Finn

"HERE," I SAY, PULLING RYLIE TO HER FEET. I shrug off my cardigan and lay it across the end of the bed and then begin lifting the hem of my shirt, but I only get it halfway up my chest before I feel her cold hands grip my forearms.

"What do you think you're doing?" she all but screeches. Her eyes are wide, the green shimmering in the warm hotel lamps.

"Wy," I say with a huff of a laugh, peeling her hands off my arms. I pinch the fabric of her dress at her hip, but I hold her gaze. "Do you really want to wear this tight ass thing to bed? That can't be comfy. I was giving you my shirt to sleep in."

"Oh." She doesn't so much say the word as mouth it, twin dots of pink flood both cheeks. "Yeah, that makes sense. But, wait, what will you sleep in?"

I smirk and wordlessly lift the shirt over my head, offering it to her. "Don't worry about me, Wyatt."

I unbutton my pants, but she quickly stops me before I can work the zipper down with a hand on my wrist. "If you're about to tell me you sleep naked, you can stop right there. Unless there are undies on under these pants, you can button that right back up."

I laugh, the booming sound filling the small hotel room. "I never knew you were such a prude, Miss Foss! Relax, I have undies." I knowingly flash my dimples—I'm not above weaponizing them—as I slowly unzip my jeans, studying her as I push them down my legs, leaving me in only my gray boxer briefs.

She blinks a few times but maintains eye contact. It almost feels like a staring contest: me daring her to look and her refusing to give in.

I know I'm getting to her. And I also know she doesn't like that I am. Usually she's fairly impervious to my blatant flirting, but tonight is different. She seems affected by me but is fighting it.

I can work with that.

When the staring contest goes on too long, I drag a hand up my chest, pausing to scratch my pec before gripping the back of my neck. This draws her attention, and she finally looks down, her eyes blinking rapidly as she takes in my nearly naked body before she squeezes my shirt to her chest and disappears into the bathroom to change. Apparently, I don't get a show.

Long minutes later, she emerges, and for the few seconds before she turns off the bathroom light, she's backlit, framed in the doorway, a golden spotlight surrounding her. My mouth goes dry, and I work my tongue around to produce some saliva as I stare at her.

I can't decide if I made a huge mistake lending her my shirt, or if it was the best decision of my life. But, goddamn, is she sexy as hell. Drop dead fucking gorgeous.

If I liked her legs in that green dress, then I'm downright enamored with them in my shirt. The hem hits mid-thigh, covering all the naughty bits, but there's enough showing to be a sinful tease. I hold my hands up by my face and take a fake picture. "Click."

Tugging on the bottom of the shirt, she walks toward me. "Don't be a perv and tell me that's for your spank bank."

I laugh. "Fine. I won't say it. But I'm ok with you taking a picture for yours." When she tries to swat my stomach, I snatch her hand and press it flat against my chest. "Ok, fine, I'll behave. But, Wyatt. Shit, honey, you know you're gorgeous, right?"

"And you know you're..." She frees her hand and circles it around my bare chest and stomach. "This."

"This?" I laugh. "Wy, you can actually say something nice about me. You know that, right? I'll help you out." I raise my voice a few octaves to emulate her, "Why, Finnegan, your abs are so yummy, I could lick them." I deepen my voice again as I continue, "Feel free to lick whatever you want, Wily."

"Oh god," she whines. "You just ruined it. No matter how hot this part of you might be..." She gestures at me from my neck down. "This part of you will always ruin it." She presses her hand over my mouth and then scans her eyes all over my body before coming back up to look me in the eye. "Much better."

I circle my hand around her wrist, pulling her hand down to rest against my chest again. "All I heard is you think I'm hot."

She throws her head back and groans. "You're pure ridiculousness, Finnegan."

"You love it."

"Doubtful. And for the love of God, put these damn dimples away!" She pokes her fingers into the divots in my cheeks, and I wonder how long she's wanted to do that.

With my hands gripping her elbows, I bring her in closer to me, our bodies mere inches apart; and she gasps, catching herself with her palms to my pecs. "Now, Wy. I already told you if you're not careful, I might think you actually like me."

