Page 35 of Worth Every Moment (Hawkston Billionaires #4)

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T here is a red carpet when we arrive, and a crowd of people screaming Erica’s name, as well as a host of paparazzi.

The noise is insane, and the flashing of the cameras is blinding.

People crush towards us, held back only by the security lining the rope that separates the carpet from the public.

Jesus fucking Christ. What did I sign up for here?

I should have brought a bodyguard. I’ve had my fair share of press—good and bad—but this is next level.

Erica is composed and stately the entire time, gliding down the carpet like a couture angel.

She couldn’t look more beautiful if she tried.

But the papers aren’t wrong; there’s an iciness to her glamour that isn’t inviting.

She rarely smiles, and there’s an edge to her beauty that suggests she’d never let you fully in.

“Who’s the date, Erica?” someone yells.

So this is what it’s like to be with Erica in public. Most of the time, people don’t know who I am. Just another bloke in a corporate suit, but in Erica’s company, I’m of interest. A burst of pride at being associated with her, at being her date, inflates my chest.

Erica reaches for my hand, and as she touches me, sparks jolt right up my arm.

She pulls me closer to her and then lets go.

I stand next to her, but not touching, and it looks ridiculous.

Two kids who don’t like each other standing side by side and waiting for the school photographer to snap our picture.

I don’t know what the fuck she’s playing at, or why she’s suddenly so adamant that I can’t touch her, but it’s not going to work. The press will be writing articles about our impending and inevitable breakup before the night is over if we keep this up.

I remain at her side for a few moments longer.

It could be less than a minute, but it feels like an absolute age, and with each second that passes, I feel more and more like a spare part.

What the hell am I doing here if we aren’t putting on a show?

This is insane . I have three months with Erica before I lose her, and just under four before I have to commit myself to someone else.

I’m on a ticking fucking clock here, and I don’t want to waste any more time.

Ignoring her damn rules, I slide my arm around her waist, pulling her close, but as I do she stiffens. She fucking stiffens. Again .

I plaster a smile on my face. “Loosen up,” I whisper, amused at how the tables have turned since the photo shoot.

“You’re not convincing anyone.” She scowls at me, but I only raise a teasing brow and whisper, “You want to be an actress? You’re gonna have to do better than that. Come on Lefroy, I know you can do it.”

She tilts her face slightly in my direction, and that’s when I see it. That hint of competitiveness in her gaze. That fire I know so well.

She shimmies a little, the silk of her dress pressed right against me, her hip nestling into mine.

There’s heat radiating off her, and I wish she’d stay like this all night.

Fuck it, I wish she could stay like this forever, and knowing she can’t has pain hovering in my periphery like an optic migraine.

“This is my boyfriend. Seb Hawkston,” she calls.

Someone wolf-whistles.

“Seb fucking Hawkston,” someone else yells, and I can tell they know exactly who I am. I can’t decide if I’m relieved or unnerved. Somewhere between the two. “You gonna give her a night in the hotel, Seb?”

“More than one,” I yell back with a wave, and all Erica’s softness evaporates. Was that the wrong thing to say? The cameras flash like crazy, and I keep my arm around her, despite the fact that annoyance is seeping out of her skin.

She breaks away and goes inside, and I follow her at pace, my heart thumping. The doors swing closed behind us, leaving us cocooned in an entrance hall that feels unnaturally quiet, the thick doors muffling the screams from outside.

Erica glances around, and seeing that we’re alone, she snaps, “A night in the hotel?”

“More than one,” I clarify. “You’re special. You get more than one.”

“Fuck’s sake, Seb. You’re talking about me like I’m a hookup.”

I tilt my head. “What? Not at all. You told them I was your boyfriend. If you’re my woman, I’m taking you to my fucking hotel. In every city in the world. Every fucking night if I could. Why would I pretend any different?”

“I don’t want to be another woman in your hotels.” She waves her hand between us. “It’s not going to work if you’re treating me the same way you’ve treated everyone else.”

She’s upset. Fuck . And no wonder. I think of Emerald and those naked photos, and Erica throwing me out of her apartment to go back to the hotel.

She probably thinks I actually went through with it.

That I left her apartment and went to the Hawkston Mayfair and fucked that woman’s brains out.

Maybe I should tell her I didn’t, but this point I’m not sure it would be enough to convince her that she could never be just another woman to me.

“What do you want me to do?”

“Argh, I don’t know.” She turns on the spot, one way then the other, like she wants to move but doesn’t know where to go.

“But it won’t help me to be seen as another one of your many women.

You need… You need to look at me like I’m the most beautiful woman you’ve ever seen, the most amazing human being you’ve ever met.

You need to look like you want to be with me forever, that you think you’re lucky to be—”

“I do think all that.” The silence crackles, and the annoyance splinters and falls from Erica’s beautiful face like broken glass from a frame. “I do. I do feel that way—”

“What way?”

Oh, Christ. My chest is hot and tight. Did I just say I wanted to be with her forever?

Do I want that? Fuck, even if I do, I can’t.

“You are beautiful. It’s not even an opinion.

It’s just a fact. Most of the world agrees with me.

