I take a deep breath and draw my shoulders back, tipping my chin up.
You’ve got this.
“Not for nothing, but if you let Jessica win, we’re all doomed.” Nina’s draped over the wall of my cubicle with pouty lips and her baby face twisted in agony. “Don’t do it, Riley. I’m begging you. Your coworkers need you.”
“If I don’t tell Spencer the truth, she will.” I tug the lapels of my jacket tight across my chest and press at the crease of my black slacks. Through the glass, I see him sitting at his desk, still on a conference call.
The second he hangs up, I’m going in. I’ve got to get this over with. Jessica isn’t going to hold this over my head.
“But doesn’t Spencer think you guys are dating? Didn’t he say to go to the holiday party together? This isn’t the same as falsifying reports. It’s your personal business. Who cares if Jessica’s perverted ass saw you guys getting busy in the backyard? By the way, can I just tell you how proud of you I am?” She swoons and presses her hand to her heart.
I haven’t seen Chase since the party Saturday.
The memory of us outside Saturday night floods my mind. Longing whispers through me when I think how my skin had tingled as desire percolated between us. How my body ached for only him. But it wasn’t just sex. In that stolen moment in the shadows, our hearts eclipsed, but lust blindsided me. I couldn’t see it then, but we were aligned in every way a man and a woman could be.
My heart wrenches.
“What proof does she even have? I mean, did she record it? If not, it’s her word against yours.”
“That’s not the point,” I whine.
“Then what the hell is because I’m confused,” Nina heaves a frustrated sigh. “You weren’t at work, you’re consenting adults, and no matter what the suck-up thinks, you and Chase are so freaking hot together. Don’t let her throw shade on your parade.”
“Actually, Jessica said we looked good together, too…”
A wave of dread washes over me as Spencer leans forward doing that smile-at-the-phone-because-I’m-about-to-end-the-call nod.
My stomach plummets because I’ve got to get to him before Jessica does. This was my idea. I can’t hurt Chase.
I scrub my hands over my face and pinch the bridge of my nose. “This all started because Spencer James likes to promote ‘sticky people,’ remember?”
“Um what?” Nina’s top lip curls and the crease between her brows deepens.
“At the all-hands meeting. Jessica was talking about how Spencer always grooms people who have reasons to stick around. You know, marriage, kids, mortgage. I don’t have any of those things. Just a fake relationship with Chase.”
“But that’s just it. You’re completely missing the point. It clearly isn’t fake.” Nina’s tone is so sharp and matter of fact. The way she pins me with her stare, it’s like she’s a mirror, and there’s nowhere to hide my feelings for Chase.
I drag my gaze to meet her warm brown eyes. They’re filled with empathy as she softens her tone.
“You’ve got so much more to offer than your relationship status, Riley. What matters is, you’re real…and ethical and a hard worker. Whether you’ve been in this relationship for two weeks or four years, it doesn’t matter. He knows you’re loyal, committed and, and you’re innovative, dammit.” She laughs. “That’s who he wants working for him. A real person.”
She rights herself and rounds the corner until she’s in my cubicle. She stands at my side, and we both watch as Spencer replaces the phone receiver on the base.
“Be honest. If Jessica wasn’t a factor, would you be telling me not to tell him? For me, this also has to do with my integrity. Lying to get what I want is not the route I want to take to advance my career.”
Nina doesn’t miss a beat. “No. But I’d also remind you what you have with Chase doesn’t come along every day. It’s what every single subscriber to Lovestruck and every other dating app out there is looking for. It’s what Keira is looking for. Love. It’s why it’s a billion-dollar industry. Everyone wants love, but it is not promised to anyone.”
The corners of my eyes sting as I swallow my words.
Do I love Chase?
Spencer swings his door inward and walks out of his office. He flashes Nina and me a quick smile as he walks past my desk toward web development, and I don’t say a word. I simply let my chin drop and the tears fall.
After working the whole day without talking to Riley, my heart is in my throat. I thought giving her the space she needed to process everything that happened Saturday night was the right move—let her come to me first. She didn’t, though. As far as I know, she didn’t meet with Spencer, so all is not lost. Yet. But I can’t let another day go by without talking to her.
This is why I’m outside her door, freezing my ass off with my heart on my sleeve at eight in the evening. I’m loaded down with Chinese, another batch of her favorite M&M Christmas cookies, and the Secret Santa gift I never got a chance to give her.
