10. Avery
By the timeI pull up outside Eddie’s that night, a part of me is still expecting this to be one big prank; Duke’s way to exact some humiliating revenge. I’ll walk in, and he’ll be hanging out with his buddies, chuckling away that I could believe he’d agree to spend a single moment in my presence– let alone pretend to be wildly in love with me.
I slowly get out of the car, bracing myself. I figured that if I’m going to be humiliated, I may as well look good doing it, so I took my time getting ready: picking out a floaty sundress and sandals, blow-drying my hair perfectly, and applying a whole face of “barely-there” makeup. I can tell I’m already way overdressed: Eddie’s is a casual seafood joint, with picnic tables overlooking the water, and people lined up for two-for-one fried shrimp platters. The sun is just setting over the bay, streaking the sky with pink, and everyone seems relaxed and sunburned from a day on the beach.
Then I spot Duke. He’s looking anything but relaxed: sitting stiffly at a table by the water, backlit by the sinking sun. He’s wearing jeans and a worn blue T-shirt that makes his tan glow golden; stretched tight across the muscles in his back.
I pause a moment, remembering how his shoulders felt beneath my hands; clinging on for balance as he gripped my hips, his mouth hot against my thigh…
“Avery, babe, there you are.” Quinn appears, air-kissing me on both cheeks before briskly steering me over to Duke. “You guys have great timing, I’m just about to hop a flight back to LA.”
“I, um…” I mumble, thrown for a moment as Duke rises to greet us. “I didn’t know you’d be here.”
“I figured Quinn would know how this kind of thing works,” Duke says, looking awkward and polite. “Since we want to be professional about it.”
Professional.
I take a seat dumbly, still scoping the room for Candid Camera.
Is he actually serious?
“I’m glad you did call,” Quinn says, whipping out her phone and notepad. “This kind of arrangement needs rules and boundaries, or you’ll just create an even bigger mess to clean up.”
“So… you’re really doing this?” I venture, looking to Duke. I search his unshaven face for a hint of an ulterior motive, but he just avoids my gaze, picking at a French fry from the spread of food on the table between us.
“I mean, sure. Why not?”
I can think of at least a hundred good reasons, starting with the fact we can’t spend two minutes together without breaking out in a fight.
“Umm, because you hate fake Hollywood bullshit?” I say instead. “A fact you’ve made more than clear to me. On several occasions.”
Duke gives me an even stare, his blue eyes still inscrutable. “Right. And you said this way the fastest way to get them to back off from the both of us.”
“It is,” Quinn speaks up, already making notes. “Play this right, and they’ll leave you alone. Most of the time. Managed chaos. So, let’s get started. I figure this is the standard fake-dating routine?” She looks back and forth between the two of us.
“There’s a standard?” I ask, surprised.
“Of course,” Quinn looks at me strangely. “It happens all the time. Tessa and Jackson started out that way, and I arranged a whole thing for my client Luke Rafferty – you know, Doctor Casanova?” she adds, naming a hit medical TV show from a few years back. “And a dozen more couples besides. I thought you knew, this is standard in Hollywood, for publicity.”
“I mean, I knew people date each other for all kinds of reasons,” I say quickly, because it’s true. In fact, the kind of circles I run in, love doesn’t even figure up there on the list. Not when there’s fame, connections, and a membership at Malibu Beach House to aim for instead. “I just didn’t realize it was so… formal.”
“What can I say? Fake dating never goes out of style,” Quinn offers with a shrug. “Everyone loves a happy ending.”
Well, that much is true. I even blew up my wedding for the chance of finding it myself, one day. But I guess if I can’t have the real thing, playing pretend is the next best option for me right now.
With Blackberry Cove’s notorious grump, Duke Hendricks.
God help us all.
“So,” Quinn continues. “I figure you’re looking at the summer here? Six weeks or so, to let the tabloids do a full gossip cycle. I’ll make a few calls, and kick things off with a couple of my sources. People I can trust to spin this right. Well, as much as you can trust a gossip blogger,” she adds with a wry grin. “But they owe me some favors, so they’ll behave. Now, let’s look at your schedule?—”
“Hold up a second,” I interrupt her. Duke is already frowning– more than usual. “Are you sure you want to do this?” I check again. “Because if you say ‘yes’ now, and then back out?—”
“I won’t back out.” Duke says grimly. “So stop asking.” He turns back to Quinn, pulling out a battered notebook of his own to take notes. “Let’s get into it. Exactly what do you need me to do?”
Quinn launchesinto a brisk timetable for us, including two wholesome public activities a week– strolling at the farmer’s market, or frolicking at the beach, preferably with some kids. “If you don’t have any here you can borrow, I know some you can hire out,” she adds, then quickly moves on while Duke is still choking back laughter.
At least, I hope it’s laughter. But as Quinn continues through hair and wardrobe suggestions, and exclusivity clauses, and instructions on how to secure Duke’s phone devices against hacking, that inscrutable look of his starts getting very scrutable. The familiar furrowed brow is back.
It’s clear, he’s already having second thoughts.
