In Name Only: Best Friend Bride (In Name Only) / One Night Stand Bride (In Name Only) / Contract Bride (In Name Only)

He shook his head with bemusement. “It’s a sixteen-hour trip and that’s only if there’s a not a horribly long line in customs, which even a Kim cannot cut through. Trust me, I’m doing you a favor by not taking you.”

How had they shifted from talking about hot sex to visiting his grandfather? That was not how this was supposed to go.

“Well, we have plenty of time to talk about our stories, too,” she said brightly. “And the good news is that my hair is almost dry so the bathroom is yours. I like to read before going to sleep so I’ll just be here whenever you’re ready.”

“Oh. Um...” Jonas glanced at the bed and back at her. “Okay. I was thinking about sleeping on the couch and setting an alarm—”

“You can’t do that,” she cut him off in a rush. That would ruin everything. “What if someone gets up for a midnight snack? Also, the couch would be so uncomfortable. Sleep here. I insist.”

She shooed him toward the bathroom and the moment he shut the door, she dragged air into her lungs in deep gulps as she dropped the towel and twisted her hair into a modified updo at her crown, spilling tendrils down her cheeks. Then she slithered into the shameless yellow teddy and panties set that she’d picked out with Grace yesterday. Strictly so she could rub it in that she had a hot husband to wear it for, of course. And then she’d had Grace gift wrap it. The sly wink had been all her sister’s idea, so she really hadn’t fibbed much when she’d related the story to Jonas.

The lace chafed at her bare nipples, sending ripples of heat through her core. The panties rode high and tight, the strings threading between her cheeks. Not a place she was used to having pressure and friction, but it was oddly exciting.

No wonder women wore this stuff. She felt sexy and more than a little turned on just by virtue of getting dressed. Who knew?

The sound of running water drifted through the walls as Jonas went through his nightly routine. She dove into bed and pulled up the covers until they were tight around her shoulders. Wait. That wasn’t going to work. Experimentally, she draped the sheet across her chest like a toga, and threw her shoulders back. Huh. The one breast looked spectacular in the low-cut lace teddy, but the other one was covered up, which didn’t seem like the point. Inching the sheet down, she settled into place against the pillow until she was happy with how she looked.

That was a lot of skin on display. Much more than she was used to. The lace left little to the imagination.

Surely this would be enough to entice Jonas into making the most of this opportunity to share a bedroom.

Light. She leaped up and slammed down the switch, leaving only the bedside lamp illuminated and leaped back under the covers. The doorknob to the bathroom rattled and she lost her nerve, yanking the sheet back up to cover the yellow lace until X-ray vision would be the only way Jonas could tell what she was wearing. He strode into the room.

Oh, God. Was a more delicious man ever created in the history of time? He’d untucked his button-down and the tail hung casually below his waist. Plenty of access for a woman to slide her hands underneath. There was a gaping hole where his tie had been. A V framed a slice of his chest and he’d rolled his sleeves up to midforearm. It was the most undressed she’d ever seen him and her pulse quickened the closer he came.

This gorgeous creature was about to strip all that off and get into bed. With her. This was such a bad idea. Alluring and aloof was not in her wheelhouse and at that moment, she wanted Jonas with a full body ache that felt completely foreign and completely right at the same time.

“I thought you were going to be reading,” he said, and stopped in the middle of the room as if he’d hit an invisible wall.

So close. And yet so far.

She shook her head, scrambling for a plausible excuse when she’d just said that was what she planned to do. Couldn’t hold an e-reader and pretend you weren’t wearing sexy lingerie that screamed put your hands on me at the same time.

In retrospect, that might have been a nice scene. She could have been reading with the tablet propped up on her stomach, which would have left her torso completely bare without making it look like she’d set up the scene that way. Dang it. Too late now.

“I couldn’t find anything that held my attention.”

“Oh. Okay.”

And then the entire world fell away along with most of her senses as Jonas started unbuttoning his shirt. It was a slow, torturous event as he slipped the buttons free and each one revealed more of his beautiful body.

Thank God she hadn’t stuck a book in front of her face. Otherwise she’d have missed the Jonas Striptease.

She glanced up to see his dark eyes on hers. Their gazes connected and she had the distinct impression he hadn’t expected her to be watching him undress. But he didn’t seem terribly unhappy about the audience, since he kept going. She didn’t look away either.

He let the shirt fall, revealing first one shoulder, then the other. It shouldn’t have been such a shock to see the indentations of muscles in his biceps as his arms worked off the shirt. She knew he hit the gym on a regular basis. They’d been friends for a year and talked about all manner of subjects. Sometimes he told her about his workout routine or mentioned that he’d switched it up and his arms were sore. Little had she realized what a visual panorama had been in store for her as a result.

“I feel like I should be wearing something sparkly underneath my pants,” Jonas said with wry amusement. “Would it be possible for you to not watch me?”

“Oh. Um...sure.” Cheeks on fire, she flipped over and faced the wall, careful to keep the sheet up around her neck. With the motion, it stretched tight. More mummy than Marilyn Monroe, but this was her first seduction. Surely even a woman like Marilyn had a few practice runs before she got it right. This one was Viv’s.