"Also, doubtful," she says as she stalks to the bed and folds her side of the covers down. She crawls under the blankets and punches her pillow a few times before she lies back, her red hair fanned out under her head. Even covered up from the neck down, she's still beautiful.

After switching off all the lights except the lamps by the bed, I slip under the blankets on my side. We immediately flip to our sides to face each other. I reach across the bed to comb the hair out of her eye, and I finger the strands between my fingers. "Fuck me red," I whisper.

She holds her index finger over my lips and shakes her head. Grinning at her, I steal her hand away, tucking it against my chest under the covers.

We're quiet for a few moments while we lay facing each other. Then I broach the subject we never finished at the bar. "If you really need a fake whatever to appease your parents, I'll do it, Wyatt. It'll be easier with me than some random dude. We already know each other, have a rapport. Chemistry. And, yes," I say talking over her attempt to interrupt me, "we do whether you want to admit it or not. We'd be much more believable than some rando. It makes sense, Wy. Think about it. I won't even hound you about the reason you need me so bad."

"Like I said, I don't need you."

"Well, you can have me anyway. Use me."

"That's what she said."

I smirk. "Yeah, she did."

"Finn!" she groans in uncontained exasperation and flings herself onto her back. "This is a bad idea. I know I'll end up regretting it. I don't do messy, remember? And this has messy written all over it."

"Why does it have to be messy?" I go up onto my elbow so I can peer down at her. "It doesn't have to be messy, Rylie."

"This cannot in any way, shape or form be real. Ok?" She points her finger at me with narrowed eyes. "You are not allowed to fall in love with me."

I smile down at her, caressing my knuckles over her cheek. "That's cute, Wyatt. But I'm a big boy. You don't have to worry about me."

"I'm not worried about you, Finnegan. I'm worried about me. I'm not looking to clean up any messes after this is all said and done. Not only are we intertwined in our personal lives, but our professional ones too. This reeks of mess."

"Maybe it's just my shirt you're smelling."

At this, she lifts my shirt to her nose and inhales. "Nah, it already passed the sniff test."

Laughing, I fall back onto the bed, staring up at the ceiling. I find her hand under the covers, and I intertwine our fingers. "It won't be messy, I promise. Let me help you." I turn my head on the pillow to look at her. "Please, Wy. Let me help you."

She turns to me, her eyes studying me. With a sigh, she finally relents. "I'm going to regret this, aren't I?"

A smile curves my lips, stopping just shy of detonating the dimples. "Not a chance." Then I shamelessly let them loose. I anticipate her hand before she can shove my face away, and I force it above her head on the pillow as I hover over her. "Be a good girl. I am your devoted fiancé after all."

"Oh God, you just can't help yourself, can you?"

I boop her nose before falling back onto the bed, putting a bit of space between us. "At least you'll never have to be afraid of being bored with me. I keep things interesting. I'm at least good for that."

Those green eyes, partly shadowed in the low light, study me. Most people don't take the time to look deeper, past the sarcasm and witty remarks, but Rylie has always seemed to look a bit longer than most. I don't break eye contact, allowing her to see whatever it is she's searching for.

"I have a feeling," she finally says, breaking the silence, "there's more to you than you let on, Finn Anderson. Hiding under your awful fashion sense and floppy hair and endless immaturity is someone you don't show the world very often. And that's fine. It's not like I'm exactly an open book either. But if we're doing this thing, we'll be spending more time together, so it's ok if you want to drop the act from time to time. Let the real Finn come out to play. I promise I won't tell anyone that you're sweet and smart and kind of adorably dorky. But," she quickly tacks on, lifting the covers to peek at what lies beneath, "I'll definitely be keeping this a secret. Jesus, who knew you were hiding that under your clothes?"

"Feel free to touch if you want." I smirk at her, trying to disguise how her words affected me. I have carefully crafted these walls of indifference over the years, and I don't want the terrifying woman next to me to single-handedly tear them down.

"No. Absolutely not. There will be none of that. Ok? That's a rule if we decide to go through with this." Her serious expression, made more ominous by the uneven light casting shadows over her face, makes me laugh.

