She heard a light chuckle and opened her eyes. “Just because you’re my boyfriend doesn’t mean you know me,” she teased.
He didn’t laugh. In fact, his smile faded and he let out a slow breath. “I didn’t plan it to go down like that, it just came out,” he said. “Lowen wasn’t buying anything I was selling, McGuire was being an ass, then you started talking about jars, candles, art projects . . . me. Turning what was a shit idea into something amazing and real. So amazing that Lowen became interested.” Adam slid her an uncertain look. “And by association, he became interested in me.”
“So you decided to take that interest and lie to him about being in a relationship with me?” Harper said quietly.
“Slippery slope, remember.”
As if she could forget. That one little lie had complicated an already complicated situation. Then again, it had also given her a chance to get to know Adam, someone she’d known her entire life, but never really knew. The more time she spent with him, the more layers she uncovered, and the more she liked what she saw.
But did he? Or did he find himself in a jam, needed an out, and she was the closest willing female? If so, and this was another one of his on-the-fly solutions, then what?
“What happens when your chief finds out we lied?”
“Who says he has to?”
Harper choked on her cookie, because surely he didn’t intend on keeping up the fa?ade. “Fibbing to a sales rep who lives two hours away is one thing, but lying to the town would be impossible.”
He stared at her for a few beats, then turned to face her, placing one hand on either side of her hips, pressing her between her car and his body. “Then we won’t lie.”
“What do you mean?” she breathed.
“This.” He placed his hand on her hip, and she moved slightly from the spark. “Don’t move, just stand here for one minute.”
“This isn’t a good idea.”
“One minute, Harper. That’s all I’m asking.”
She didn’t remember agreeing, but she didn’t move either. Couldn’t. Adam’s hands were cupping her hips. They were standing so close she could smell the sugar from his cookie.
He didn’t kiss her, didn’t give her some sweet line to sway her decision, or sweet-talk his way around her common sense. He didn’t do a single thing from the Five-Alarm Casanova handbook. He just stood there, as the cars passed by on the street and a light breeze stirred her skirt against his thighs, while he silently stared into her gaze. And what she saw staring back made breathing impossible.
It also made saying no impossible.
Respect, humor, friendship, and connection—it was all there. So was hunger. A hunger so intense she could feel it heating her skin until her dress felt constricting and her heart pounded as if to escape.
“Whatever this is between us,” he said, his voice a rough whisper, “it’s real.”
“It’s just chemistry,” Harper said, then wanted to laugh. She hadn’t felt chemistry like this—ever. At least, not reciprocated.
“I’ve felt chemistry before, sunshine, and this is something different.”
For the first time in her life Harper didn’t mind being different. Because whatever this was felt exhilarating. Sensual.
Alluring.
And God knew she wanted to allure, and be confident she could do some alluring on her own. “So I help you with the picnic and you what? Hold my hand in public?”
His face carefully blank, he said, “You want me to pose half-naked for Clovis’s new campaign, and the only way Lowen would ever sign off is if it were done as a favor to you—the town’s favorite sweetheart, who happens to be my girlfriend.”
“Chantel wants you to model for the line,” she said, because, wow, that sounded very contractual, and not the least bit chemical. Or alluring. “Men’s underwear.”
“Like David Beckham for Armani?”
“More like Michael Jordan for Hanes,” she lied, because his expression was turning too smug for her liking, and her heart was a little too soft to agree to this deal. “And I’ve changed my mind. This won’t work.”
Obviously stuck on comparing himself to Beckham, Adam leaned down and licked the caramel off her cookie. “You, me, under the hot lights in nothing but silk undies? It will work, I promise. And if you’re still unsure, I’ll take it slow.”
She set the remainder of her cookie in the box and pushed at his chest—only he didn’t move. “I just said I changed my mind. I told you this won’t work, and your solution is to talk about sex?”
“I’m a guy. Every solution includes sex,” he said, as if that were written on one of the tablets Moses brought down from the mount. “As for this not working out, your hand proves that wrong.” She looked down to find her palm had slid down that stone stomach of his, to tangle in his waistband.
Horrified, and a little turned on, she snatched it back. “You’re not my type.”