Page 25 of Just (Fake) Married (Calloways vs. McGraws #1)

SIXTEEN

HARMONY

An unknown number was calling me. For the third time in like five minutes. I sat behind the register at the store, half an eye on the customers as my attention kept getting pulled away toward my phone.

I didn’t answer, but sent a text.

Me: Who is this?

Unknown number: Your husband. Pick up.

Me: Bliss, this isn’t funny.

Unknown number: It’s not Bliss.

Me: Prove it.

Unknown number: I gave you three orgasms in one night.

I nearly dropped the phone and immediately called the number back.

Ethan’s warm laughter sent chills up and down my spine. “You cannot just go around texting that kind of thing,” I said.

“I can and I will if it gets you to call me back so quickly.”

“What are you doing?” I asked Ethan.

“Well, I started on a quest to find your number.”

“Why did you need my number?”

“Because I was worried about you leaving this morning without coffee. You seemed a little more flustered than normal.”

Damn right I’d left without coffee. That whole shower scene with his sexy, naked chest and water dripping all over his body left me completely flustered. And being flustered around this man, especially after our wedding night, was dangerous.

Which is exactly why I’d been avoiding him.

I’d sprinted from the lodge this morning. So fast, I’d almost forgotten Bruce.

“Amity always has coffee for me if I need it,” I told him, trying not to think about how it was sweet he’d been worried about my caffeine status.

“Good to know. Anyway, my quest led me to Tag, who you should know, only offered up your number for a bribe.”

“What bribe?” I asked, curious despite myself.

“I had to agree to give the ranch hands physicals.”

“You’re taking patients?”

“I am a doctor,” he reminded me.

“No, you’re a surgeon.”

“Yeah, well, not today. I’m taking blood pressures and fixing some gnarly ingrown toenails.”

“Sounds serious,” I said. “And gross.”

“Not too serious. Mostly just neglect and hard-living,” he said. “I swear, if I could just get them to drink some goddamn water, they’d feel better. Half of them are severely dehydrated. And the hemorrhoids-”

“Okay, okay. TMI.”

His warm chuckle travelled down the line. “There’re some worrying blood pressures and some moles I don’t love. But mostly, it’s easy. Kinda nice, actually.”

“Ingrown toenails are nice?”

“Taking care of people is nice,” he said. “You know, when they’re awake.”

I laughed and could hear his answering chuckle. A hard ping hit my chest, reminding me that this wasn’t the Ethan I’d known as a high school asshole. This was a grown man with a life, and according to Carter, a savior complex.

Taking care of stubborn ranch hands seemed very much in his wheelhouse.

“Is this what you meant?” I asked him. “About us needing to talk more?”

“Actually, I was thinking about doing that in public. Where people might see us.”

Right, I thought. Because this was all a show. I needed that constant reminder, or I might think that it was nice to chat on the phone with my doctor husband who was taking a break between seeing his patients.

“So you agree? Harmony?”

I blinked, having lost the thread of the conversation. “With what?”

“A date. Tonight. You and me.”

Shit.

“What did you have in mind?” I asked. For some reason, feeling a little nervous.

“Leave it to me. I’ll pick you up at the store after closing.”

Great. Just what I needed. A real date with my fake husband.

The orgasm whisperer with the six-pack abs.

Ethan

Night fell early this time of year, helped by the western mountain ranges. I parked my car in the twilight around the square, by the statue of Esther Calloway, the bootlegger.

Made immortal in her flapper dress, chest out like she was daring Sheriff McGraw to shoot her. Whoever did the sculpting made it seem like a wind was blowing her dress against her body, and by the look of her brass nipples…she was cold.

It was weird, very weird, but I couldn’t look at that statue of a woman about to be gunned down, standing beside a truckload of Canadian whiskey, and not think of Harmony. She had the same kind of fuck you in her eyes.

And the same nipples, if I remembered correctly, and it wasn’t likely I would forget that.

Two weeks of her trying to dodge me and it was about to come to an end tonight.

A date. With my fake wife.

I turned and walked down Hangman’s Lane to Goods and Provisions. Looking at the storefronts, you could tell which ones were owned by a Calloway – Last Chance Goods and Provisions, Last Stand bar and Last Meal café were all lit up with twinkle lights, even though Christmas was long over.

They were like cheerful, warm beacons in a cold, twilit world.

I pushed my way into Good and Provisions and knocked Harmony off a ladder.

“Holy shit, Harmony,” I said, catching her against my chest and bracing the ladder with my foot. “What are you doing?”

She held up an old brass bell. “Trying to hang this back up,” she said. “It was weighing down my purse.”