"Fine, Wyatt. But we should agree to be 'exclusive' if we want it to look real. I'm assuming it's a ruse for everyone, not just your parents?" I pause to get her confirmation before continuing. When she nods, I say, "Right, so we should stop sleeping around while we play this part then."

Not that it will really be a problem for me since it's been months since I've slept with anyone. I've been restless lately, not really feeling the whole hookup scene anymore. Until tonight when I saw Rylie at the bar, I hadn't felt that spark with anyone in a while. But this woman sharing my bed? Fireworks. A whole fourth of July show. I know it's probably stupid to go into this fake relationship scenario with her when she's so clearly ruled out anything physical, but I'm not about to pull the plug on something that finally has me feeling again. Being a walking, breathing, nearly catatonic zombie but still wearing my outgoing, charming skin to the world is exhausting. Maybe a few weeks of playing the part of someone's fiancé is exactly what I need to wake up from this depression.

"Exclusive?" She wrinkles her nose. "I've never once in my life have been exclusive."

"Ever?" This gets my attention. "Like never, ever?"

She shakes her head, hair falling across her face. I brush it away without thinking, my fingers skimming the softness of her cheeks. "Why settle for just one when you can have as many as you want?"

I suspect Rylie has constructed similar walls around herself as well. I just wonder how sturdy the walls are and how hard they'd be to break down. Are we talking the first little pig's attempt with the straw house, the second pig's with the sticks or the smartest one with the brick? How hard will I have to blow to knock her house down?

"Well, for the time being, you'll be settling for just one. At least I'm nice to look at, right?"

She rolls her eyes but doesn't bother hiding her smile. Reaching for her phone, she scrolls through the myriad of apps and delicately fingers her screen. "Bye, dating apps. It's not forever, I promise."

I tackle her onto the bed, tearing the phone from her hands and leaning across her to unceremoniously deposit it on the nightstand. The blankets fell in the shuffle, exposing her torso, and I soak up the exposed skin from the shirt riding up, bunched up at her waist. My eyes are stuck on the pink panties, the lace material she selected at home with the intention of showing them to some random guy tonight. I tug down the shirt, hiding the off-limits zone, before bringing my gaze back up to her face.

Her bottom lip is tucked between her teeth, her breathing shallow, and fuck me if I don't feel that straight down to my very hard cock. "Jesus," I groan, sprawling onto my side of the bed with an audible plop. "It'll be a miracle if I don't die of blue balls by the end of this."

"Same," she says in a breathy voice. "But the girl version of that."

This makes me laugh, and I turn onto my side to face her again. She mimics me, and I trace my finger over her lips. "We should probably practice kissing, though, Wy. We wouldn't want to be bad at it when we have to do it for show."

Brushing my hand away, she shakes her head. "No. I don't do kissing."

I scrunch my forehead at her confession. "You mean in these kind of fake scenarios? Or ever?"

"Ever. It's too intimate." Her whispered words feel like a ghost of a kiss as they breeze across my lips.

I prop myself up on my elbow, hovering slightly over her body. "Wait. Are you serious right now, Rylie? You never kiss? Like ever?"

"Nope. Never." Her green eyes dance as they look from one of my eyes to the other, then travel down my face to my lips.

"Not before sex? During foreplay?" I quiz her, trying to untangle this mystery.

She shakes her head, the red hair rustling beneath her on the pillow.

"Not during sex? In the heat of passion?"

She shakes her head again, biting her lip.

I set her lip free, then trace my finger over the plumpness. "Not after? As a thank you for the orgasm?"

"No, Finn," she whispers, the words vibrating against my fingers.

I continue my examination of her mouth, my fingers leaving no part untouched. "Not before you slink out of their bed to return to your own?"

With a light grip on my wrist, she removes my hand from her face. "No, never. It's my one rule."

"Well, shit," I whisper, my eyes returning to her intense ones. "That's a real fucking shame."

"Why?" Her voice is quiet, that familiar raspy sound crawling across my skin, straight to my dick.

"Because, Wy, kissing is the best fucking part."