They ordered Chinese food and sat at the dining table, getting to know each other better over a bottle of wine from Cassie’s refrigerator. Well, she had wine. He asked for a Bud, which, fortunately, she’d bought just in case her fiancé wasn’t a wine enthusiast.
“You’re really tall,” she blurted out.
“Uh, thanks?”
She tilted her head. “Six-three?”
“Four.”
She swallowed past the lump of food in her throat. She looked away from him, her gaze landing on the dog.
He’d followed them into the dining room and sat, staring up at them.
Cassie nodded her head at him. “Does he have to follow you everywhere?”
“No,” Eric said, grabbing his bottle of beer. “He just likes to.”
“Isn’t there somewhere he can stay while you’re here?”
“He stays wherever I do.” Eric took a swig of beer.
Cassie sighed.
“Is it that big a deal?”
“Kind of,” Cassie grumbled.
“We can go. That way it’ll just be you and Steven.” He smiled. “And Ann.”
“Fine. He can stay.”
“His name is Tip.”
Cassie raised her eyebrows. “Seriously?”
Eric laughed. “Seriously. I kept waiting for you to ask, but you never did.”
“No offense, but I’m trying to think of him as little as possible.” She glanced down at him. “It’s difficult seeing as he’s so … huge.”
“He’s still a baby.” Eric smiled at the look Cassie gave him. “He’s only eight months old.”
“Say what?” Cassie tried to keep her jaw from dropping. “He has to be at least a hundred pounds.”
“Nah, about eighty.” Eric chuckled at her expression. “He’s a Daniff — half Great Dane, half Mastiff.”
“What does that even mean?”
Eric looked at her for a moment. “You really don’t know anything about dogs, do you?” At her blank look, he continued. “Those are two really huge breeds.”
“Oh,” Cassie said softly. She looked at Tip again. “Apparently.”
“You’re a graphic designer?”
She was grateful for the change of subject. “I’m the creative director for the advertising department at Innovative Images.”
Eric nodded. “The same place Julia works.”
“That’s right.” Julia was the art director at the agency, which meant, technically, Cassie was her boss. Fortunately for everyone involved, the only crises Cassie couldn’t handle were ones that involved her love life — or lack thereof. In any case, theirs had never been the normal boss-employee relationship.
“Creative director, impressive. That’s the offer you couldn’t refuse?”
Cassie smiled. “Yes. I was just a lowly production assistant when I started in this field seven years ago. But after making art director, I realized I wasn’t going anywhere else at my old agency.” She picked up her glass of wine and took a sip. “And what is it you do?”
“A lot of things.”
Cassie ran a finger over the rim of her wine glass. “That’s cryptic.” It was incredibly snobby, but she hoped he had an impressive job. Steven wouldn’t be bowled over by the fact that she was engaged to bum. Well, he would be, just not in a good way.
“Well, for about six months now, I’ve been tending bar at one of the dives downtown.”
“Oh,” she said, trying to hide her disappointment, “that’s … interesting.”
Eric shrugged. “It can be. I mean, you meet interesting people.”
Cassie picked at her rapidly cooling chow mein. So he was a bartender. She could deal with that. She could just play it up as him wanting more of a laid-back job, after dealing with the stresses of being a … a … CEO, that was it.
Cassie looked at him as he devoured his sweet and sour pork. He had a little sauce dribbling down his chin. No. CEO was probably reaching.
Eric wiped his chin with the back of his hand before polishing off what was left of his beer.
Cassie watched in what could almost be described as horror. She should have listened to Julia. There was no way Steven would believe she had even gone on a date with this man, let alone agreed to marry him. This cannot get worse.
Eric pushed his now empty plate away and picked up where he had left off. “And before bartending, I drove a truck for about six months.”
Cassie’s fork stopped halfway to her mouth. She quickly forced herself to continue eating so he wouldn’t notice anything amiss. She was engaged to a bartending truck driver. “Really?” she asked, for lack of anything else to say.
Eric nodded. “That was kind of nice, actually, being on the road.”
As he dove into the details of the many ways trucking was not only lucrative, but a great life experience, Cassie’s mind drifted. How offended would he be if she suggested he make up a fake career history to go along with their fake romance? She looked at him. He looked so animated as he talked about the perils of maneuvering a big rig in inclement weather. There went that plan; she wouldn’t ask him to lie about this particular subject.
She dropped the pretense of having an appetite and placed her fork on her plate.
“You all right?” he asked.
