The Fake Out: An utterly hilarious and totally heart-warming romantic comedy

Are you Siri? Because you autocomplete me.

—JULIA B.

“And where might I find Chris right now?” I asked, trying to keep my voice calm.

It should be noted I was not calm. Oh, I tried. I’d gone home, stalked around the house like a caged animal, changed into shorts and a t-shirt and gone for a walk in the hopes I’d feel better after. But I was looking for a fight. Peter and my father were out of the running. That only left one person.

Piper gave me a hesitant smile. “He’s out in the barn.”

“I’m gonna go pay him a little visit.”

“Should I be worried? You look a little steamed up.”

“A little steamed up,” I muttered under my breath as I stomped out the front door, around the side of the house, and across the yard to the old red barn. “You have no idea.”

I whipped open the door to the barn and marched in, letting it slam behind me. The inside of the barn was nothing like I’d expected, and it momentarily threw me off my mission.

From the outside, the barn looked old and faded. But on the inside, it had been completely renovated into what was probably a first-class gym. There was an elliptical, a treadmill, a rowing machine, that sort of thing. But also weight machines, the large ones with lots of moving parts that looked like someone could get tangled up in them easily.

Okay, I would probably get tangled up in them easily.

A clink of metal on metal snapped me back to attention. “Chris Sterns, where are you?”

“Mae? What are you doing here?” His voice came from somewhere in the back behind some fancy arm thingy.

I tramped toward him. “What do you think I’m doing here? I was minding my own business at work today when Peter shows up, and do you know what he had to tell me? Do you?”

At this point, I’d arrived almost in the back corner of the room and that’s where I saw him sitting on a weight bench. Shirtless.

Get your act together, Mae. Who cares if he doesn’t have a shirt on? Not you. You are here because you want to yell at him. Remember that.

I snapped my spine into place and marched over to him. By the time I reached him, he’d stood and was using a towel to dry the sweat off his face. And neck. And chest.

I kept my eyes very purposely on his. “Do you know what Peter just told me?”

He winced. “I’m guessing it was something—”

“He told me,” I snapped, cutting him off, “you donated a whole lot of money to the library. After I very clearly told you not to.”

The towel paused. Right on top of his six-pack. I wasn’t going to look, I swear. But apparently my eyes had a different idea. It was all right there, out in the open. How was I not supposed to look at it? All golden skin and defined muscles. And a little scar below his left shoulder which I now itched to touch and ask about. When my eyes finally made it back up to his face, and I’m embarrassed to say how long that took, he was smirking.

“Are you enjoying the view?”

I felt my face heat with embarrassment. “Put your shirt on.”

His smirk transformed into a grin. “Why? Is it bothering you?”

“No, it is not.” I took a step closer, just to prove my point. “It’s that I need to have a serious conversation with you, and I don’t want to do it while you’re half-naked.”

“I think it bothers you.” He wrapped the towel over his shoulders.

“I need to talk to you, and I don’t want to have to stare at your sweaty chest the whole time. It’s gross,” I said, with all the outrage I could muster, which was a lot.

“You know what I think, Sprinkles? You’re hanker sore.”

I blinked. “Hanker sore? That’s not a thing.”

“Sure is. It’s what you are when you find someone so attractive, it makes you mad. You’re hanker sore over me.” He took a step closer now and my heart rate kicked up. With one finger, he poked my shoulder. “You are hanker sore.”

I sputtered, feeling panic rise in me. That was exactly what I was. I did find him attractive, and it did make me angry.

I took a deep breath. “I am not.”

“You are hanker sore. Mae is hanker sore,” Chris taunted, continuing to poke at me with both his words and his finger.

“Oh, grow up.” I batted his finger away. “Put your stupid shirt on. Now.”

“Nope.”

What I said next would forever follow me the rest of my life. On my deathbed, someone will lean over and remind me of the stupidest thing I ever said. This would be it.

“Fine. If you won’t put your shirt on, I’ll take mine off.”

Before he had a chance to even work out what I’d said, I’d whipped my ratty t-shirt off and stood in front of him wearing a pair of shorts and my third-best bra.

I needed to plan these things in advance. Then I could have been wearing my best bra.

Really it didn’t show any more skin than a bathing suit top. Or my outfit at Chicky’s.

The smile slid off his face and I could see a small tick in his jaw as his eyes crawled from my face and lower. I actually heard him swallow. A surge of satisfaction ripped through me. There was power in knowing I affected him too.

“Now, let’s talk,” I said sweetly, and dropped my shirt at our feet. “I asked you not to donate that money.”

His eyes snapped to my face. “Fine. I’ll put my shirt on, and you can put yours on and we’ll talk.”

“Nah, I’m good.”

With a frown, he bent and picked up my shirt. “Look, I’m sorry. I was being a jerk. I shouldn’t have teased you. Let’s put our shirts back on and talk.”

I shrugged. “Why do you care anyway? A minute ago, you had no problem with it.”