And the fact that we’re even friends, that you’ve ever given me the time of day in any capacity, blows my mind. ”

She falls silent, absorbing what I’ve just said. Probably trying to work out what the fuck it actually means. I’m not even sure I know what it means.

“Tell me what you want me to do, and I’ll do it,” I say softly.

Her shoulders sink, the fire in her eyes dying out.

“I know this is all pretend, but I want…” Her breath hitches, eyes darting to mine and away again.

“I want to be the reason you’d give everyone else up.

I want to be… the one.” Her voice cracks a little, and I see just how important this is to her.

“It needs to look like I’m the one for you. ”

The one? That’s not just fake dating. That’s fake love. It's way too fucking close to my reality, and to tell her as much when there’s a list in my jacket pocket of things I cannot do, feels like a mistake I can't afford to make. “Lefroy—”

She holds a hand up to cut me off. “Before you say it, I know this is all fake, and I’m not the person that you’re going to feel like that about, and this is only going to last a few months, but I need you to make me feel like it’s true.

And I know it’s asking a lot for someone like you to imagine what it’s like to choose one person.

And especially for it to be me, when we’ve been friends so long, and this”—her hand flits rapidly between us—“would never go anywhere. I know you aren’t really interested.

Not to the degree I need to convince the world you are.

” She sighs. “And I’m not into you, either.

” A sharp sting whips across my chest and I clench a fist, gripping it hard enough to distract from the discomfort her words cause .

“We’re friends, that’s all. So it’s a lot. To make this play out like love .”

The air feels loaded with invisible energy, and for a few precious seconds we’re frozen in a moment that belongs only to us.

“Have you ever been in love?” I ask, and the way she jolts reveals that she wasn’t expecting the question. I don’t even know why I asked.

Her gaze collides with mine, and the impact makes me realise she hardly looked at me during her outburst. “No. Have you?”

Numbness spreads through me, and when I drag my answer from the depths of my being it feels like a lie. “No.”

She inhales, and when she exhales, the sound trembles.

“I know what a big ask this is, and I’m sorry.

But you offered, and now we’re here and we’re on the posters and we’re on social media and we’ve committed to this, and when I open that door”—she points to the door to the main ballroom beyond—“everyone will be there, including my mother.” She shakes out her hands, and I want to grab them and hold her still.

I want her to see that I’m here for her even when she’s spinning out and desperate, but I hold back.

I still don’t know if she wants me to touch her or not.

“We have to pull this off. They have to think this is real. Everyone has to. No one can ever find out that this isn’t real. ”

“That you’re not the one?” I whisper.

She swallows and licks her lips, and I follow the motion. Her mouth is so beautiful, so wide, her lips so full, that any other time I’d be thinking about kissing her again, but her expression is so insecure, so afraid , that a hollow ache sets up in my ribcage instead. “Exactly.”

I want to ask her what the fuck she’s frightened of. What does she think I’m going to do? I step closer, taking her hands in mine. “Do you trust me?”

My heart thumps while she weighs up the question, eyes flitting over my face as though it might help her decide. “Yes.”

“Then let me take the reins. Forget your rules. Scrap the list. Let me show you what it would be like if you were the one. Can you do that?”

She hesitates, her eyes wide and dark and fixed on me like I might be able to save her, although from what I’m fucked if I know. I can’t even save myself. My father is blackmailing me, stealing my money, and coercing me to commit to someone else. Doing this for Erica will only make it worse.

But I would endure anything to help her get what she wants.

“You need to give me permission to touch you,” I continue.

“To initiate it.” I release her hands and hold mine up.

“I swear, I won’t do anything inappropriate.

But you can’t expect this to look realistic if I can’t touch you.

If I’m dating someone, and I like them, I’m going to touch them.

That’s part of the joy of being with someone you like. Being able to hold them. Kiss them—”

“There’ll be no kissing.” Erica takes a tiny step back, and the movement causes the silk strap of her dress to fall down her arm on one side.

I reach out, easing the strap of her dress back up with the tip of my finger. I do it slowly, so fucking slowly , stroking the velvet of her bare skin. Erica doesn’t move. She barely breathes. The moment is charged like a thundercloud, at least on my side.

I want to run my hands over the rest of her body, kissing every inch of her skin.

Fuck . I should never have suggested this fake dating thing because it’s going to be painful.

I know it already. It’s the worst temptation ever.

The one woman in the world who would never agree to go out with me, asking me to convince the world she’s the one.

This is fucked, and we’ve only just begun.

I raise my eyes to find she’s watching me as I break the contact between our bodies and lower my arm to my side again.

She gives a shaky breath, a small, erotic-sounding gasp slipping out, and I swear it tugs right on my cock.

I rub a palm over my eyes and scrape it down my face, letting out a groan to distract from the heavy thump of arousal beating through my body. “Okay. No kissing.”

“And no hotels,” she adds.

Before I have a chance to reply, the door to the ballroom swings open, and we’re exposed to the room. There are people gathered drinking champagne, and like a scene from a movie, they all turn to where we’re standing.

The MC for the evening catches sight of us and calls out, “The woman we’ve all been waiting for! Miss Erica Lefroy, ladies and gentlemen.”