Indecent Arrangements: Tabloid Affair, Secretly Pregnant!

And then she was climbing out of bed—dragging the sheet he’d barely had a corner of with her as she cast an impish wink back and darted for the bathroom.

His fingers tingled where he’d almost gotten hold of her. Damn, it was a good thing they were taking this off a physical level. He liked control. After the past six months, he needed it. And Payton, all naked and soft, had an unnerving ability to threaten his.

He glared at the closed bathroom door. He wasn’t following her in there.

The shower sounded, then the quiet thud of the sliding glass door as it closed.

He wasn’t going to take her against the tile wall. Bury himself inside her again. No. Because if he gave in, one more time wouldn’t be enough. It would be again and again. Finding new and creative ways to get Payton’s petite form wrapped tight around him. In his arms. In his bed. But that was all he’d have to offer her. Sex. And right now, the friendship they both needed was more important than that.

So, no. Definitely not. He wouldn’t follow.

Chapter Six

PAYTON stood beneath the hot spray, her body tender from sensual satisfaction, her mind whirling a mile a minute as she began to compartmentalize everything that had happened with Nate. Everything that would happen. She needed to be cool, to make sure he understood she didn’t have expectations about a future together. Or at least a romantic future. Because while last night had been incredible—exciting in a way she hadn’t believed possible and would never regret—it was the going forward that mattered.

Going forward as friends.

Tipping her face beneath the water, she pushed back the sodden curls, wringing the heavy mass clean.

These past hours with Nate had been a taste of what she’d missed so much over the years. Someone who could see her as she truly was. Accept her without recrimination. He hadn’t balked at her attraction—her interest in a single night of insanity. He’d helped her embrace it.

She needed that kind of freedom and acceptance as she edged out of the mold of perfect daughter to a man no longer there to maintain it for. She needed to be real.

Brandt wouldn’t approve of this business with Nate, and her mother—well, she was already worried out of her mind about the changes Payton had made with her career, her apartment, Clint. Most of all Clint. Nate would be just one more thing. But it was time she stopped living her life to someone else’s expectations.

Turning the brass tap fixtures to “off”, she stepped from the shower and knotted a thick terry bath sheet between her breasts. Stared into the mirror seeing the foggy image of a woman no one knew.

She’d been alone for too long. Surrounded by so many people—all the right people with their picture-perfect smiles and placid conversation—yet none of them knew her. What she really thought. Who she was.

And at the first sign she might be more than they believed, the talk had started. Concerned talk. Catty talk. The kind of talk she’d never been interested in and didn’t care to listen to now. She’d rather be alone. Only eventually loneliness wore on a person and they started to search for someone—a friend—to take them as they were.

A breath eased from her chest. A smile curved her lips.

She’d found Nate. And he’d asked her to be the friend he needed. When she needed one most. So this would work.

She opened the bathroom door and stepped into the now sun drenched suite, scanning the floor for her panties and bra. And her dress! She didn’t want to put that thing on again, but unless she planned to sprint for Nate’s limo in a robe it was the only option.

They’d started by the wall, but the floor was clear. Then the bed—

Her lips parted in silent awe.

Nate sat reclined against the headboard in his black trousers and bare feet, hair a spiky mess and tuxedo shirt hanging open down his chest. His attention fixed on The Wall Street Journal in his hands.

The look was all sin and seduction and wild bad-boy. This was the shot the magazine should have run next to his most-wanted bachelor bio. He wouldn’t be able to beat the women off with a stick.

Forcing her gaze away before he needed the stick for her, she noticed the pink lounge pants, zip jacket and shirt neatly folded at the foot of the bed. An accompanying set of lacey panties and bra lay beside them. “When—How?”

Without looking up, he yawned, “While you were in the shower.”

She checked the tags. This man had practice purchasing women’s clothing. “Quite an impressive skill set you have going on—your ability to guess sizes so accurately.”

A wry smile tugged at his lips. “I’ve got my limitations. I’d’ve had a tough time eyeballing you for a fitting. But I know exactly what fills my palm.”

“You’re bad,” she muttered, running a fingertip over the soft fabric.

“Yeah, but, as we’ve already established…” he folded the paper and tossed it beside him “…you like it.” Rising from the bed, he cast a lazy glance her way—and stopped. His eyes riveted to her.

“What?” Her hands went to her hair, seeking out some pile of suds she’d missed. Then, tucking her chin, she looked down. Everything packed away where it was supposed to be, and yet Nate’s halted posture—his unsettled reaction—was clearly in response to her. “Is something wrong?”

And then she saw it, in the last second before he gave an abrupt shake of the head and turned his back to her.

Heat. Desire. Ruthlessly shut down. She understood they weren’t continuing a physical relationship, but his almost hostile reaction—

“Nate?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest to stave off the cool chill running through her heart.

“Nothing. Just realized I forgot a file at the office,” he answered abruptly. “Go on and get dressed and we’ll get out of here.”

Payton took a step back. “Sure. Of course.” Just as well. She’d been looking at Nate like too much of a temptation anyway and that wasn’t going to work. Not for either of them. Gathering the loungewear he’d gotten for her, she went back to the bathroom. The sooner they got out of this suite and back onto solid friendship ground, the better.

A few minutes later she returned to find a hastily scrawled note atop the bed.

Had to rush out. My driver is waiting for you downstairs.

I’ll get your address and stop over this afternoon.

Payton stared down at the note in blatant disbelief. She’d been on the other side of the door, a few panels of wood between then, and he’d left a note? The nerve!

No—this was something other than nerve. Nate would never intentionally hurt her. He might cat around, but he wasn’t cruel and he wasn’t callous. Her mind played back the minutes before he’d left, slowing to that last glimpse of desire and then anger. He hadn’t wanted to see her that way. Hadn’t wanted the attraction.

So be it. She’d look at this as the clean break they needed.

When she saw him again, it would be as friends.

And then her friend could explain what kind of a mess he’d gotten himself into that he needed a pretend affair to cover it up.

Nate raked his fingers through his hair, balling them at the base of his skull before letting go with a grunt. His dogged strides ate up the sidewalk, taking him fast from the scene of the crime. He was a jackass of the most contemptible variety. But seeing her there, wrapped in that towel, wet tendrils of hair snaking over her bare shoulders, tiny beads of water sprinkled across the swells of her freshly scrubbed skin—it was like being thrown back in time. To a place he didn’t want to revisit.

To a time when he was still mere potential and promise. Trying to exist within the confines of an environment that wanted to squelch the pride and drive out of him. Teach him a lesson. Show him he wasn’t good enough. That nothing he did could change it.

When all the frustrations and inequities of his youth came to a head—all driven by one inadvertent mistake. One look. One girl.

And like that, the years folded over and his feet were pounding up the stairs at the Liss house as he went for the textbook he’d left on Brandt’s floor the night before. Breaking the landing, he’d looked up, and through the open door of Payton’s bedroom, there she was. Brandt’s little sister emerging from her bathroom—fresh from the shower. Totally unaware.

He stopped breathing. Stood, mouth agape, stunned. Payton, his little shadow—always bundled in those conservative sweaters, jackets and formless clothing, her hair restrained, her legs covered—stood wrapped in a towel, her curls wet and wild, her curves unmistakable, her legs bare and pink and looking so soft. He jerked his gaze away. Snapped his jaw shut and forced his fists into his pockets.

God help him, she was beautiful. Hell, he’d known she was beautiful. Sweet and funny. But he’d never wanted her until that very minute and it caught him like a sock to the gut.

For too many reasons he had to get out of there. Couldn’t risk that he’d look again.