As if that made any sense. She quickly disengaged herself from my arms and that made me a little sad.

She wore the green sweater she’d left the house in, and her hair was back in a messy bun that did nice things for her eyes and her cheekbones. I noticed she wore lip gloss and mascara and I wondered if that was for our date. For me.

“What are you staring at?” she asked, wiping her face. “Have I got something-”

“No. You look nice.”

She shot me a wry look that made me want to kiss her, but mascara or not, she’d made it clear there would be no kissing.

Which, of course, now, was all I wanted in the world.

I took the bell from her hand and climbed the ladder. The hook attaching the chain to the bell was broken, but I bent it back into shape, rehung it, and bent the hook closed so it wouldn’t fall.

“You’ve been so busy the bell rang off the hook?” I asked.

I climbed down the ladder and closed it up. She reached for it and I knew she was used to doing things herself.

All the Calloways were, really. They’d had to be. For generations.

“Just tell me where it goes,” I said, determined, for a while at least, to treat her right.

“In the back,” she said, pointing to a small doorway with a bright red, yellow and blue checked curtain.

I pulled back the curtain to reveal steps going upstairs and a landing filled with tools, mops and brooms. I tucked the ladder against the wall and came back into the main room, where she was banking the fire in the old potbelly stove.

“You hungry?” I asked her.

“Starved,” she sighed. “We were so busy today, I didn’t get a chance to have lunch.”

“That’s good for business,” I said, and she laughed.

“If people bought anything more expensive than gum, mostly they were coming in to ask about us.”

“Still?”

The last wanted sign had been days ago.

“We’re the main story in town until something new comes along and replaces us.”

“I hope you flashed them that ring.”

She smiled and looked down at it. “It kind of flashes itself.”

“So, what have you been telling them?” I asked her. “About us, I mean. I’m sure they want to know how it happened.”

“That we had a forbidden high school romance.”

“Fascinating,” I mused. “Forbidden because of the feud?”

“Of course, but not even your father’s hate for all things Calloway could keep us apart. And after you left for school, we wrote each other constantly.”

I shook my head. “No way. Most of that time I was in medical school. It was hard enough finding time to take a piss, and you think I was able to squeeze in email writing?”

She pouted. “So you’re saying I poured my heart out to you for years and years and you never wrote me back?”

“I feel like this fake email scenario is upsetting you,” I pointed out.

“Of course, I’m upset. I can’t believe you wouldn’t take just a tiny amount of time to say something. Anything!”

“You didn’t write me any emails!” I reminded her.

“Well, if I had, you should have written me back.”

“If you had,” I said, trying to mollify her. “I would have found a way to reply.”

Another shy smile that made me want to kiss her.

“Now, if we’re all done sorting out our complicated past,” I said. “Let me feed you.”

She left the lights on for the animals, and locked the front door behind us.

“Does your mom still make that meatloaf sandwich at the café?” I asked her.

“Amity runs it now and she’s got a new cook in the back. Everything is different.”

“Is it good?”

“Very.”

“Then Last Meal it is.”

From her store, we had to cut through the town square again to get to the café. We passed the gallows statue and stopped at the community board.

The first part of the board was taken up with an announcement.

Emergency Town Meeting Wednesday 8:00 PM!

The second half of the board featured a new Wanted Poster, again with both my and Harmony’s picture on it. Only, instead of our high school yearbook picture, it was a picture of Harmony’s face super imposed on the statue of the Widow Calloway and a picture of my face on Duncan McGraw.

Wanted: Location of where this “happy” couple has been hiding since they got married.

“We haven’t been hiding,” Harmony said, commenting on the poster.

“What’s with the rabbit ears around the word happy?” I said, at the same time.

“I’ve been at the store every day since we’ve been married,” Harmony said, as if she was debating the author of the wanted sign.

“You’ve been hiding from me,” I said.

“I haven’t been hiding,” she muttered. “I’ve just been…busy.”

“You’ve been avoiding me,” I insisted. “Is it because of what happened on our wedding night?”

“I wish you wouldn’t call it that. Wedding night feels so…so…real.”

“Well, our wedding night felt very real.”

“We shouldn’t talk about it,” she said, and continued walking.

“Yeah, I’m sort of leaning the other way,” I said, following her.

“Why?” She stopped just before she reached the door of the café.

“Why what?”

“Why do you want to talk about it?”

“Because…” Her question caught me off guard.

Why did I keep bringing it up? I knew the situation we were in was temporary. I was going back to Seattle in a couple of months. What was the point rehashing something she clearly wanted to put behind us?

But the truth just hit me so hard, I had to say it.

“Because I want to do it again.”