A whisper of a breeze sweeps through the trees as I ring the doorbell and take a step back, biting back a shiver. When the door swings open, a wave of warmth, light, and minty fragrance washes over me.
“Rile—” Her name dies on my tongue when a woman with rich brown skin and gold-flecked brown eyes appears in the doorway. She’s taller and curvier, with a mass of textured curls instead of locs, but I immediately see the resemblance.
A smile breaks out on her face when I don’t say anything else.
“She’s indisposed at the moment, but I’m Keira, her sister. You must be Chase.”
I’d be lying if I said her knowing my name didn’t send a wave of warmth through me—it means, one way or the other, Riley’s been talking about me. She hasn’t forgotten me.
Yet.
Keira’s whole demeanor is airy and welcoming, and even though I’m still on the wrong side of the door, the tension in my shoulders drains the slightest bit.
“Is it weird I just want to say, ‘It’s carolers,’ like Keira Knightly did in Love Actually?” She laughs. “You’re much cuter than that guy, though. Plus, he always makes me think of fighting zombies, so there’s that, too…”
Keira’s gaze drifts over me appraisingly, and her full lips quirk into a smile.
“Uh, yeah,” I start, shaking the confusion from my head. “I’m sorry, I just… Do you know when she’ll be available? I really need to talk to her.”
My eyes dart past her into Riley’s bright, relaxed living room, and Keira leans into my line of sight blocking my view before peeking over her shoulder. When she returns her attention to me, her eyes are narrowed, and her eyebrows pull down. She’s got an air of defiance in the way she heaves a sigh.
“Look, if it were up to me, I’d let you in, and you two could kiss and make up.” Her tone is gentle and careful as she dips her chin. “But Riley’s my big sister, and even though I think she’s crazy insane to let you go, she has too much dirt on me to even think about overriding her ‘wishes.’” She air quotes the word and rolls her eyes playfully.
I’m listening, swallowing the emotion thick in my throat, ready to suck up my pride when she winks.
It’s so off-putting, I freeze, unsure of exactly what is happening.
“Uh…” Tilting my head, I scratch my beard, and my posture loosens.
But Keira just stands there, her gaze darting this way and that, and I’m truly thrown. Her eyes widen like she’s trying to communicate something, but it’s gobbledygook to me.
My mind races, and I narrow my eyes, searching for answers.
Then Keira presses the air with her palms, nodding, before holding up a finger. Apparently, she’s going to catch me up on this game of charades.
“So, as adorable as you are standing out there in the cold,” she says super loud. “I know you’re shivering and alone with those big puppy-dog eyes and all this delicious food…” she says, trailing off with another exasperated sigh and I catch on.
We have an audience. The woman who’s taken my heart hostage is listening behind her, and we’re making our plea without saying as much.
“And with Christmas right around the corner, too. It’s a shame.” Keira smacks her teeth dramatically and makes this tsking, cooing noise that is so hilarious I’m having a hard time keeping a straight face. “But I’m going to have to ask you to respect her wishes, too. Goodbye Chase. Best of luck to you.”
Apparently, this is the end of her bleeding-heart monologue because she gestures for me to say something. She makes a pouty lip sad face and pretends to wipe away tears with her fists over her eyes. She wants me to milk this for everything it’s worth.
Playing off her energy, I clear my throat and sniffle for effect. My voice is flat and monotone as I get into character.
“I guess I’ll go watch This Christmas or Elf,” I say, letting my shoulders droop, and bowing my spine. “Maybe I’ll drown my sorrows in a vat of spiked eggnog.” I have to cough to stop myself from both laughing and gagging. I’m halfway hoping Riley will hear the Christmas classics I’ll be forced to endure and come out and save me.
“Be well,” Keira says with the air of a seasoned thespian.
Rubbing a fist against my chest, I hold a hand up to wave and turn on my heel. “You don’t have a tissue, do you?” I sniff again.
When I peek over my shoulder, Riley is at the door with her arms folded across her chest.
I choke back a laugh.
She’s standing beside Keira, and there are traces of humor and sadness in her expression, but she flashes me a smile anyway. “You two are literally the worst. Useless, the both of you.” She chuckles as she moves outside.
My heart gives a small lurch to see her in the sweatpants and T-shirt she wore home when she stayed over my house.
