Mitchell slammed the car door as he got inside. “Seriously, what the hell was that?”
Arielle was already in the back seat. Her lips were pressed firmly together, and the mischievous smile on her lips bordered on evil. “Our contract states that you may touch my body over my clothes during public displays of affection, and I may touch your body over yours. It’s within the terms of the contract. You should have read the contract if you don’t like it.”
Frustrated energy that had nowhere to go jumped around inside him. “You are playing with fire, little girl. You do not know what you’re asking for.”
“I am only doing what is stated in the contract. It’s not like I’m backing people up into walls in hotel rooms and kissing them, which is entirely outside what we agreed to,” she said as the car crept into the heavy Las Vegas traffic on the Strip.
Mitchell scowled at her. “Oh, it’s like that, is it? You’re the one who said we should ‘practice’ last weekend. So we were practicing. It looks like the ‘practice’ paid off because this time we weren’t bobbling around like sparring penguins, trying to decide which direction our noses went.”
“Well, your little gasp of surprise was ridiculous,” she said. “I hope they didn’t notice it. Maybe we need to practice more.”
This was getting insane. He was wound up so tightly that he thought he might bounce between the seat and the ceiling like a spring. “Little girl, I remind you that you are playing with fire. Don’t say you want to practice making out unless you are absolutely sure. There might be consequences you’re not even thinking about.”
“Yeah, right. You wish.”
Her flippant answer poked his swirling frustration. “Do not grab my ass in public again unless you have an exhibitionist kink and want to get arrested for public indecency.”
Arielle crossed her arms over her chest and stared out her window, pointedly ignoring him.
“Fine,” he said, that word coming out as a huff. “I—dammit—fine.”
Jesus, he hadn’t been this piqued with a woman since college when, what was her name? Meredith had spent a weekend demanding tributes and gifts, which he had run himself ragged supplying even though it had been the weekend before finals. It turned out that Meredith had been screwing one of Mitchell’s frat brothers and told her sorority sisters that the presents she’d demanded were “galimony” for having dated him for six weeks. She’d had broken up with him Monday morning, and Mitchell had pulled an all-nighter so he wouldn’t fail Macro Econ.
Arielle Carter was infuriating. He should’ve known that the daughter of a guy who’d negotiated for all the wrong things while selling his business wouldn’t be logical and able to adhere to a damn contract.
He didn’t care if it was unfair. Grabbing his ass in front of those reporters had been tawdry.
And her sweet little hand grasping his body had turned him on far too damn much.
“Really,” he told her. “Don’t do it again.”
“Oh, I won’t,” she said. To be any more dismissive and angry, she would’ve had to be cracking bubblegum while she talked.
“Grabbing my ass like that is my go-signal,” he told her, grinding his teeth. “When a woman grabs my ass like that, my brain turns off, and my dick takes over. It’s a Pavlovian response at this point.”
She snarked, “It’s not my fault you didn’t tell me your butt was your primary erogenous zone.”
“My butt is not—” His cell phone rang in the inner pocket of his suit jacket, and he fished it out.
His phone screen read Emily.
Oh, Jesus. Now? Right now, of all times?
His thumb hovered over the green dot, and he said to Arielle, “I have to take this. It’s my little sister. Just be cool, okay?”
“Oh, I’ll be cool, all right,” she said, still staring out the car window.
Mitchell answered the phone and held it up to his ear, probably giving Emily an excellent view of how his hairline around his ears was getting shaggy. He needed a haircut. “Hello, Emily, first angel of the heavens. How was your day?”
Emily’s guileless giggles filled Mitchell’s ear, and he felt his shoulders relax. “I had my horseback riding lesson today.”
Their mother kept Emily busy. “Which horse did you ride today?”
“His name is Ivory Keys, and he’s a white gelding,” Emily recited.
“And where did you ride him?”
“I rode him in the outdoor arena because the weather is good today because it is May.”
“That’s right,” Mitchell said, and he quizzed her on what she’d eaten for lunch and supper.