And she needed a lot of practice, clearly, since she’d been caught staring and made Jonas uncomfortable at the same time. The whisper of fabric hitting the carpet made her doubly sorry she hadn’t been facedown in a book when he came out of the bathroom because she could easily have pretended to be reading while watching the slow reveal out of the corner of her eye.

The bed creaked and the mattress shifted with Jonas’s weight. “Still think this is a good idea?”

“I never said it was a good idea,” she shot back over her shoulder. “I said our friendship could take it.”

Which wasn’t a given now that he was so close and so male and so much the subject of her fantasies that started and ended in a bed very much like this one. And she’d been forced to miss half of it due to Jonas’s inconvenient sense of propriety. Well, he was done undressing now, right? This was her seduction and she wanted to face him. Except just as she rolled, he snapped off the bedside lamp, plunging the room into darkness.

“Good night,” Jonas said, his voice sinfully rich in the dark.

The covers pulled a little as he turned over and settled into position. To go to sleep.

As mood killers went, that was a big one. She’d totally botched this.

Okay. Not totally. This was just a minor setback, most likely because she was trying to play hard to get, which was not as easy as it sounded, and frankly, not her typical method of operation. Plus? This was not a typical relationship. Jonas needed to keep her around, so by default this wasn’t going to go like it had with her ex-boyfriends.

She had to approach this like a new recipe that hadn’t quite turned out because she’d gone against her instincts and added an ingredient that she didn’t like. And if she didn’t like it, what was the point?

This was her cupcake to bake. Being the opposite of clingy and needy had only gotten her a disinterested husband—and rightfully so. How was he even supposed to know she wished he’d roll back over and explore the lingerie-clad body she’d hidden under the covers like a blushing virgin bride? Viv wasn’t the kind of woman to inspire a man to slavish passion or it would have happened already.

She had to be smart if she couldn’t be a femme fatale.

She blinked against the dark and tried not to focus on how the sound of Jonas breathing fluttered against her skin in a very distracting way. Somehow she was going to have to announce her interest in taking things to the next level in big bold letters without also giving him the impression she couldn’t live without him. Though perhaps that last part wouldn’t be too difficult; after all, she’d already been pretending for a year.

Six (#u31b7ac24-ca2f-5f1b-b268-bc2e0c29b419)

After the weekend of torture, Jonas went to work on Monday with renewed determination to get his grandfather moving on the Park Industries merger. The sooner the ink was dry on that deal, the better. Then Jonas could get over his irritation that his marriage to Viv was what had tipped the scales toward his grandfather’s decision to retire.

Grandfather recognized Jonas’s accomplishments with Kim Electronics. Deep down, he knew that. But it rankled that the conversation about naming Jonas as the next CEO had come about after Grandfather had met Viv.

Didn’t matter. The subject had come up. That was enough. And Jonas intended to make sure the subject didn’t get dropped, because if he was forced to stay married to Viv, he should get something out of it. An Academy Award wouldn’t be out of line after the stellar performance he’d turned in at his parents’ house. How he’d acted like he’d been sleeping all night while lying next to his wife was still a mystery to him and he was the one who’d pulled it off.

Her scent still haunted him at odd moments. Like now. This conference call he’d supposedly been participating in had gotten maybe a quarter of his attention. Which was not a good way to prove he deserved the position of CEO.

But it was a perfect way to indulge in the memory of the sweet way she’d curled up next to him, her even breathing oddly arousing and lulling at the same time. He’d expected it to be weird the next morning, like maybe they wouldn’t look each other in the eye, but Viv had awoken refreshed and beautiful, as if she’d gotten a great night’s sleep. He pretended the same and they settled into an easy camaraderie around his parents that hadn’t raised a single brow.

At least that part was over. Viv’s mom and dad had invited them for dinner on Friday and he was plenty nervous about that experience. It would probably be fine. As long as he didn’t have to act like he couldn’t keep his hands off Viv. Or act like he didn’t want to touch her. Actually, he’d lost track of what he was supposed to be doing. Hence the reason he hated lying. The truth was so much easier.

But when he got home that evening after a long day that had included a two-hour debrief with Legal regarding the merger proposal, Viv was sitting on the couch with two glasses of wine. She smiled at him and he felt entirely incapable of faking anything. Especially if it came down to pretending he didn’t want to be with her.

His answering smile broadened hers and that set off all sorts of fireworks inside that should have been a big fat warning to back off, but he was tired and there was absolutely nothing wrong with having a glass of wine with his friend Viv after work. That was his story and he was sticking to it.

“Are we celebrating something?” he asked as he hung his work bag on the hook near the refrigerator.

“Yes, that I can in fact open a bottle of wine all by myself.” She laughed with that little peal he’d never noticed before he’d married her, but seemed to be a common occurrence lately. Or had she always laughed like that and he’d been too stuck in his own head to notice how warm it was?

“Was that in question?” He took the long-stemmed glass from her outstretched fingers and eased onto the couch next to her. Instantly, that turned into a big mistake as her scent wrapped around him. It slammed through his gut and his arm jerked, nearly spilling the wine.