“And the other date? Are there really that many women your mom’s trying to set you up with?”
He smiled. “Well, you see, this is where it gets good. The other one is you.”
I jolted. “Me?”
“Apparently, you made a wonderful first impression on my parents. They both now love you.”
Dang it, Jack Taylor.
“I told your dad I had a boyfriend.”
His eyebrows raised appreciatively.
“He didn’t know it was you. He shouldn’t be pushing you toward a date with me.”
He laughed and folded his arms. “My dad’s a big believer in the whole ‘all’s fair in love and war’ mentality.”
“And you can’t just tell them no?”
He shrugged. “I could. But according to them, you’re exactly my type.”
I made the mistake of looking at him just then. My stomach dropped as our eyes were locked in a crosshair battle of wills and…something else. We should have broken our gaze moments ago, but he was still staring at me, and I was having a hard time looking away.
“I figured we could help each other out. We both get away from the matchmaking, and you save face with your mom and sister. Your family already thinks we’re together. It wouldn’t be hard to convince my parents.”
I sucked in a breath. This whole thing was my idea. I knew that I should have been readily agreeing to this crazy scheme. Glenn was here. And he was still a jerk. Miles was actually trying to do me a solid, helping me out in his own twisted way.
For reasons I couldn’t define, it was too much to have him see me like this. Too personal. My emotions from being here were too cloudy. I needed to be able to hide away under a passive smile to get me through this week. And Miles had never been one to let me get away with anything. Pretending to date him would mean we would be hanging out all the time. Him seeing me interact with my mom and her new husband? No, thank you. I didn’t need him judging my life choices over Christmas break.
“What do you say, Celery Stick?”
“No.”
“No?”
“No.” Even saying it for the second time, a sliver of doubt pierced through me, but I couldn’t let him see that. “I don’t think it would be in our best interest to get involved like that. I don’t date people I work with—even if it’s just pretend.”
He gave a tiny smirk of a smile. “No?”
“No.”
“Our grasp of the English language is astonishing,” he said, grinning.
The smile was out of my mouth before I could rein it in. I bit my lip to tug my unruly mouth back into shape. Did he seem more charming here than usual? I mean…not that I ever found him charming before.
“Alright,” he sighed. “Time to pull out the big guns.” He cocked his head to the side and studied me. “What do you want?”
My brows furrowed. “Nothing.”
“Everybody wants something. Did I hear you’re sleeping on the pull-out couch?”
I swallowed before lifting my chin defiantly. “Yup. And I love it.”
“Really? Do they still have those hard metal bars across the bed?”
“I wouldn’t know. It feels great so far.” Wow, the lies were just spewing from my mouth these days.
He smiled. “What if I told you that I had access to a cabin that’s not being used right now.”
I froze as my eyes flew up to his, trying to determine if he was pulling a fast one. A sudden sense of hope infiltrated my body. “Your mom said all the cabins were rented.”
“Not this one. The gas fireplace doesn’t work, so they couldn’t rent it out.”
“It’s not heated?” I asked doubtfully. That was a no-deal for me. I had to be warm.
“It has an old wood fireplace, too. Lately, it’s more used as a cozy look for website pictures, and the gas fireplace is what’s used to actually heat the place up. But I could find you an ax.”
He grinned at me. My eyes were drawn to his five o’clock shadow and mysterious brown eyes. I found myself blushing. Hotly. It had nothing whatsoever to do with the sudden vision of Miles Taylor in red flannel outside my cabin, chopping wood.
“You make all your guests chop wood?”
“I’ll chop it for the ones I like.”
My breath stilled. Did he mean—
“So, I’ll be sure to get you an ax.”
I glared at him while he only bit his lip, smiling.
“You do this fake-dating thing with me, and the cabin’s all yours.”
Welp. The stakes were raised, and they were definitely good stakes. Very intriguing. Pretty much everything I could ever want in this place was being offered to me on a silver platter. And all for the low price of one fake boyfriend.
“Where is it?” I made a point of looking around at the rest of the cabins in the village. Every one I could see already had a vehicle parked in front. “Is it run down somewhere and crawling with mice?”
“Last I checked, the mice were tame. Just leave some cheese out every now and then, and they won’t cause any issues.”
“Miles.” I shot him a warning look.
He laughed. “No mice. It’s on a trail behind the lodge. It was one of the original cabins before they built all of these.” He motioned to the small subdivision around us.
“Do people still use it?” I had sudden visions of furniture draped in white sheets and cobwebs everywhere.
“Yeah. When the fireplace is working.” When I said nothing else, he continued. “What’s your hold up? Wasn’t this your plan?”
That I could answer. “My hold up is that you were never supposed to be here. It was just a name to scare people off. Not real.”
He shrugged. “It’s still not real, though, right?”
I bit my lip. It felt real when there was a warm body to suddenly go with the name.
“Can I think about it tonight? And let you know tomorrow?”
He crossed his arms over his chest and shrugged. “You can, but I can’t guarantee the offer will be the same tomorrow. That gives me a whole lot of time to think. You might want to snag this deal while you have it.”
What else could he possibly add to this crazy scheme? “I’ll take my chances.”
I should have been nervous when he just grinned bigger and shrugged at my statement, but I was feeling too rattled to overthink things.
Turning to walk back up the porch steps, I said, “I’ll let you know tomorrow.”
“Sweet dreams, Carrots.”
“Don’t Anne of Green Gables me,” I hissed. A low chuckle met my ears before I closed the cabin door.
TEN
“I’ll be back.”
The Terminator