After that, Emily asked, “Is your pretend-girlfriend with you because you are away for the weekend?”
Mitchell didn’t like to fudge facts with Emily. “Uh, yeah. We’re in the car going from the convention back to the hotel, and she is here with me. Her name is Arielle Carter.”
“I remember her name. She has the same name as The Little Mermaid.”
Mitchell wasn’t going to quibble over spelling with Emily. “Yep, you’re right.”
“Can I talk to her?”
Mitchell froze. Emily thought everybody was her friend.
From beside him in the car, Arielle said, “I can talk to her if you want.”
Arielle sounded a whole lot less angry. When he glanced over, she’d unfolded her arms, and her jaw was less clenched.
Mitchell said into the phone, “Okay, sweetie pie. She’s right here.”
He handed his phone over to Arielle and prayed to all the Episcopalian saints that this was a good decision. His hand hovered in front of him, ready to grab his phone back if Arielle said anything upsetting to Emily.
But Arielle smiled at the screen and talked to Emily’s blue eye and the side of her nose, and within a few seconds, they were giggling together.
Mitchell let his hand drop to his knee.
Emily asked Arielle a lot of questions, which was kind of surprising. Emily liked to answer direct questions, but she wasn’t much of an asker.
But Mitchell nearly snatched his phone back when Emily asked Arielle, “Do you like my brother?”
“Yes,” Arielle said. “He seems like a nice guy.”
“I know you’re just pretending to be his girlfriend.”
“That’s right. It’s just pretend. We’re making a story for the cameras.”
Emily said, “It’s fun to play pretend. Mitchell said it was just business.”
“Yes, it’s just business.”
“I don’t think I would like just business,” Emily said.
Arielle nodded. “I don’t think I like it much, either.”
“Are you going to come to Connecticut so we can meet you?”
Arielle’s smile turned sad. “It would be wonderful to meet you. Maybe I can someday.”
They talked for a few minutes, and then Arielle handed the phone back to Mitchell and resumed staring out her car window.
He said his goodbyes to his sister and hung up. “Thanks for talking to her. She likes to talk on the phone. It’s important to her.”
Arielle said, “She seems nice. Do you talk to her every day?”
“Most days,” Mitchell said.
“Oh, okay.”
“Emily was a surprise, my mom told us, a bonus baby seven years after she had my two brothers and me. When they found out she had Down Syndrome, my mom refused to even talk about options. Emily is one of those people who is just a beautiful soul. The world is better for her being in it. Everybody makes their own choices in life, but I’m glad I have my sister.”
Arielle nodded. “It sounds like she doesn’t like business very much.”
Mitchell had to chuckle at that. “Emily often asks to help with my business because that’s all I seem to talk about, but I don’t mix business with family.”
Arielle nodded. “Yeah, that’s probably for the best.”
Mitchell debated with himself, but they seemed to have come to a détente. “The hotel has a good restaurant. Would you like to try it?”
Arielle’s glance at him was sharp, but she seemed to find whatever she was searching for because she answered, “That would be nice.”
The hotel restaurant was more romantic than Mitchell had anticipated, with low mood lighting and violins playing. When they slid into the round booth and sat next to each other, the upholstery under his hands was butter-soft leather. The waiter asked what kind of wine they would be having that night.
The meniscus of wine in the bottle lowered as they ate, and the tension between them turned to teasing.
Arielle lowered her head near his shoulder and whispered, “I didn’t know grabbing your butt was such a big deal. I’m sorry that it upset you.”
He shrugged and flipped his hand in the air as if throwing the whole day over his shoulder behind them. He whispered back, “I was just surprised, and it was a little crass in public. It was one of those things that, if we really were dating, you would have known about me, which means it might have tipped those two reporters off that we aren’t really dating.”
She tipped the last of the wine in her glass into her mouth and swallowed, and the waiter was right there to pour more into her glass from their second bottle. “Maybe we should practice more so that we don’t make those kinds of mistakes.”
The wine in his veins turned hot, and Mitchell should’ve known he was in trouble when he said, “That sounds like an excellent idea.”