The warmth of Luke’s hand resting low on my back helps calm some of my nerves as we enter Romano’s with Luke’s business partner, Paul, Paul’s date, and Mr. and Mrs. Koh—or Jia and Cheng, as they’ve insisted I call them.

When the Kohs had requested that we meet here for dinner, Luke had shot me one of those looks that make it hard to forget he’s not really my fiancé and immediately tried to talk the Kohs into making other plans. Apparently, though, Paul has really talked the place up to them in the past, and they insisted.

Luke offered to make my excuses for me, but selfishness is making me brave. I know I’ve stumbled into a fairytale with him—or maybe a Christmas miracle—but I also know it can’t last. No matter how willing I am to give myself to him, no matter how precious and cherished and safe he makes me feel, the truth is that once the Kohs leave town and the big business deal Luke and Paul are trying to sign with them is complete, Luke will realize just how far out of my league he really is. How inexperienced and ignorant I am. How much we don’t fit.

Even if, in my heart, it feels like we do.

“Everything okay, sweetheart?” Luke asks, his voice full of that genuine-sounding concern that just makes me melt. He leans down to whisper the question directly into my ear, sending a delicious cascade of tingling shivers through me as his warm breath hits my skin, and it occurs to me all over again just how much danger I’m in.

I’m falling for him.

Jessie is right, I don’t have any experience with men, but this man… I want him in every way a girl can, and I’m not sure how I’m going to survive it when my “job” as his fake-fiancée is over and I end up on The Luminare’s housekeeping staff or whatever other position he has in mind for me longterm.

And that’s why I’m here tonight. No matter how much I’d rather avoid the risk of running into Trey, I’m too dang selfish to give up a single minute of whatever time I have with Luke, even when it means coming back to Romano’s. Besides, I do feel safe with him. No matter how nasty Trey gets—if he’s even here tonight, which I’m praying he isn’t—I know Luke will protect me.

“Hannah?” Luke prompts when I take too long to answer. The rest of our party goes on ahead, heading to the VIP room with tonight’s hostess, but Luke holds me back as he waits for my reassurance. “We can leave if you’re worried about—”

“No,” I rush to say, falling for him just a little bit harder for this moment of sweet consideration. “I’ll be fine, Luke, really.” I lower my voice, not wanting any of my former coworkers to overhear. “I don’t even see Trey here, and… and I don’t want to mess up your business deal with the Kohs.”

No matter how well Luke treats me, I can’t let myself forget that I actually have a job to do here. Paul explained it clearly that first night in the fancy car: the Kohs want to do business with stable, family-oriented men, but neither Paul nor Luke really are that.

My heart squeezes painfully, wishing for things to be different, but I ignore it. My job is to help Luke look like he could be that man, and everything else he gives me—including the naughty pleasure he’s got me addicted to—is just a perk of that job.

“Don’t worry about the business deal,” he says to me now, smoothing a hand down my hair as he smiles at me in that way he has; the one that makes my toes want to curl. “The Kohs love you. Not that I can blame them.”

“Okay,” I promise because I can see he wants to hear it. “I’ll stop worrying.”

“Good girl,” he says, giving me a sweet kiss right there in the main dining room and then leading me back to the VIP area to join his business associates.

I bite my lip as I follow, my heart doing a slow roll in my chest. The things he says… it’s a good thing one of us keeps his business interests in mind. I won’t let him down, though. I won’t forget why I’m really on his arm tonight, and it helps to remind myself that he can’t mean it when he looks at me like that. When he says things like that.

Oh, I know he obviously likes me—I really don’t think anyone could fake all the wonderful and wicked ways he treats me—but he’s a sophisticated businessman. I’m not going to let myself start dreaming that he’s going to settle for someone as young and inexperienced as me for any kind of permanent happily-ever-after.

“It’s a good sign when you can’t even make it the length of a restaurant with stopping to kiss your future bride,” Mrs. Koh says to Luke with a saucy wink as we reach the VIP table. Then her eyes light up and she adds excitedly, “I have a wonderful idea! The two of you should honeymoon at the new property!” She titters behind her hand. “Oh, what am I thinking? You wouldn’t want to wait that long.”

Luke and Paul instantly perk up. Mrs. Koh talking about the hotel they want to build together as if it’s a done deal is a very good sign, and a warm feeling of satisfaction fills me at the thought that I might have played even a small part in making that happen for them.

“Have you two set a wedding date yet?” Mrs. Koh asks as Luke pulls a chair out for me.

“Not yet,” he answers, winking at me as he takes his own seat once I’m seated. “I’m hoping Hannah won’t make me wait too long, though.”

I blush as Mrs. Koh—I mean Jia— titters, but then she plucks my hand off the table and tsks. “But you haven’t even given her a ring yet! Of course she hasn’t let you set a date. Silly man.”

“Oh, he doesn’t need to—” I start.

“The ring is being sized,” Luke says, talking over me. “You’ll see it on her finger at the Christmas party, Jia.”

I swallow hard, not sure if my heart can stand wearing Luke’s ring without it being real. But I will, of course. I’ll do anything he needs.

Paul steers the conversation back to the idea of Luke and I honeymooning at the new hotel they want to build, and from there manages to get the talk onto pure business. I try to follow along, but then Trey enters the VIP room and my stomach freezes into a block of ice.

He looks horrible—nose still swollen and the lingering signs of two black eyes from when Luke hit him last week. He also looks pissed, and I can tell he didn’t just wander in here; someone must have told him that Luke and I were in the VIP room.

I’m worried that Trey plans on making a scene, but to my surprise, as soon as he catches my eye, he smirks, turns on his heel, and walks away.

