Cole swallowed, his heart lodged in his throat. The idea of showing Rhett his was enticing to say the least. In actuality, and seemingly out of nowhere, Cole wanted to pin Rhett against a wall and fuck him into the next room. But he knew that was conduct unbecoming a future fake husband. He needed to find a way to keep his hormones in check if he wanted this thing with Rhett to work. Not to mention he had Ryan to contend with now.

“I’ll show you mine tomorrow,” Cole managed to verbalize, standing up and clearing his throat before taking a step into the hallway. Something about being in Rhett’s bedroom made him feel a lot of things that exceeded far beyond the standard carnal thoughts he’d been grappling with all night.

“Oh,” Rhett said, looking up and pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. He tucked the stuffed Garfield under his arm and followed Cole back into the living room. Cole looked over his shoulder and tracked his movements with a predatory intensity.

Rhett sat the stuffed cat next to the fern.

“Hang out with Lucy for a second,” he whispered.

Cole furrowed his brows together. “Who is Lucy?”

“My fern,” Rhett answered, so matter-of-factly Cole didn’t even think to dispute the absurdity of it.

“So come over tomorrow. Early. I’ll make you breakfast.”

“Breakfast?”

“Yeah. We have a lot of catching up to do if we want to make this convincing when the weekend comes,” Cole reminded him.

“Ryan is probably going to call me tonight,” Rhett offered with a shrug.

“I’m sure he’ll be calling both of us,” he agreed. “That’s why it’s important we know the basic things about each other so people don’t catch on.”

“What’s your favorite color?” Rhett asked him.

“Red. Yours?”

“Red,” Rhett whispered. He did that reverse blush thing again and Cole shoved his hands into his pockets.

“How do you drink your coffee?” Cole asked, his voice unusually low and gruff.

Rhett’s eyes flared. “Two sugars.”

“Black,” Cole shared.

“What time do you go to bed?”

“Late,” Cole rasped. “I don’t sleep well.”

“I’m in bed by ten,” Rhett replied.

“How domestic,” Cole remarked.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, wanting so badly to tumble into bed early enough to fuck Rhett so he could fall asleep on schedule. Cole blew his breath out loudly, making a raspberry sound with his lips.

“I need to go,” he said, producing his car keys and turning away from Rhett before his erection became visible.

“Breakfast then?” Rhett asked hopefully from behind him.

“Yeah,” Cole said, not turning around. “Come by before nine.”

He twisted the front doorknob and had one foot outside when Rhett’s voice stopped him.

“Cole.”

God, that voice.

“I’ve never been to your house.”

Cole closed his eyes and squared his shoulders, not wanting to be rude, but really needing to get the fuck away from Rhett before he fucked everything up.

“I’ll text you the directions.” He dared a quick look over his shoulder at red-faced Rhett and his pet fern. “Sleep well, Rhett.”

Cole closed the door behind him and practically ran to his car, pulling the door closed and banging his head against the steering wheel a few times before turning the key and backing onto the road.

He drove quickly, thankful to be back home. It shouldn’t have been a big deal. It wasn’t like Ryan’s barely younger brother was some kind of forbidden fruit or something. But still…

Cole kicked his shoes off in the entryway and padded into the kitchen, checking the pantry to make sure he had sugar for Rhett in the morning. His phone was still sitting on the counter and seeing it reminded him he needed to let his mom know about his unexpected plus one.

He powered his phone on, ignoring the onslaught of text messages, including a handful from Ryan that he didn’t dare read. It wasn’t terribly late yet, so he decided to call his mom up at the main house.

“Cole,” she answered on the fourth ring.

“Mother,” he greeted.

“Have you come around since you stormed out of the house earlier?”

He bristled at her insinuation, “I’m going to have a date coming with me to Kristen’s wedding.”

“Impossible,” she huffed.

“Excuse me?”

“It’s far too late to add anyone to the seating chart, Cole.”

