I was snuggling into his scent under the weight of his arm curled around me the next morning until I realized what the hell I was doing. He’d laid me down in the spare bed last night, and I’d fallen off to sleep quickly. I tried to shoot out of bed, but he cranked his arm tighter and grunted before pulling me back down.
“Shit.” I shoved at him. “Dex, are you kidding? Wake up.”
He rolled over and stared at me for a second, hazy with an old look that reminded me a lot of the boy he used to be. The fog eventually cleared from his eyes though, and he lifted his arm away. His tone had no emotion as he asked, “You in a hurry to get somewhere?”
“What time is it?” I tried to jump out of bed again but winced from the ache of the night before.
“Sore?” he murmured in my ear.
I chewed my cheek and nodded.
“Good.” The word rumbled out of him as he dragged a finger along my bare arm with a look of damn pride across his features.
“You should feel bad for me,” I pouted.
“Why? Because every time you walk around there will be a reminder of me making you feel good?”
I would have narrowed my eyes at him, but I was rubbing away the sleep from my eyes and considering how I’d never gotten dressed last night. I sighed at the idea of going to find my clothes. Yet, Dex rolled over to the nightstand and handed me clothing stacked atop it. The dress was folded neatly, like he’d prepared for the moment.
“Here. Get dressed. I have a car outside if you need it. And”—he turned once again to grab a box that he held out—“try this on.”
I assessed how he had all this ready and realized he must have done it after I went to bed last night. He liked order and was already putting our situation in place. It was easy to succumb to it but maddening that he already had his mind set.
The proposal wasn’t what I wanted. Not that I wanted one at all. Even still, the callousness of it was like rubbing gravel into old wounds. “No sweet words?”
He looked down at a ring box that wasn’t there yesterday and cleared his throat. “I have nothing sweet to say, Keelani. I’m doing you a favor, and in turn, I’m closing a chapter of my life.”
He was drawing a line in the sand. I’d stated that verbal sentiment a few times the night before too. Still, somehow, in the light of a morning next to a man I’d once loved, it felt like he was slicing that line through my heart rather than drawing it in the sand.
I stared at the box, trying not to be hurt. “What if I don’t like the ring?”
“Did you like Ethan’s ring?”
I glanced at my naked ring finger and was reminded of how he’d made me take that ring off in the kitchen. “I’m sure Trinity just sent him the one they thought would look best.” I groaned, thinking of our phone call to him last night. “I need to call him.”
“What for?” Dex’s tone was instantly harder, lower. The man never hid his jealousy well.
He didn’t get to ask those questions if this was all he wanted our situation to be. “Ethan’s a friend, Dex. He literally got me through some of my roughest years. He’s going to want to know what’s going on.”
With that, I pulled my dress on and then snapped open the box. A solitaire diamond stared back at me. It was massive. Two or three times the size of Ethan’s. It was a statement, but it was generic, boring, and cold. It meant nothing to Dex. I could tell right away. “You pick this out?” I asked, trying to keep emotion from my voice.
“Of course not. My assistant had it sent over earlier this morning. It’ll work for six months, right?” He stood to get out of bed and kept his back to me as he grabbed his watch off the nightstand. The muscles in his back moved fluidly, showcasing that pretty much every part of his body was in perfect shape. I saw a hint of the tattoos on his ribs but didn’t catch much more as he hurriedly threw on a shirt. “Does it fit?”
I glanced down again at the ring, took it from the velvet lining slowly, and slid on the cool metal. Of course it fit. “Perfectly.”
“Great.” His tone was clipped. “Obviously don’t wear it until I propose publicly. And go make your call. Then, let’s work out the logistics of this quickly. I need to get to work.”
“It’s Sunday.”
“And I work on Sundays, Keelani.” He said it with condescension, like I should already know this. Then, he walked off in his boxers towards the bathroom.