She forced a smile. “Yeah.” She would just have to suck it up and deal the best she could. It was time for more pressing matters. “I need to fill you in on a bit of our, uh, history.”
Eric chuckled. “This should be good.”
“We met at an art museum.” Now that she actually knew him, she realized how ridiculous that sounded. How the hell would she make this work when she was trapped by lies she’d already told?
Eric folded his arms on the table and leaned forward. “And what kind of art do I like? Abstract, impressionist?”
Cassie’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly. Maybe this wasn’t such a lost cause after all. “I didn’t give details so you can like whatever you want.”
“Cool.”
He was staring at her and, once more, she lost her train of thought as she stared back at him. His dark blond hair was in desperate need of a trim. The stubble on his face gave him a rakish charm she didn’t want to acknowledge. It had to go. She liked her men clean-shaven.
She almost laughed. She also liked her men in three-piece suits, but that wasn’t happening any time soon. Fine. The stubble can stay. She wasn’t about to admit to herself that she hadn’t really wanted it to go in the first place. And that was strange indeed because she really did like her men clean —
“What are you thinking about?”
She almost jumped. You’re not my type at all. She stammered for an answer, but finally gave up. They were lying to Steven and Ann. There was no need for them to lie to each other. “I was just wondering how we’ll pull this off.”
“Care to elaborate?”
“Well, it’s just,” she shrugged, “you’re not my type at all.” There. She’d said it. It was out there. He needed to know she was not interested in any capacity so there was no need to get any ideas. She waited for his reaction to her admission. Many men would be angry, considering it a blow to their egos.
Eric smiled.
Cassie was caught off guard. “What?”
“It’s just that,” he sat back in his chair, “you’re not my type either.”
Son of a … “Oh,” she lightly, “good.” That hadn’t hurt a bit. Before she could think better of it, she asked, “So what is your type?”
He arched an eyebrow.
“Just curious,” Cassie said.
“Let’s see,” he said. He scratched at his stubble as he thought about it. “Blonde.”
“Bleached?”
“Doesn’t matter.” He bit his bottom lip as he continued to think.
Cassie tried not to stare at him biting his bottom lip.
“Tall,” he said.
“Amazonian?”
He smiled as he shook his head. “Not that tall.”
His words weren’t stinging this petite brunette at all. Cassie gave him a tight smile. “Is that it? Not a long list.”
“Well,” he said, hesitating, “that’s not it.”
“What else?”
“I like them … uh … busty.” He gave her that lopsided smirk of his again.
And, naturally, she was anything but busty. “Hmm,” she said nonchalantly, “real or fake?”
“They’re all pretty good.”
Cassie crossed her arms. “Tall, busty blondes, huh?”
Eric nodded. “Yep. You?”
Oh, she was definitely naming traits he did not possess. Not that she would be lying; she would just get a little kick out of describing the man he wasn’t. She looked up at the ceiling. “Oh, dark hair, brown eyes, not too tall and,” she shrugged, “really muscular.”
Eric just looked at her for a few seconds. He smiled. “Each of us is the polar opposite of what the other wants.”
She returned his smile. She had thrown in that muscular bit for good measure. Not that she could swear to it, but under his clothes, Eric seemed to be sporting more of a swimmer’s body than a bodybuilder’s. Not that she was thinking about what was under his clothes because that was not happening.
“Then we’re clear. No deviating from the plan to engage in,” she glanced at his mouth before her eyes darted away, “any inappropriate activity.”
“The thought never even crossed my mind,” he said softly.
His eyes glittered with … something. Cassie couldn’t tell if it was mischief or if the beer was getting to him. She stood and picked up her plate.
“Oh, and Cass,” he said as she was turning away.
She cringed. She hated being called that. She kept her face impassive as she turned back to face him. “Yes?”
“How wild are you in bed exactly?”
Her neck and face warmed immediately. “Excuse me?”
Eric stood and looked at her blankly for a few moments. “Are you a wild sleeper? A cover hog?”
“Oh,” Cassie said, releasing a pent up breath.
He tilted his head. “You didn’t think I meant — ”
“No,” she interjected. “I just don’t understand why you’d ask about that.” She turned and walked into the kitchen.
“Easy,” Eric called out. “We’ll be sleeping together, right?”
She dropped the plate she had been holding. It shattered into pieces.
“You all right in there?”
No. “Yes,” she called out to him. She braced herself against the counter and took a deep breath. Lord, how would she sleep next to that man? She was grateful she hadn’t considered their sleeping arrangements earlier.
She may have thought twice about that no inappropriate activity rule.