“You literally cannot tell me that I need to settle down then tell me that I can’t bring my boyfriend to my little sister’s first wedding.” Cole slid onto a barstool at his kitchen counter with a roll of his eyes.

“Cole MacKenzie Mallory!” she shouted at him.

“You’re fooling yourself if you think this is going to be the only time Kristen gets married and you know it,” he chastised.

“That’s beside the point…”

Cole cut her off. “You’re right. The point is my boyfriend is coming to the wedding with me and he’ll need a flight and a seat. He obviously doesn’t need a hotel room though.”

“Since when do you even have a boyfriend, Cole? You didn’t have one three hours ago.”

“I didn’t tell you I had one,” he corrected, even though that was a loose interpretation of the facts.

“It’s the perfect opportunity for him to be re-introduced to everyone, as my boyfriend anyway. The whole family will be there.”

“What do you mean re-introduced?” His mother’s voice took on a hint of concern and suspicion.

Cole swallowed, finding himself unexpectedly worried about committing so fully to this lie.

“I’ve gotta go, Mom. I’m needed elsewhere,” he said quickly to avoid the question. “I’ll call you tomorrow and we can talk more.”

Before she could protest, Cole ended the call. He stared at his phone to make sure it wouldn’t spontaneously combust in his hand or, worse, ring because his mom was calling him back.

When neither of those things happened, he set it down, pouring himself a fresh glass of wine before clicking into the text messages from Ryan.

Cole huffed a frustrated groan and dialed Ryan’s number. He answered on the first ring.

“Dude!”

“Dude,” Cole repeated.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were fucking my brother?”

“That’s crass,” Cole began. “And I didn’t say anything about Rhett because it’s nobody’s business.”

“It seems really out of left field.”

If you only knew.

“It was unexpected,” Cole answered, completely truthful. “But I think it’s going to work.”

It better work, or this whole facade would crash around them in a catastrophically painful and destructive way. Cole hoped that in the fresh light of morning, Rhett would still be okay with what they’d agreed to do.

“Do you...does... Fuck.”

Cole could picture Ryan tearing his hair out at the roots.

“Does he make you happy?” Ryan finally asked.

“Yeah,” Cole answered, telling the truth again. Rhett had made him extremely happy tonight.

“And do you make him happy?”

“I try,” Cole answered, “I’ll always try.”

“And he’s coming to Tahiti?” Ryan mumbled.

“Well, of course he is. He’s my boyfriend.” Cole was surprised again at how easily that rolled off his tongue. He had to keep reminding himself this was pretend. Rhett wasn’t his real boyfriend. None of this was real.

Well, the erection between his legs was real.

He didn’t want to have an erection while he talked to Ryan.

“Ryan, I gotta get going, okay?” Cole popped the button on his jeans and shoving his hand down his pants to adjust himself.

“Oh, yeah. I mean, are you and Rhett together now?” Ryan asked, a bit bitterly.

“No. He’s home.”

“Oh.”

“So I’m going to get to bed. I’ll talk to you soon though, yeah?”

“Right. Alright, dude. Bye.” Ryan stumbled his way through the end of the call, hanging up before Cole could.

He laid his phone back on the counter and finished his wine, pouring himself another glass and carrying it with him to bed. He loved his house, but it was large. Far bigger than he’d ever need on his own. He’d only moved in because staying in the main house had been driving him insane. Even being in another wing, as far from his parents as he could manage, it was too close.

He was almost thirty, not thirteen, and he desperately needed that separation between them. Although, he lamented, it was mostly useless because even across the property, he’d still have these stupid familial relationship constraints around his neck.

Cole kicked out of his pants and tugged off his shirt, tossing it all into the hamper in the corner before he got into bed and turned on the fifty-two inch flat-screen that was mounted on the opposite wall. He flicked through over one hundred channels, not finding anything he wanted.

He knew he wouldn’t fall asleep, though, even with two glasses of wine and as many beers in him. Cole settled on a random alien conspiracy show on the History channel, swallowing his last mouthful of wine before he settled back into the pillows and waited for sleep.