“… so this scruffy blue-collar look of yours is great,” Quinn finishes up, gesturing at Duke. “But Avery, let’s watch the designer labels. We need you down-to-earth, the girl-next-door,” she adds, eyeing my platform sandals. “Natural. Like you just rolled out of bed this way.”
“Sure, great,” I agree, relieved. I can stay low-key for the summer. Just, you know, the camera-ready, “effortless” kind of low-key.
“Then that just about covers it.” Quinn checks her phone, and bounces to her feet. “You two should stay and finish your drinks. I already tipped off a photographer that you’re here.”
“You did?” Duke looks around, wary. “Where?”
“Oh, lurking in the bushes out front, I’m sure, waiting to snap you helping Avery into the cab of that manly truck of yours.” Quinn taps away on her phone, probably sending out an alert of our location to every tabloid in the nation.
“I drove myself,” I tell her, but Quinn shakes her head.
“Collect your car in the morning. Do you want them all taking photos of you leaving, all alone and unloved, or do you want everyone cooing over pics of your dashing, chivalrous new boyfriend opening his truck for you, and walking you to your door?”
“That sounds rhetorical,” I sigh, and she grins.
“You’ll get used to it. The both of you,” she adds, with a pointed look at Duke. “Remember: eyes on the prize.”
She starts to walk away.
“Wait!” I call, struck by a sudden thought. An uncomfortably hot and bothered kind of thought. “What about, um, public displays of affection?”
Duke chokes on his beer.
“Relax,” I roll my eyes at him. “I’m an actress, remember?”
“Apparently so,” Duke scowls back.
“Easy, kids.” Quinn smirks. “PDAs aren’t a priority. I’d say you’ve already done plenty in that department. Let’s keep things PG-13 from here on out.” She pauses, glancing back and forth between us. “Although, try to look as if you don’t loathe and despise each other.”
Quinn finally exits, leaving us alone. There’s silence.
“So…” I wrack my brains for conversation. What do you say to the man who’s just agreed to fake-date you? “Are you finishing those fries?”
“Help yourself.” He pushes them over.
“Thanks.”
There’s more silence. I dunk my fries in mayo and mustard, one after the other. Duke wrinkles his lip. “Mayo? Gross.”
“I like it.” I shrug, and eat another.
“You know, I once heard Guy Fieri call it ‘food lube’,” he drawls.
“What? Eww!” I put my fry down in a hurry, and he smirks.
“See? Gross.”
“Real mature.” I snap back. Then the back of my neck prickles, and I don’t even have to look this time to know. “Don’t look, but the paparazzi are here,” I murmur in a low voice. I carefully smooth down my hair, and check I don’t have mustard dripping down my dress.
Duke cranes his neck, looking around. I poke him with a fork. “I said, don’t look!”
“Easy there.” Duke rubs his hand. “Unless you want the photos to be me walking out of here dripping blood.”
I bite back another retort, and fix a big, besotted smile on my face instead. I can’t go snapping the guy’s head off anymore– not when I’m supposed to be tumbling head-over-heels in love with him instead.
“Oh, poor baby,” I coo, leaning over and squeezing Duke’s hand. “Do you need me to kiss it better?”
I bring his hand to my lips and kiss the knuckles softly, gazing at him across the table with the flirty kind of smile that turns all men to putty in my hands.
Duke just shakes his head. “I liked it better when you were being a spoiled brat,” he grumbles.
OK, maybe not all men.
He finishes his beer, and gets to his feet. “C’mon. We better get this dog-and-pony show on the road.”
I take a deep breath. He’s right. The rehearsal’s over, and now, I need to sell the performance of a lifetime.
We head out to the parking lot, and I try my best to ignore the photographer snapping away from behind his rental Volvo.
“I think I remember this guy from the cottage this morning,” Duke says with a smirk, as he opens the passenger door for me. “He squealed like a little baby, running away.”
I laugh. “You did look like something from a horror movie,” I point out. “I’m surprised nobody called the cops.”
“Oh, they did.” Duke offers me his hand, helping me up into the cab. “Good thing I’ve known the deputies here since we were kids. They don’t have any time for outsiders, kicking up trouble.”
“Is that what I am?” I look over. Sitting in the truck, I’m eye-level with him. His blue eyes are almost inky in the twilight, I realize. Deep and stormy and–
“Trouble?” Duke’s gaze slides over me, strangely intimate. “I’d say so.”
He slams the door before I can answer, and rounds the hood to the driver’s side. Soon, we’re on the road, heading back to my cottage. Duke keeps shooting tense looks in the rearview mirror, as the photographer’s headlights follow us back along the winding country roads.
“I thought the whole point of this plan was to stop those assholes trailing me around,” he grumbles.
“They will.” I try to reassure him. “Once they get a good photo, they’ll leave. Nobody will be staking me out 24/7 anymore; they won’t have to, not with Quinn tipping them off exactly where to find us.”
“Sounds like a deal with the devil,” he mutters, scowling.
“Now who’s being the drama queen?” I tease. Then I remember what Quinn said. “Will it be OK, not dating other women for the summer?” I venture, glancing over at him.
Duke gives a shrug. “Doesn’t make that much difference to me.”