“A minute ago, I was the only one without a shirt on.” He took a step forward. I’m not sure if he expected me to back up, but I held my ground, even if I did have to tilt my head back some to see his face.

“So?”

“So?” he said, his voice growing louder by the second. “Put your shirt back on.”

He dangled the shirt in front of me, the back of his hand brushing against my chest. A sizzle ran through me at the contact. I gasped, which only made me more determined to not back down.

“I don’t care if it’s ridiculous. I’m not putting it back on.” I poked him in the chest. “You are not the boss of me, Sterns.”

Yes, I sounded like a third grader with authority issues.

He leaned closer, smirking. Oh, I wanted to wipe that smirk off his face. “I kind of am your boss, if you think about it.”

“Oh, really?” Somehow my finger-jamming had turned into my entire hand pressed flat against a warm, solid chest. His heartbeat matched the same chaotic rhythm of my own. “Maybe I need to talk to HR about filing a sexual harassment complaint since my boss can’t keep his damn shirt on.”

He leaned closer, glaring down at me like a miffed-off Greek god. The only sound was our breath sawing in and out. His hand clutching the shirt skimmed down my arm, so light I wasn’t sure if he meant to do it.

But then his eyes dropped to my lips, and his smile was slow and a little wild; my breath caught.

“Mae.” That’s it. Just my name.

He took a step toward me, crowding me. And when a 6’5”, 280-pound professional defensive lineman decides he’s going to get up in your space, there’s nothing you can do but go with it.

I shuffled back. My heart pounded. Not in the “I’m scared of what he’s about to do” sort of way; it was more in the “I’m excited for what he’s about to do” sort of way.

“What are you doing?”

Another step. “I haven’t been honest with you.”

“A-about?”

Yet another step. “That kiss?”

I knew that kiss well. My back hit the wall. “Yes?”

One of his hands landed on the wall by my head. “I wanted to do it.”

I swallowed. “W-we said we were going to forget that happened.”

His other slid into my hair. “Alright. You forget that one if it makes you feel better; this one, though? You remember.”

I sputtered, but words seemed impossible to form. Not that I had time to say them.

There was nothing soft or teasing this time. It was his mouth on mine, his lips firm and demanding and greedy, taking the gasp that escaped me, my breath, my ability to remember my name. He crowded me, pressing me against the wall.

I reached for him—arm, neck, hair, whatever I could hold onto. One of us groaned, him or me, maybe both of us.

There’s a rational part of the brain; it makes logical, well-thought-out decisions. It kept me from doing idiotic things.

That part of my brain broke.

Which left the irrational, illogical, impulsive, stupid, stupid, stupid side in charge. And oh boy, was it.

It said things like, We should start naming our children right now.

Well, not right now. Right now, we should keep kissing him.

He broke the kiss, his chest rising and falling. His mouth opened and I slapped a hand over it.

“Do not say a word. Just keeping kissing me,” I said.

He smiled the most satisfied, primal smile, and I wanted to kick him. Instead, I kissed him.

“Oh, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

We both jerked at the voice and turned to find Piper standing not fifteen feet away, her back turned to us. I scrambled out from under Chris’s arm, more than a little horrified. What must she think of us shirtless and sucking face like teenagers on prom night?

HOW DID MY LIFE GET HERE? Maybe that will be the name of my autobiography one day.

“I’m so sorry.” She took a few shuffling steps, careful to keep her back to us. “I wanted to talk to you both about something. but it can wait.”

Chris stepped in front of me. “You didn’t interrupt anything.”

“Nothing at all.” I snatched my shirt from his hand and pulled it over my head. “Just in the middle of a discussion.”

“Ooo-kay.” Slowly, Piper turned around, keeping her eyes pointed at the ground. Just in case, I guess.

“Clearing up a few things about this whole fake engagement.” I emphasized the word fake as though it were written in neon lights with arrows pointing at it. “How it will end soon, so we need to be careful about respecting each other’s wishes and not overstepping.”

“Yeah,” Chris mumbled, wandering several feet away. “What she said.”

“And Chris now,” I continued, keeping my attention on Piper, “realizes his mistake and that he shouldn’t have tried solving a problem I asked him not to solve. I don’t need him to fix anything for me. This is just business between us, right, Chris?”

“Yes,” he said, but it sounded more like “Yeth,” because he was pulling his shirt over his head.

Piper’s eyes darted between us, her expression caught somewhere between what-the-hell-did-I-just-walk-into? and I-do-not-have-time-for-this.

“So”—I pasted on a smile and turned to Chris—“I’m sure you’ll give Peter a call and clear this up immediately.”

Eyes narrowed, he put his fists on his hips. “Sure.”

“Great.”

“Fine.”

More weird staring between us.

As casually as I could, I strolled past Piper and headed to the door. To freedom. To forgetting whatever the heck had just happened and getting back to my normal life. You know, my normal life that involved a fake engagement to a famous football player who I kissed kissed mere seconds ago.

I almost made it before Chris called out, “Hey, Sprinkles, your shirt’s on backward.”