“What are you doing here, Chase?”
“Aside from freezing my ass off out here, I’m trying to bribe you with food and bring you the Secret Santa gift I never got to give you, and…I’m also here to plead my case.” I laugh despite the heavy, hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach.
“Your case?”
The breeze picks up again and I flit a glance over my shoulder as a car passes by.
Keira shoots Riley a raised brow daring expression. Her lips purse, and her arms cross, letting on she’s well aware of everything that’s happened between Riley and me up until now. I’m just glad to have her on my side.
“Hear him out,” she says.
Riley and I laugh because this is unexpected for both of us. Even when she first conjured up the phony office romance, I couldn’t have anticipated we’d be here now.
She sags against the door frame, her arms still folded across her chest and her eyes watery with indecision. “Listen—"
“Please.” I set the bags of Chinese food—my only source of heat at the moment—on the pavement beside me and jam my hands in my back pocket. I’ve got to get this right. Dropping my chin for a beat, I close my eyes. “This was all supposed to be a fake relationship, I know, but somewhere along the way, it wasn’t—it isn’t. Honestly, I don’t know that it ever was. Not for me.”
I lift my head and meet Riley’s soft gaze.
“So, I’m asking you not to tell Spencer. Not to stage our breakup when you get this promotion. Let’s date. Please, let’s keep exploring this amazing thing that fell into our laps.”
“Chase, I can’t. Where’s my integrity if I lie to get a promotion? If I allow your job to be a risk because of it?”
Her voice hitches, and my throat tightens. My vision blurs as I nod, my mind warring with sadness and fear. To be so close to Riley and know I’m losing her, it feels like a knife to my heart. I’m devastated and desperate.
“I don’t care if I get fired over a lie about a relationship that shouldn’t matter when it comes to you getting this job. You’re the best candidate. Period.” I throw my hands up, begging her to see my perspective.
She just shakes her head.
“Listen, being at Lovestruck has never been about career growth for me, and maybe it should be, but I’m still more interested in learning about real love. This, what you and I have, nothing about it is superficial or run of the mill. I want the kind of love my parents had, and this is the closest thing I’ve experienced to it. I’d rather have you than this job, Riley.”
She presses a hand to her eyes and wipes. It’s killing me not to be able to go to her, take her in my arms, and kiss her pain away.
Her voice is thick with emotion. “I just can’t let you do that for me. I’ll make sure Spencer knows it was all me—that you had nothing to do with it.”
“Why not? What we have is so much more important to me. I can get another job anywhere,” I say, hating the desperation in my tone.
“But why should you have to? I’m the one who got us into this by lying. Chase, I’m not willing to hurt the ones I love…” she trails off and panic appears on her beautiful face. Her lips are parted and her eyes wide with surprise as she gasps.
She didn’t finish her sentence, but that one word, those four letters, they’re all I need to hear to know I’m not insane for feeling what I’m feeling.
My heart knocks around in my chest.
In one long stride, I erase the distance between us, cupping her face. Our lips are inches apart, and I’m breathless, but I have to say something first. “I love you, too.” A smile tugs the corners of my mouth. It feels so good to name this feeling that’s been welling up in my heart these past few weeks. “Riley Mills, I’m so in love with you.”
Then, I let my lips crash down on hers. Every nip and lick and swipe of our tongues feels urgent, necessary. It’s messy and complicated, like us. Heat curls down my spine, my body throbbing as desire radiates between us. She rubs her hands wildly over my chest, and it feels so good to know she’s missed me, too.
I release a low growl, loving the way my skin blazes beneath her touch. She’s jump-starting my heart the way only she knows how.
“Ew,” Keira says good-naturedly, edging back into the house. “There is such a thing as public indecency. Take it to the bedroom.”
We pull back from the kiss, and I’m laughing, but then I notice Riley’s pained expression and the tears she doesn’t try to hide. Her silence is deafening.
Humiliation burns through me. What I thought was a shared homesick hunger and desire isn’t.
She cups a hand over her mouth. Her chin is quivering and her shoulders curl over her chest. Her posture is crumbling, and I know this was a goodbye kiss.
“Riley, please.”
She reaches out to touch me then pulls back. Her voice cracks, “I’m so sorry. I can’t do this to you.” Then she steps back and closes the door on us.