“Really?” I look him over. Sure, the guy has a habit of getting under my skin, but there was a moment when we first met – a very brief moment, before he opened that mouth – that I thought he was kind of hot. In a scruffy, unshaven, brooding kind of way. “I would have thought the ladies of Cape Cod would be all over your surly woodsman routine.”
Duke gives me a withering look. “I don’t chop wood.”
“Then what’s the chainsaw for?” I shoot back. “Or do I not want to know?”
He finally breaks into a smile. “OK, OK. On occasion, I have been known to chop a cord of lumber or two,” he admits.
“Ha,” I crow, delighted. “I told you: woodsman!”
We pull up outside the cottage– and sure enough, the headlights behind us pull over, too. There’s another long silence.
“Quinn said…” I venture. “You probably should walk me to my door. You know, like you would if we really were dating.”
“Right.” Duke nods. “Good idea.”
He crosses around to open my door for me, and helps me down to the ground. Then we slowly walk up the path to the cottage, pausing when we reach the front step.
“He’s taking photos of us right now, isn’t he?” Duke murmurs in a low voice, looking down at me. He’s still looking stressed, his handsome features drawn together with tension, so I try to break the ice.
“Remind me, which is your good side?” I tease, and he huffs a laugh.
“I know I signed up for it, but it still feels weird, having someone watching us.” Duke shakes his head with a rueful smile. “I can’t believe you live like this.”
“It’s the price of fame,” I shrug. “I guess if you want something bad enough, you’ll do all kinds of crazy things to get it.”
“Yeah…” Duke’s voice quiets, and his eyes fix on mine, dark in the moonlight. “I guess so.”
I swallow. It’s dark out now, but the lantern above the door casts a warm glow around us, and we’re framed by the planters, spilling flowers and fragrant lavender into the night.
It’s romantic, intimate...
Completely fake, I remind myself.
Duke’s gaze slips to my lips. “Should we…?” he trails off.
“Kiss?” I offer, feeling strangely breathless. There’s a curious anticipation sizzling in my bloodstream, something deep, and rich, and hot. “I mean, probably,” I blurt, my cheeks warming. “You know, for the photos.”
“Right.” He nods, raking a hand through his tousled hair. “For the photos.”
Duke reaches for me, and I automatically step back.
He looks at me, questioning. “Sorry,” I gulp. My heart is racing now, but I don’t know why. I’ve done a hundred fake kisses for the cameras– and way more than just kissing, too. This should be a breeze compared with those roles. After all, I’m not soaked to my skin in see-through lingerie, with two dozen crew members all drooling over my every move.
Tonight it’s just me and Duke… and whoever is lurking on the other side of the bushes.
“Let’s try it again,” I say brightly, trying to get into actress-mode. “If you… put your hand on my waist, then I’ll, um, put mine on your shoulders.” I suggest, wishing we had one of those intimacy coordinators here to choreograph the whole thing. “And don’t forget to angle to the left, so they’ll get a good shot. OK?”
“OK,” Duke agrees. He takes a breath, then reaches for me again.
This time, I don’t shy away.
One hand slides around my waist, tugging me closer. The other gently cups my cheek. Our eyes lock, and I inhale in a rush, shivering at the contact. And then he’s leaning closer… closer… closing the distance between us until his lips find mine in a slow, lingering kiss.
Oh.
It starts off gentle, just the barest whisper of sensation. So soft, I can’t help but sigh. But then Duke’s hands tighten as I sway against him, and our bodies press tight. Heat surges, and that sweet, gentle oh turns to a fevered oh my god.
I clutch at his shirt, wanting more, shocked by the rush that floods my body as his mouth claims mine with slow, deliberate strokes. Duke’s tongue slides deeper, exploring me, and God, it’s incredible.
What is this?
It’s not a stage kiss, that’s for sure. Or like any other kiss I’ve known. They don’t even qualify compared to this intoxicating tangle of hands and mouths and low, burning desire.
Duke finally pulls away, and I gasp for air, reeling in delicious sensation as he drags his mouth softly along my jaw and up to my ear; breath hot against my lobe.
I melt. My brain short-circuited about ten seconds ago, and now all I want to do is grab the man by the hand, take him upstairs, and tear of all of our clothes?—
“Do you think he got it?”
My eyes snap open.
Duke’s voice is low in my ear, and he’s still holding me tightly, like he’s whispering sweet nothings. But his words bring me back down to earth with a bump.
The photographer. Of course.
This is all just for show.
“Uh uh,” I manage to squawk, coherent sentences taking a few moments longer to form. “Yeah, I’d say that was… good.”
Understatement of the year.
Duke carefully releases me, and I stumble back, still dizzy. “So, goodnight?” I chirp like an idiot.
An idiot with her body on fire, and her panties all in a twist.
A very damp twist.
“Goodnight.” Duke’ eyes rake over me again, making me shiver in all the right places. Then he gives me a casual nod, turns, and saunters away, like the earth isn’t still shifting under my feet.
Like I haven’t just been stunned into silence.
Because whatever I was expecting from this fake-dating business… It sure as hell wasn’t that.