At some point, this fake relationship would actually start to feel fake. Right? Because at the moment, Carolina was stuck in her bedroom, unable to go to the kitchen to get a simple glass of water without getting dressed and that was a pain. Who wanted to put clothes on just to wander around your own house? But not putting on clothes meant she’d be parading around in a skimpy little tank top and short-shorts in front of Charlie, and after he’d nearly singed her hair off with nothing more than a charged glance earlier, she wasn’t sure she had the fortitude to take chances. Fine time to find out he still got her blood humming. Not that she’d ever fooled herself into believing he’d lost even an ounce of his snake oil salesman personality. The man could convince every last resident of Siberia to buy a case of sunscreen in January. That’s all this case of the tingles was. His charisma was legendary. So what? She could resist him. Water. Cool, clear, crisp water. Her throat was still on fire from that same charged moment. Tap water from the bathroom wouldn’t do. It tasted like lead and dirt. Plus, this was her house. What was she going to do, hide out for fourteen days? Seventeen. Whatever arbitrary number Charlie had slapped on it, it didn’t matter. She needed water. And if she felt like walking around naked, what was he going to do about it? All at once, the feel of his fingers on her arm ghosted through her as she contemplated exactly what he might do about it. But then he hadn’t kissed her earlier when he’d had the opportunity. Which was great. There’d been no mistaking the intent burning through the space between them. Kissing was definitely on his mind. She might have slapped him if he had. Or not. Jury was still out. And then he’d shifted at the last second to her cheek. Strictly to throw her off guard, no doubt, which he excelled at. It wouldn’t happen again. She’d make sure of it. Emboldened, she flung open her bedroom door and strode into the living room, consequences be darned. Empty. So was the kitchen. Fine then. She’d worried about nothing. Humming, she poured herself a tall glass of water from one of the Fiji bottles in the fridge and leaned a hip against the granite countertops that she’d painstakingly picked out. They were black, a contrast to the white cabinets, which Eliza had rolled her eyes at. But it was Carolina’s house and she’d wanted something more interesting to look at than brown. The fact that she didn’t really cook a lot hadn’t mattered a whit. “Fancy meeting you here.” Carolina k ept her suddenly frozen fingers wrapped around the glass. Barely. Charlie waltzed into the kitchen like he owned the place, his gaze traveling boldly down her scantily clad frame. Heat trailed along the wake of his fiery stare as if he’d developed superhero style laser vision. Now she was sorry she hadn’t taken a minute to throw on a pair of jeans. “Yeah, what were the odds?” she snapped back, just to show that he didn’t affect her. Or, more to the point, that she’d learned to live with it.
His effect on her would have had to stop in order for it to have started up again. “I have to honestly say that I’m a fan of casual Tuesdays around here.” “A gentleman would have averted his eyes upon finding his roommate in the kitchen without a robe.” “Since none of those labels apply here...” His gaze didn’t flicker and in all honestly, the hot appreciation reflected there—for her—had started going to her head. He liked her half-dressed look. It was far more thrilling than it should have been and way too empowering. They’d never lived together the first time, nor had she ever gotten that far with any other man. Not that she’d had a plethora of them beating her door down for a shot at her company. Charlie had been the first to get her to contemplate such a st ep. In the four months they’d dated, the passion between them had been instantaneous and off the charts. After he’d proposed, she’d spent more than a few nights wondering what their honeymoon would be like. Maybe that had contributed to her unease the morning of the wedding. What kind of hold would he have on her if she let the promise in his kiss really take root in her heart? “I can totally buy the bit about you not being a gentleman, but I am most assuredly nothing more than a roommate,” she told him and sipped her water to coat her still dry throat. He cocked his head, a tiny smile playing about his chiseled lips, which had always been prettier than was expressly fair to have been granted to a man. “What exactly do you think is going to be happening around here over the next seventeen days?” “You’re going to find a loophole to stretch it out to twenty?” she guessed flatly. “Hmm.” The look on his face said he was considering the possibilities. “That just shot to the top of the list. But not before item number one. Which is lots of romance. Non-negotiable.” Charlie had always been a romantic, from the first, when he’d chased her down at the farmer’s market, clutching a cactus she’d been admiring at a succulent vendor. He’d held it out to her and said, “For you. You strike me as the kind of woman who would appreciate this more than flowers.” And he’d been right. Right enough to get her phone number, which had led to a stellar first date that hadn’t ended until dawn. They’d talked all night long, spurred by the early discovery that they’d both majored in psychology and both had a focus on relationship dynamics. Charlie had walked her to her door and before she could say good night, he’d backed her against it, treating her to the most torrid kiss imaginable. She knew body physiology and had studied the brain’s rec eptors to stimuli as part of her degree plan. A kiss was nothing more than chemical reactions interpreted as attraction, a necessary st ep toward procreation. Logical people could control it. She’d have counted herself in that group before that moment.
