Fool for You (Southern Bride #7) - Kelly Elliott Page 0,54

word vomited. Trying not to laugh, she looked at my sister, crossed her heart, spit on her hand, and stuck it out to Hailey. “I promise never to speak of your brother’s—”

Hailey held up her hand to stop Emmerson.

“Right. Never again.”

“Good,” Hailey stated as she spat on her hand at the same time as Emmerson. They pressed them together as they laced their fingers.

“That’s so gross. I have never understood why two grown women still make promises like this,” I said, snarling my lip.

“Fuck off, big brother.” Hailey dropped her hand, wiped it on her jeans, and then went to grab Mike’s hand.

He held his hands up and shook his head. “I love you but not enough to touch Emmerson’s spit.”

Hailey sighed again and made her way to the door. “Y’all better hurry up. We have to meet our folks in fifteen minutes, and you both look like you’ve only slept for an hour. If you’re going to play this game,” Hailey said, turning to face us, “you’re going to have to learn to hide the fact that you’ve been doing…whatever you’ve been doing all night. Otherwise, our parents are going to see right through you both.”

Mike nodded but had a wide smile on his face as they walked out the door and shut it. I looked at Emmerson, who was now standing in the doorway to the bathroom.

“I’ll meet you back here in ten minutes. Is that enough time to look normal?” I asked.

She nodded. “See you in ten.”

I got to my room, jumped in a quick shower, changed, and then rushed back to Emmerson’s. The entire twelve minutes, I never once stopped smiling. I never dreamed I could be so damn happy.

Emmerson

“WHAT DO YOU mean, People wants to interview us?” I asked Landon as we sat in Cup of Joe coffee shop in downtown Waco.

He glanced around, making sure no one was eavesdropping. “They want to interview us about how we went from friends to lovers to engaged.”

I shook my head. “You mean friends to engaged to lovers?”

Landon rolled his eyes.

“I hope you said no.”

“I did; I told Heidi that this was why I stepped away from the spotlight. Privacy. That you were going to document stuff on your Instagram, and that was all they were getting from us.”

I sat back in my chair and sighed in relief. “Good. I don’t think I could do an interview like that knowing we were…”

My voice trailed off. It had only been two days since the charity dinner, and it felt like our worlds had been turned upside down. It was starting to get confusing. We needed to play the couple in public, but we weren’t really playing because we were dating, and when we were with our families, we had to play the role of best friends pretending to be engaged and not dating.

“What are you doing for dinner tonight?” I asked, giving him my most innocent of smiles. Since we’d gotten back to Clifton, we hadn’t had a chance to be alone again, and I knew Landon was as anxious as I was to find some time for just the two of us.

“I believe I have a date with my fiancée.”

I let my smile grow wider. When I got back home, I had called Bryce Reynolds to cancel our date. That had been awkward, since Landon and I were supposed to be engaged. So I had made up a story about how we’d taken a break, but realized we simply couldn’t be without one another. He bought it.

“By the way, we need to put a ring on it,” I said, holding up my ring finger.

Something moved over Landon’s face, and he squirmed around in his seat as if he’d suddenly gotten shy. “I’ve sorta already picked something up.”

I grinned. “Oh, really? When do I get it?”

He chuckled. “Soon, I swear. By the way, my uncle Chris wanted to know if we’d head to their place this Saturday. They’re bringing in two new race horses.”

Emmit’s brother, Chris, was obsessed with breeding race horses and had a ranch out toward Hamilton, Texas. Chris knew how much I loved horses, so when he had new studs or mares come in he always asked if we wanted to see them.

“I can’t Saturday, I’ve got a wedding. Oh, and by the way, there’s this new bakery in Waco that opened, and I’m dying to check it out. I figured I might get a better idea of how they work with engaged couples if we