“I thought you had nothing to say to me.”
“You poked the tiger and now I have a lot to say, so listen up, bub,” she said, turning in the car seat to look at him. The hairs on his arms stood to attention, and of course so did the muscle in his pants. She turned him on and that was bad, very bad, because if she turned him on when she was bitching him out, there was no telling what would happen if she said something sweet to him. “First of all, I am not some gold-digging ho, so I don’t understand why you felt the need for a prenup!”
“You’re still mad about that? I thought it was because I wouldn’t eat with you last night,” he said with a laugh. “Piper, I have to protect myself. Besides, that was more my agent and lawyer’s suggestion. You think I’d think of that shit?”
“That’s fine, and understandable, but you could have talked to me about it. Instead you just throw the damn thing on the table and say sign this. Oh, and the dinner thing: You are lucky I didn’t stab you with my fork. I am beyond pissed about that,” she shrieked. “It is common courtesy to eat dinner with your housemate.”
“I’m not eating at the table, so if you want to get a gamer chair and pull it up beside me so we can eat together, more power to you, and I am sorry if my delivery of the prenup wasn’t what you expected, but I think your delivery of the news of our child wasn’t that great, either, so we’ll chalk both those up as a loss and move forward.”
He glanced over at her and swore she was about to jump across the gear shift and gouge out his eyes. Looking back at the road, he listened to her labored breathing and wished like hell she did not want to continue this conversation, because all it was doing was making him want to smother her with kisses. How in the world did it make sense that he wanted her when she was shrieking about him being an ass**le?
He needed help, he already knew this, but this moment in the car with his new wife proved it.
“There is no arguing with you. You sit there with this arrogance about you. As if you are the hottest thing since fire! It’s so frustrating because I know you are not this person that you portray! Where is the person I went home with six months ago? The man who held me until the sun came up, the man who told me he saw me and wanted only me?”
Feeling like she had stabbed him in the chest, he looked over and saw that she was getting ready to cry. He was an ass**le, but he had to be. He couldn’t let her in any more than he already had.
In a low, cold voice, he said what he needed to say: “It was a lie.”
“You think you’re good at lying, huh? Well, let me tell you, you aren’t! You think you’re good enough to make both our families believe this is real? Because I don’t. You wouldn’t even kiss me yesterday! How the hell are you going to make anyone believe this stupid freaking lie of a marriage?”
“I made you believe that I cared for you that night, didn’t I? When all I really wanted from you was to get laid.”
Erik didn’t mean to say that but she was getting too close to the truth of it all and he felt like his back was up against the wall. He couldn’t dare look at her; he knew he had just f**ked up royally. He considered himself to be very levelheaded, and he usually thought things out before doing them. He didn’t understand the effect she had on him, but it was obvious when he said and did stupid things—Piper was dangerous.
“No,” she pursued. “I don’t believe that for one second. I see right through you and I know in my heart you are not this person. If you want me to stay around and carry out this deception, then you better treat me with some respect.”
Erik nodded as he pulled up to the curb of Jakob’s house. Putting the car in park, he turned to face her.
“I have no problem treating you with respect, Piper; just remember where the lines are.”
“Oh, I know where the lines are, Erik, and I know about your walls, too, and you’ve had them up since the beginning. You need to remember who needs who here. I don’t need you. I was fine before you ever stepped one foot into my life.”
“Same here, babe,” he said, grabbing the keys and throwing the door open to get out of the car.
Great, he was pissed now, and that was the last thing he wanted. Being nervous and pissed all at one time wasn’t a good combination, and he hated it. Taking in a deep breath, he walked around the car to find Piper still sitting in the front seat. She was wiping her eyes and fixing her makeup, which was good. He needed a moment to breathe.
This whole thing wasn’t going to be easy at all. He liked things to be easy. Being on the ice was a different story: He wanted to work hard there. But off the ice he didn’t want outspoken and spunky and that was Piper. Unfortunately, even though she could piss him off there was still an attraction between them that was hard to ignore.
Shaking his head, he watched as she got out of the car and shut the door. Fixing the bottom of her short shorts, which showed off her gorgeous tanned legs, she glanced up at him before looking at the house. Erik followed her gaze and let out another long breath. He wasn’t sure what was about to happen, but he knew it wasn’t going to be easy. She was right when she said they needed to be believable if they were going to deceive everyone in their family. As much as it hurt him to lie to Alla, Cooper, and Jakob, there was no choice. He needed everyone to believe he loved this woman and that the child she carried was the greatest gift in the world. They might not like each other right now, but they needed to act like they did. Looking back at Piper, he met her soft blue eyes.