I glance at Luke and Luke gives me one of those loving smiles that I wish with all my heart meant more than they do. Luke’s back is to the VIP room entrance, so he doesn’t know Trey is here. He’s also deeply involved in business talk, so I can’t think of a way to warn him.

Before I can figure out what to do or whether or not it’s even my place to do anything at all, Kevin, the restaurant manager, appears at my side.

“Phone call on the house phone for you, Ms. Carsen,” he says to me in a discreet restaurant-manager tone, as if I really am a VIP guest.

My stomach clenches, my gut telling me this has something to do with Trey. I can’t just ignore it, though. What if it’s Jessie? I ran out of pre-paid minutes on my cell phone a while ago, and even though Luke arranged for a nanny to stay with her at the hotel, my brain can’t help filling with a million scary “what-if” scenarios of my sister needing me.

“Thank you,” I say to Kevin quietly. And then, to the table, “Excuse me. I’ll just be a moment.”

Luke looks up with an inquiring tilt to his eyebrows, but I smile reassuringly and Mr. Koh says something about building codes and Luke’s attention goes right back to the conversation, as it should.

I follow Kevin out of the VIP room, but instead of leading me to the house phone, he sighs and ushers me toward his office. “Sorry, Hannah,” he whispers apologetically as he opens the door to reveal Trey waiting for me, just as I’d feared. “Mr. Romano requires a word with you.”

Before I can get a word out, Kevin backs out of the room and shuts the door after him, leaving me alone with Trey.

Trey smiles at me, and it’s not a good look on him.

An icy burst of fear shoots through me, and I take a slow breath to try to stay calm. I don’t have to fear this man. He’s not my boss anymore. I can turn and walk right back out of this room and go find Luke.

“Congratulations on your ‘engagement,’” Trey says before I can convince my feet to move, making air quotes with his fingers to let me know that he knows my relationship with Luke is fake. Trey looks me up and down in the fancy dress Luke bought me, his lustful gaze somehow making me feel even more violated than all those groping touches he used to steal. “Didn’t realize that’s what the asshole meant when he said you were going to work for him now.”

The way Trey says it is so dirty it makes my skin crawl, like he thinks I’m whoring myself out to Luke or something.

Am I?

Luke has seen me undressed. He’s… touched me. I’ve let him do wicked things to my body with his mouth and hands and the deliciously naughty things he says. No, I’ve done more than let him; I’ve begged him to.

I swallow, a sickening combination of fear, worry, nerves, and shame filling me. I think I’m falling in love with Luke, but Trey is making it sound like something else entirely.

“It’s not like that,” I say, pushing the words out past the lump in my throat.

“I think it is like that,” Trey says, stalking toward me.

Kevin’s office isn’t large, and I only back up two steps before my spine is pressed against the wall. Trey doesn’t stop until he’s standing right in front of me, close enough that the hem of my skirt brushes his legs.

He plants his hands against the wall on either side of my head, trapping me there.

“I think it’s exactly like that, you fucking little tease,” he says with a hard glint in his eye.

His breath smells like garlic and I see faint pockmarks on his cheeks. I’ve never been close enough to notice them before, and I hope I never am again.

“Jenna—” the server working the VIP room tonight, “—told me that she overheard your sugar daddy and his friend trying to work a deal with that Asian couple. Is that what this is about? He may have dressed you up so you don’t embarrass him, but do you think they’d want to do business with him if they knew what you really are? His paid arm candy? Homeless? A girl who will spread her legs for a few extra dollars—”

“I’m not,” I say, my voice cracking as I cut into the stream of horrible words coming out of Trey’s mouth. “I haven’t…”

My voice trails off. I haven’t, but I would.

I want to.

I want to give Luke my virginity, and I am just paid arm candy.

Jenna didn’t lie to Trey, and I don’t blame her for spilling everything she overheard. The staff here hears a lot of things we shouldn’t, given the restaurant’s high class clientele and how we’re trained to blend into the background unless needed, and I’ve got no doubt that Trey got the information out of Jenna with the same kind of threatening tactics he uses on everyone else who works for him. Well, technically everyone who works for Trey’s father, but unfortunately, the elder Mr. Romano spends most of his time on the golf course, leaving all day-to-day operations to his son.

Trey grins down at me evilly, thrusting his hips forward so that his pelvis grinds into me.

He’s hard down there.

I feel sick.

“You wouldn’t want to ruin whatever sweet deal you’ve got going with those guys from The Luminare by screwing up their business deal, now would you, baby? But I don’t need to tell the Asians about your little… arrangement. Not if you finally decide to be a little nicer to me.”

“No,” I whisper, because I just… I can’t. “Please, Mr. Romano, don’t—”

Kevin’s office door flies open before I can figure out what to say to get Trey to leave me alone, hitting the wall so hard that a framed picture hanging there crashes to the floor.

Trey whirls around, his elbow knocking into my side as he turns.

“Ooph,” I cry, doubling over and clutching the spot.

“You fucking ass,” Luke hisses, crossing the room so fast it makes me dizzy. And then he puts Trey on the floor for the second time since they’ve met. “The next time you touch her, I’ll kill you,” Luke promises Trey.

Trey glares up at him from the floor, swollen nose bloody all over again, but he doesn’t try to get up. The hate in his eyes scares me, though, and I can’t shake that fear even when Luke tucks me against his side and hustles me out of there. I feel safe with Luke, but how do I keep Luke and the business deal that means so much to him safe from Trey?

I don’t know the answer any more than I know how Luke realized I needed him, but I do know one thing for sure: it’s already too late for me. I’ve fallen for Luke completely, and no matter how little time I may get with him, I’ll do anything and everything I have to, to give him what he wants. Me… and making sure the deal with the Kohs goes through.

I’m going to be perfect for him.

I have to be, because I love him.