Page 19 of Resisting You
A tinny laugh cascaded from my throat. “Yes. Yes, I suppose I do, don’t I?”
Another fake laugh. Just like my fake marriage. No, the marriage was real. Wasn’t it? And he was correct… Ididknow how stars could be. Hell, I grew up alongside a whole different kind of stardom. Actress mother. Senator father. I was in the midst of it my whole life.
I pinched the bridge of my nose and before I could change my mind, I said, “I’ll email you the onboarding paperwork tonight. Just text me your info.”
I hung up and stared at my phone screen for a few breaths. What had I just done?
I glanced up at the dock to find it empty… no Noah. Where did he go?
I spun in a circle until I spotted him across the lawn, leaning the annulment papers against a post with a pen in his hand.
No.
Before I knew what I was doing, I sprinted the fifty feet across the lawn, closing the distance between us and clapped my hand down over the paper where he was about to sign.
“Wait,” I said, panting, trying to catch my breath.
“Wait?” he repeated. “As in… wait, don’t sign?”
Crap, how was I going to explain this? “I–I might have an idea. Or at least, a thread of an idea.”
“Okay,” he drew the word out, then waited for me to continue.
“You want a reason out of this bachelor auction,” I said. “But it’s more than just that. I’ve heard you talk for a year now about wanting to be taken seriously in your industry. To be seen as more than just a teen heartthrob.”
“Yeah…” Ice blue eyes coasted over me.
I swallowed, taking a long, slow inhale.Here goes nothing. “Well, you said it yourself. Being married would get you out of that. And it would probably help with a lot of your other issues, too. Especially being married to a psychologist.” I gestured to myself, lightly.
His gaze narrowed. “You want to stay married?” My body clenched at the raspy tone of his voice. God, that voice.
I tried to collect my thoughts as I stared at the papers, still pressed between the wood post and the palm of Noah’s hand to keep it from blowing away.
The panic in his eyes gutted me, freezing the blood in my veins, and I immediately regretted my plan. “Just for a little while,” I added quickly. “Long enough for you to feel like you got a stronger foothold as a serious actor.”
“And what about you? What do you get?”
With a gulp, I held my phone in the air and waved it. “New clients,” I said, quietly. “Apparently, people think I’m a better therapist to celebrities if I’m married to one.”
His gaze dropped to the phone briefly before whipping back to mine. “Who?”
I pressed my lips together and glared at him. “You know I can’t say who.”
“Not even to your husband?” A smile tilted his soft lips.
Not that I would know if they were soft. I was married to the man and had never kissed him. Or rather, I don’t remember kissing him if we did.
Instinctually, I licked my lips, my throat going dry at the thought of his mouth on mine. Slowly, I shook my head. “Nope, not even to my husband.”
He took the papers and folded them, holding them up between us. “So, let me get this straight. You want to pretend to be married in order for each of us to gain some traction in our professions?”
I nodded, then stopped myself. “Well, it’s not pretending. Wearemarried.”
“True,” he said. “But then what? We can’t get the annulment, can we?”
“We can, actually. Within two years of marriage we can get the annulment.”
Noah’s eyes bugged out. “Two years?” he whispered.
