolutely. I was thinking the same thing.”
“Sure you were.” She nodded, unconvinced.
He released her quickly, like ripping off a Band-Aid.
“To be clear, I’m doing this for the insurance. And so you can rent out the home I grew up in to strangers until you make me a competitive offer. I swear to god, if you try to lowball me after this, I’m taking a chainsaw to one of your pinkies. Don’t test me, Hodges.”
He lifted his hands in surrender. “It’ll be a fair offer. I swear. I’ll have my lawyer draw up a premarital agreement. No surprises.”
“Good. I’ll have my lawyer look at it, too.”
There was no way Mark would allow her back into his office without a Hannibal Lecter mask fastened to her head, but Elliot didn’t need to know that the only lawyer she could almost afford believed her to be homicidal, especially after threatening her fiancé’s digits.
“Isn’t a chainsaw a bit big for a finger? Seems like overkill.”
“I’m pretty precise with it. Plus it’s quick, which I’m guessing would be your preference.”
He nodded his head once, grimacing. “That’s…generous.”
“Nothing to worry about so long as we can trust each other, right?” She slapped his back with her palm.
“Right,” he choked out. “Now, is there anything else you wanted to talk about at one eighteen in the morning?”
“Just that it’s important to me that you take my last name. I know it sounds old-fashioned, but I think a husband’s identity should be subsumed by his wife’s, both legally and symbolically. It’s a dream I’ve always had for myself.”
“Good night, Lainey Davis.” He was shoving her out the door.
“Good night, Mr. Lainey Davis. See, isn’t that gorgeous? And you’re handsome enough to pull it off.”
The corners of his mouth tilted upward. “You think I’m handsome?” he teased.
“Not to me,” she argued defensively. “Just in the most basic, biological sense.”
His smile broadened until his eyes crinkled into something she imagined Gran would characterize as “bedroom eyes” but Lainey would classify as arrogant.
“It’s too late. You said it. I heard it. You can’t take it back.”
“Thirty seconds ago, I threatened you with a chainsaw, but this…” She gestured between them. “This is your major takeaway?”
He shook his head. “My major takeaway is that you find me so irresistible that you couldn’t wait until the morning to beg me to marry you.”
“The delusion!” Her eyes fluttered in bemusement. “I can’t believe I’m going into business with you.”
Just the other day, this man had no doubt been debating whether or not to sue her for a house that currently had a bat living in the mailbox, and now, even with a résumé and relationship history as spotty as hers, Lainey Davis was going into the “business” of marriage with Elliot Hodges.
Fate was a fickle son of a bitch.