Fake (West Hollywood #1) -Kylie Scott Page 0,29
him. But I’d no sooner managed a whole two inches of separation than the muscles in his arm flexed and he pulled me back against him. Heck. There wasn’t a breath of space between us from head to toe. Dammit.
“Patrick,” I said, giving his arm a little shake.
A groan from him.
“Patrick, wake up.”
He yawned and stretched and settled full body against me once more. And promptly went back to sleep.
There was nothing else to be done. I pushed at his leg and twisted out from beneath his hand and pulled down my shirt all at the same time. Hooray for multitasking. However, the whole twisting out from under his hand hadn’t worked out so well since his palm now lay warm across my thigh. His fingers even gave the flesh a little squeeze. This guy. I swear. While he might be a gentleman when he was awake, he was damn grabby in his sleep.
Big blue eyes blinked up at me all mildly perturbed. “Norah, what are you doing?”
And he was so cute all sleep rumpled. I really couldn’t help myself. Fucking with him was both a privilege and an honor. “Morning, big boy.”
“Morning,” he mumbled.
“Thought I’d make you breakfast. You must have worked up quite an appetite after last night. I love it when someone else does all the work,” I said. “Would you like waffles or pancakes?”
“Pancakes,” he said, closing his eyes once more.
“I’m so glad we gave in to our rampant lust and just went for it, you know?”
He frowned.
“You were amazing,” I purred.
Both eyes opened and he gazed up at me all confused. Then he snorted. “Very funny.”
“Thanks.”
“You could just say good morning like a normal person.”
“Indeed I could. But look where your hand is, my friend.”
He blinked some more and looked down our two bodies to where his hand remained curled around my thigh, all proprietary like. I’d never seen a man move so fast to unhand me without the aid of my knee in his groin. It was impressive.
“Shit. Sorry, Norah.”
“It’s okay.”
“I just . . . shit.”
“You already said that.”
“I didn’t mean to maul you in your sleep.”
“I know. Relax,” I said. “We were both out of it. And there are worse things in life than being your cuddle bunny for a night.”
He frowned some more. Then he grabbed at the blankets we’d kicked off and covered the middle section of his body. The poor man with his hard-on. This was why having a vagina was so superior in every way.
“You know,” I said. “Normally I toss and turn and wake up a few times and can’t always get back to sleep. My brain gets busy, you know? But you seem to have done the work of a weighted blanket. Because I slept remarkably well.”
“Great.”
“How did you sleep?”
For a moment, he thought this over. “Good, actually.”
“There you go. Apparently, we’re a winning sleeping combination.”
He grunted. The man was not a morning person.
“Do you think us having slept together will change things?” I asked.
He just looked at me.
“I still respect you. Just in case you were wondering.”
“You’re getting way too much mileage from this,” he grumped.
“You still want pancakes?”
At this, his crankiness eased. Truly the way to a man’s heart remained through his stomach. “Yes, please.”
Renee and Tom had left early this morning, having ascertained that I was not out to hoodwink their son or break his heart. As much as I liked them, it was kind of a relief to have them gone. Since I was like ninety percent certain that Mei knew Patrick and I weren’t a couple (my acting skills really weren’t that great), the house was the one place I didn’t have to pretend. Or pretend hard, at least.
Our next appearance was at the launch party for a new brand of vodka. The owner was a big-name actor Patrick was friends with and had been in a film with a few years back. If you haven’t heard of Cole Landry, I don’t know where you’ve been. Having made movies for almost thirty years, the man was the gray-haired fox of action adventure films. And he kissed my hand. Talk about swoon.
Patrick reclaimed my limb with his usual frown. “Leave her alone, Cole. She doesn’t even like you.”
“I do like you,” I countered.
Cole grinned and said in his sexy husky voice, “Of course you do. I’m very likable.”
My knees went weak.
Patrick just looked to heaven.
We all paused and pasted brilliant smiles on our faces as the event photographer appeared. Patrick slid an arm