Nathan brushes off my question. “It’s nothing bad. Nothing good either, but it can wait,” he says, his scowl deepening.
“You sure?” I ask, concern tightening my chest.
His mood has done a full one-eighty. Whatever just happened is more bad than good. I cock my head in question and wait to hear more.
He doesn’t make me wait long. “I have an alert set for whenever my name gets mentioned online. Apparently yet another article has been published about me.”
My initial response is full of long-standing biases. Something along the lines of: Why am I not surprised? Of course he needs to know the second someone mentions him. His ego demands dopamine from spotlights and attention.
Though, that doesn’t jibe with the man I’m starting to know. Nathan West doesn’t need approval from others the way I assume everyone with fame and money does. And if the pulsing muscle in his jaw has anything to say about it, he’s not riding high on a much needed dose of dopamine.
He’s pissed the hell off.
Go figure. I can always count on The Prince of Darkness to find a reason to be grumpy.
Meanwhile, my belly tingles with a heady mix of excitement and worry. Fallon said she would mention me in her next article. I’ve been giddy ever since. Maybe this is it.
“What’s it say?” I ask, aware that my excitement clashes with his frustration and consciously take it down a notch. The chances that this has anything to do with Fallon’s article are small. I doubt she’s even a blip on his radar.
Nathan scrubs his face, then shakes his head. “Nothing good, I’m sure. They never do.”
I cringe, thinking of Fallon’s mission to make him see how much he’s changed. “None of them?”
“Not lately anyway.” Nathan sighs, then runs a hand through his hair. It flops into his eyes, transforming his scowl into a smolder before he shakes it back into place. “And it’s mostly just one blogger. She’s relentless. If I so much as step into the crosswalk a second early, she’s there. Yammering away about my villain era.”
I inwardly cringe. Fallon’s been calling this his villain era too. I’ve always questioned the validity of her idea to “bring him back to himself.” How can pointing out someone’s mistakes, without context or caring, spur positive change? If his reaction to this other blogger is any indicator, he has enough people calling him out. I’ll have to tell her how much it bothers him so she can take it down a notch.
Nathan sucks his teeth before sitting back and crossing his arms over his chest. His muscles flex and my libido shouts its approval. I imagine him hefting me onto the pool table, spreading my knees with strong palms sliding up my inner thighs, stepping close, heated gaze, rough touch…
Enough already! His response to me asking for an advance should be enough to shut down all physical reactions from this point forward.
Isn’t that what a boyfriend would say?
Dear Mina. This is fake. Sincerely, yourself.
I drag my focus back to Nathan’s face and look for something to say, but he sits forward, gesturing as he continues.
“And on the one hand, I get it. A lot about my life has changed, but this woman…she crosses lines. Everything I do, and I mean everything, she twists into something terrible with these clickbait headlines. She’s profiting off my misery. Fucking vulture. She has my whole family thinking I’m out drinking myself stupid and sleeping with a different woman every night. I tell them it’s not me, it’s my friend, but they’d rather believe her. It’s the whole reason I came up with this fake relationship idea in the first place, to help them see she’s the problem, not me…just see for yourself.” Shaking his head in disgust, Nathan shifts one hip to slide his phone out of his pocket, then freezes. “You know what? Never mind. It doesn’t matter. Whatever Fallon fucking Mae has to say about me can wait for later. I don’t need to drag you into this more than I already have.”
Fallon…? She’s the reason he’s paying me to date him?
“I kind of thought you’d be used to being in the public eye, after growing up in a family like yours.”
Nathan picks up his empty glass and glares into the bottom before plonking it back to the table. “There’s no way to get used to invasions of privacy like this. This woman can blow a cup of coffee into a three-act tragedy. And then? When something bad does happen? It’s blasted to the world, without any context. I’m imperfect, just like everyone else. I’m good and bad and right and wrong. I just get to go through it all with public commentary.”
I catch myself chewing my lip and take a drink instead. Damn nervous habits sneaking in to ruin my aura of confidence. Being friends with Fallon makes me feel complicit in his misery. He’s so much deeper than she gives him credit for. He’s not a two-dimensional character on a TV show. He has nuance and feelings. I need to tell her to back off.
“Humans weren’t designed to have this much attention,” Nathan continues. “Fucks with your head.” His green eyes flash with anger, followed by sympathy. “If this headline is any indicator, you’ll see what I mean soon enough.”
“Why?” Adrenaline dumps into my system, twisting excitement with concern. This must be the article Fallon told me about. “What’s it say?”
And why didn’t she let me read it first?
Nathan pulls his phone out of his pocket to read, “Serial dater Nathan West adds another girl to his lineup—and she’s a little different from the rest.” He rolls his eyes and puts the device on the table. “I promise you, it’s better if you don’t pay attention.”
“That’s not bad, though.” I smile, curious about the rest of the article, though I’m sure my best friend made me sound ten times better than I am. “I don’t mind being a little different.”
“That’s what I said the first time Fallon Mae put out an article about me. ‘That’s not so bad. It’s almost complimentary.’ Everything went downhill from there. I should have warned you about the possibility of being in the media before I asked you to pretend to date me.”
“It’s okay, Nathan. It really is. I was aware of the risks.”
Mostly because this particular risk comes in the shape of a close friend, but I’ll explain that uncomfortable little coincidence later, after I’ve told her to stop talking about him on her blog and he’s less angry. Bringing it up now feels…complicated.
We finish dinner and he pays the bill, then stops to chat with his aunt and uncle. They’re the kind of people who feel like sunshine, like Mason, like Angela. I lean close to Nathan just to be close to them, wondering if I’ll ever feel like sunshine for someone else.
Nathan says his goodbyes, then walks me to his car, one hand placed firmly on my lower back as he always does. Over the last few weeks, I’ve grown used to the warmth of his palm, the gentle pressure, the intimacy of his touch.
I know I shouldn’t like it.
But I do.
A lot.
We step into a glorious evening and Nathan slides his palm from my back to take my hand. The moon is full and the air is warm, the breeze caressing my skin as it moves through my hair.
“This is my favorite time of day,” I say, watching the stars shimmer and shine. “When it’s dark out but the energy is high. Expectant. There’s no pressure to be or do or conform, but there’s this…anticipation…like anything could happen. One minute, you’re living your life and the next, everything’s different.”
There’s a heartbeat of silence. Then another. One more and I start to feel judged. Why did I think Nathan would care about my favorite time of day? What’s more, why do I want to share that bit of myself with him? This relationship is transactional. It’s not real. Getting emotionally involved is a mistake.
But then he stops, tugs my hand to turn me around, then pulls me close, slipping one arm around my waist and nuzzling my nose with his. The look in his eyes is bright, like the moon, filled with promises and anticipation, and maybe he cares more than I thought.
Maybe this isn’t an act.
Maybe he’s falling.
And I’m falling.
Maybe we aren’t faking it.
Maybe, somewhere along the line, this started to become real.
“What are you—”
Nathan tips my chin and brushes his lips to mine. I return the kiss, helpless, hopeless, tentative then insistent. I grip his back as he cups the nape of my neck, his tongue teasing my lips, then meeting my own. He tastes of whiskey but feels like fire, ready to devour me until there’s nothing left but smoke and ash and this one perfect moment.
I groan, relaxing into his strong embrace. Humidity hangs in vaporous clouds around us, softening the moonlight. Crickets chirp and someone opens the door to the bar, letting a rush of laughter escape before silence descends around us.
This is another one of those things I don’t want to like.