This engagement was an agreement, a contract for financial security for my family. For starting my life over. I had to remember that; needed to tell myself that over and over. If it was closure for Dex, great. He could have that too. I knew with the way he was treating me, I couldn’t be falling down the rabbit hole of investing emotions, though. I wiggled my dress into place, slid the ring off my finger, and placed it back in the box. It snapped shut with finality. Backing away from it, I went to find my phone.
After pacing back and forth in the living space while talking things over with Ethan, I told him, “You know I love you. It’ll work out for both of us, and this is your chance to see if Janey is ready for something more with you.”
“She isn’t,” my friend groaned but I knew he didn’t know that for sure. He’d never told her how he felt.
“Tell her how you feel, Ethan.” I sighed. “And then call me to tell me how it goes because I want to be the first to congratulate you.”
He said he would think about it all. I wouldn’t push him. Our careers were complicated enough without pulling in those we loved. He was protecting a relationship, and I honestly didn’t know if it would be best for him to make it public anyway.
“Love you, Ms. Keelani,” he said before he hung up.
“Love you back, boo,” I told him just as Dex walked into the living room and made it known he was checking his watch. I could tell the band of it was expensive, as it flashed gold and it held one of the best smart watches made, a HEAT tech one.
I ended the call and stood staring at my fiancé as he leaned against the doorframe, looking me up and down. He had showered and was put together in his signature suit and tie, ready to conquer the world. His hair had been combed back, he had on loafers, and even his cuff links were in place.
“Took quite a while to finish that call,” he said softly.
“I was smoothing things over for the both of us. You should be happy.”
“Why would I be happy when it seems my fiancée loves another man?” His eyes held madness, but I met it with my own.
“I said ‘I love you’ to him because he’s a friend who’s been in my life for a very long time,” I immediately argued, but then I caught myself. We weren’t here to bicker with each other. “Do you really care?”
“The media will care.”
For some reason, I wanted him to say anything but that. “Right.” This was the life I lived, and I had to do it for more than just myself. “Well, we’re going to have to figure out my rebrand today. Maybe slowly launch into my dating you.”
He hummed. “Is that what you want?”
“I want to move toward rebranding as soon as possible,” I grumbled, aware we couldn’t simply push an opinion on the public.
“What does the new Keelani look like to you exactly?” He squinted at me as if trying to picture me some other way. “You need stylists and a new PR firm helping with that sort of thing? Would the record label have contacts for—”
“They won’t help.” I stopped him. “No one is going to rebrand who I am if what I’ve been doing is already working for them.” I took a deep breath. “It just doesn’t work for me now. I’m not a kid anymore.”
He stared at me for a few more seconds before he said, “What does that mean?”
“I’m not the all-American girl. I’m singing to an intimate audience of a thousand people every weekend here in a month, right?”
“That’s what you agreed to do, yes. The Orpheum Theater holds that.”
“Right. That’s extremely intimate. I want them to feel me and feel what’s raw in my heart. I want to write my own stuff, have my own look, be…” I shrugged. “Me.”
He studied me for a few seconds as he rubbed his chin. “Don’t you think over the years you’ve become what you faked for so long?”
It was a slight, but I didn’t stoop to his level. “Maybe parts of me are that way, but I know not all of me is, Dexton.”
“Then call Olive and Pink and tell them to change your look.” He looked like he couldn’t be bothered with any of it as he pushed off the doorframe, making his way to exit the hotel.
“How do you know about Olive?” He hadn’t been introduced to my best friend.
“I know just about all there is to know in my casino, Kee.” He didn’t elaborate further but instead changed the subject as he glanced at his watch lighting up. “Utilize HEAT’s PR. It’s at your disposal. Do what you need to do, but I need to be at a meeting regarding staff within the casino in about ten minutes. So, my assistant will send you information on events we can attend. Our PR schedule will be drawn up by her too. She can propose it to Trinity Enterprises, and we’ll have your image all changed up with a neat, tidy bow in just six months. Perfect for you and that important brand of yours.”
He said it all without looking at me as he texted away on his phone. I wasn’t on his radar anymore. Instead, this had turned into business for him.
“What about your image?” I asked softly.
“Why do you ask?” He didn’t look up.