Everything she’d known about anything had drained from her mind as pure reaction and heat and light took over. She was ashamed to say she’d never quite regained her faculties until she’d said, “I do,” which served as some kind of hypnotist’s wake-up call. She’d do well to remember how easily she fell under his spell, especially when he added romance to the menu. “That doesn’t work on me.” He lifted a brow. “Romance? Or reverse psychology?” Dang it. How could she have forgotten that Charlie had always had her number? “Romance. Duh. I... uh, forgot to mention this, but I’m actually dating someone.” To his credit, Charlie’s expression didn’t slip as he internalized that bombshell. “You don’t say. He’s sticking around as you remarry your ex- husband, after I told the whole of America my sole goal was to win you back? Does that make him a champ or a chump?” “Neither,” she countered fiercely, sorry she’d mentioned it. “He’s... no one.” Now she’d done it. Charlie was a lot of things, but stupid was not one of them. He’d demand additional details that she didn’t have. Because there was no boyfriend. “Give me his name. So we can have a little man to man chat about how he better ke ep his grubby paws off what’s mine.” She threw up a palm designed to diffuse the enormous amount of testosterone that had just exploded all over her beige travertine. “Back off, Neanderthal. We’re all adults here and he’s more than willing to bide his time until this blows over. No reason to get antsy.” “Blows ov— Carolina, you’re playing with matches in the middle of a forest full of dry timber. You best watch where you start dropping those flames.” Charlie’s gaze had grown darker and decidedly more dangerous as he advanced on her until her palm nested tight against his torso. Just as she flexed to snatch her hand away, he smacked his over it, capturing her as surely as if he’d bound her with steel cables. “You don’t scare me,” she murmured even as her breath caught in her throat, nearly strangling her. “Good. I’m not trying to.” His voice cascaded through her blood, just like it did late at night when she listened to his show on r epeat, falling asle ep to the sound of his de ep timbre, imagining he was next to her, whispering things in her ear that only she could hear. “I’ve moved on, Charlie.” A total lie. He didn’t call her on it. “I don’t care. I’ve got one agenda here—prove I can win you over. Your new boyfriend is history.” “You can’t just will him away.” The real joke was that there’d never been anyone else. But she couldn’t tell him that. His ego would become unmanageable. “I don’t have to. You aren’t in love with him. Or you wouldn’t be standing here in the kitchen with me, begging for me to realign that smart mouth of yours with mine.”
“That’s how you plan to win this bet?” Her heart started battering her rib cage. “Kiss me into oblivion until I’m so overcome by your manliness that I swoon at your feet?” “Maybe.” He sw ept her with a look so full of dark promise that she nearly crumpled to the ground. “There’ll be plenty of that in your future. But for me to win this bet, I think we have to start at a much baser level.” “Which is?” “Why you tell callers to leave their boyfriends and husbands.” Her head snapped back as she physically recoiled at the abrupt subject change. Veiled seduction she could handle. But delving into her own messed up relationship psychology was dirty pool. “Because sometimes relationships don’t work out,” she told him point blank, but the firmness of her statement did nothing to steady her knees, which had gone weak, as if she’d suddenly st epped on the deck of a rollicking ship. “Not everyone is destined to find love.” “So at least you’re admitting that some people are destined then. Right?” Which wasn’t even the point. Sure, she’d helped some of her friends who were too blinded by their pasts to get out of their own way when it came to love. But to admit it would play into his hands. And she still wasn’t sure what game was afoot here. “Why don’t we start with your philosophy instead?” The best defense was a good offense, after all. “What’s so great about sticking it out in a bad relationship that my advice becomes suspect in your world?” “Nicely done,” he purred. “Shift the mirror back to me so you can avoid answering the question.” “Is this about my advice, or us, Charlie?” He froze, going still so fast that she got disoriented all over again. “I mean, every caller’s situation is different. But most of the time, she’s seeking validation that he’s not worth the heartache and she’d be better off alone. I give them the courage to take st eps toward their own happiness, outside of the relationship. None of that has to do with whether you’re going to win this bet or not. You’re not, by the way.” “I think it has everything to do with whether you’re going to give me a chance to win this bet, sweetheart.” His low voice snaked around her, offering no slack, exactly as he’d always done. There was something wrong with her, some fatal flaw beneath her skin that allowed him to slide right inside, affecting her in ways that she couldn’t unravel with any amount of will. “You really shouldn’t call me that,” she said, not at all happy with how desperate her plea sounded, as if she liked it too much, not because it was a stupid term of endearment that most men used like a blunt instrument. But Charlie wasn’t most men. And she did like it too much. “Love isn’t a nebulous conc ept you can toss around. Describe with clinical terms until it’s lost all meaning.” Somehow, he’d moved even closer as he ripped her closely-held barriers to shreds. “Love is meant to be experienced, meant to be full of emotion and passion. And that’s what is happening here.” She forced her expression into some semblance of evenness. “Really. So to win this bet, you’re going to convince me that we’re in love and both blissfully ignorant of any problems between us. Happily ever
after. That kind of thing.” “Something along those lines.” He flashed her a brief, bright grin. “But with less sarcasm and more swooning.” She couldn’t help it. She laughed. “Since that didn’t work out so well the first time, I’m a little curious to see what you could possibly do different.” “I figured that curiosity alone would get you here,” he agreed readily, prickling the hair on her arms as she scouted around for the trap he’d just laid, which his tone told her she’d somehow blundered into without realizing it. “I’m here to show my viewers how it’s done. They trust me, and the least I can do is make sure they have a front row seat for exhibit A on how to kick a man to the curb.” He nodded sagely. “I hope they’ll forgive you when that’s not what happens.” As if. She might not have moved on from their relationship, but that didn’t mean she was sitting around pining for him. It was easier to be alone than it was to constantly worry about the moment when her husband would decide he was done, that he’d never been all that serious about marriage in the first place and walk out the door. Like her father had done. Instead, she’d done the walking out and was better for it. She never had to wait for the other shoe to drop. “If that’s your goal, you should have angled for more than two weeks,” she advised him with another halfhearted laugh. “Because you’ll need it. That’s never going to happen. I readily admit that love as a conc ept is a thing. It’s just not for everyone.” “Fortunately, we’re just concerned about whether it’s for us,” he countered smoothly as if her completely valid points had just rolled right by him. “Spoiler alert. It is.” And with that, he waltzed right out of the kitchen, leaving her hanging.