“I don’t know if you’ve considered what being engaged to me might do to you. My fans are used to Ethan and sometimes cruel—”
He frowned at his phone then didn’t even blink as he said, “You ruined my image once, and I survived. You think I’m concerned about it again?”
“Dex…” I started, but what could I say? He was right that my omissions and silence in the past had ruined him at home.
“Again, there’s a car waiting outside when you’re ready. Grab some breakfast on the way to pack up what’s left of your apartment that you want. We already have a team doing it, but they’ll only be grabbing what I feel is necessary. Which, quite frankly, isn’t much.”
“Do you have someone in my apart— Wait.” I combed a hand through my hair. “I’m not living with you.”
That finally got his attention. His green eyes snapped up to glare at me. “Don’t be ridiculous, Keelani.”
“I don’t want to live with anyone until I’m married, and—”
“Now you suddenly have a conscience about your damn marriage?” He scoffed.
He knew that was going to rub me the wrong way. His ass wanted to. “Of course I have a conscience. I always have. So, don’t even start with that. I made an agreement with Trinity Enterprises, but I was never actually going to marry—”
“So what? My fiancée is going to live next door? I’m here all the time. Your belongings need to be moved here.”
“The apartment is fine for—”
“Get real. The press is going to be following us everywhere as it is. We don’t need them writing more shit about our separate living situations. This is supposed to be believable.”
I shut my eyes and whined at his logic. “I cannot live with you right now.”
“Why not?”
“Because we’re completely different people than we used to be, and we don’t seem to get along at all.”
“I don’t need to get along with you, Keelani. I need you to stay out of my way during the day and come to my bed at night.” He looked me up and down, his words cruel but I was sure truthful.
“Oh, that sounds so good. I get to fuck an ex I have to beg for an orgasm.” I could be cruel too.
Those green orbs lit with fire. “You begged for it, and then you screamed in ecstasy when you got it,” he reminded me, and I hated that I blushed. “You must realize I’m not trying to welcome you? I’m trying to make this shit believable. For your sake and mine.”
“You think it’s unbelievable that I wouldn’t move in with you? I’m literally in a magazine that has a poll on if I’m still a virgin or not. Eighty percent said they thought I still was.”
“I can answer that one with certainty for them,” he threw out, and my eyes widened at the fact that he was making a joke right now.
“Are you kidding me?”
He tried to be serious by pursing his lips and then shrugging. “It was the perfect opportunity. Plus, this isn’t a big deal. I promise. It’s easier for us to handle press when we’re here at Black Diamond. My security is much better here. And this way, they’ll probably stop voting you Most Likely to be a Virgin.”
Wow. “So, you still have a terrible—and rude—sense of humor.” I tried to be mad and serious about this. I really did. And it was a serious matter, but the fact that he’d taken my virginity the night before was pretty fresh on the brain. I thought of how I was still sore because of how big he was, how he’d taken me, how he hadn’t been gentle, and I glanced down to where I knew he was pierced.
“Fuck me, Kee.” His voice rumbled out low as he swore and rearranged his slacks suddenly. “Keep your eyes above the waist if you want to be able to walk out of here today.”
I snapped them up, but I knew my cheeks were hot with the embarrassment of being caught. “Right. Just processing everything that happened last night.”
He hummed. “You can process all you want when you’re moved in here later. We’re both here together tonight. And remember, most everyone around us is going to believe this engagement is real—”
“Minus most everyone who knows us because they’re never going to believe this is real.”
“Fine. Shall I wire you your paycheck for being my fiancée now?”
I rolled my eyes at the fact that he was discussing it with me. “You know what, Dex? Why don’t you pay me at the end? That way,” I said it with all the sarcasm I could muster, “If I’m not good enough at following your directions, you can keep your money.”
“Great. I’ll set a reminder.” He truly did set one because my phone beeped almost immediately. “And keep the circle small. It’ll make for less chance of a leak in the media.”
With that, Dex turned on the expensive heel of his shoe and left me completely overwhelmed with what I’d agreed to.
