Her eyes scan the page, those lashes licking at her cheeks in their thick fullness.

I can’t help but examine her face as she reads, the first view I’ve gotten of her without having to avert my eyes since I tracked her down at that wedding. Kara was always beautiful, but she’s lost that teenage it-girl look, and in its place, is a full-fledged woman. Curves replace the once stick thin body, but she wears them well. Tight in the exact right spots, full and supple in the others. She’s shorter than most of the Amazon rail thin girls who exist in Hollywood, and my cock hasn’t dismissed that. Kara is a real woman, a fit, athletic woman with tits and an ass that I’d like to put my hands on. There really was no way to poetically put that.

It strikes me that I haven’t been this infatuated with a woman’s looks in a very long time, but maybe it’s because I know what’s underneath ... maybe it’s because we have a history. Either way, I shove the feeling down, because she’s here doing this for me.

“I will not be on call for events, not if I am working or have a rotation at the hospital.” She takes the red pen in her hand and slices it across the page like a decisive knife to the throat.

I’d practically lost my jaw on the floor when she agreed to come out here and help save my image. Five days of being in Los Angeles and I still saw the complication in her eyes, but you could also see the excitement sparking there.

From the minute we’d arrived, Kara had not wanted to discuss anything else but when she could see the contract, and where she would be working with her graduate degree. For a girl who claimed independence and not wanting anything from me, she’d seemed all too thrilled to accept a residency position with Dr. Broderick Ottoman, one of the premier dermatologists in Los Angeles. I’d also managed to score her a rotating shift at Cedars-Sinai in their burn unit … in case she changed directions and wanted to do something with more trauma.

She’d thanked me after I told her about the positions, but it was her eyes that got me. The gratitude radiating from them, as if I was some sort of knight in shining Armani, hit me square between the chest. And ever since, I’d been trying to get her to see me like that again.

“You have to walk the carpet with me sometimes, it will solidify our status as a couple in people’s minds. And after parties and events are a must … although no, you don’t have to be at every one.” I was trying to find a compromise.

“I will be at as many events as I can sanely make it to, but I’m not sacrificing my work for them.” Her nose turns up in that defiant way, the privilege wreaking from her.

I have to remind myself that it’s something we’ve never had in common. She grew up an only child in a well off, middle class family. If she got a flat tire, her father took care of it. When a teacher gave her a bad grade, her parents were calling the school demanding to know why. Mine, on the other hand, were either not around, or didn’t give a shit.

Kara always had that ignorant privilege about her, the kind a person got when they never really had to struggle. No matter how much money I had now, I would never have that kind of naïve bliss.

“Understood. I’ll run them by you, and you make it to what you can.” I try to keep my voice friendly, because I need her to do this.

Patrick, and the lawyers around the table, readjust their positions, their faces annoyed. They’re used to these kind of contract relationships in this town, but they’re not used to the woman in the situation taking so long to read a contract. Usually they were more than willing to sign on the dotted line for money and fame. I had to smirk to myself thinking about just how different Kara was from them.

“PDA?” Her confused eyes glance at me.

“Public displays of affection,” I clarify.

She rolls her eyes. “I know what it stands for ... I’m not clear on exactly what that entails.”

I cross my arms over my chest and lean back in my chair, more than cocky and happy to fill her in. “It means that we have to go to dinners where the press ‘catches us’ in a make out. It means that, on the red carpet, I have to touch your ass and you caress my cheek. And plenty more of that in clubs, on dates, on set. It has to be convincing. The public has to believe that we are in love.”

Kara’s face goes pale, and I realize that she hasn’t thought about this before reading that clause in the contract.

My hands around her waist, nuzzling her neck, kissing her again … it was going to be impossible not to want to continue to do those things when we were out of the public eye. But her disgusted expression, the way the tension suffused the room, made me angry with her. And in turn, I was angry with myself … for letting this affect me so much.

“Come on, you can be an actress. I’ve seen it.” I raise my eyebrow at her, challenging her.

Because if she won’t do this to help me, she’ll definitely do it to spite and prove me wrong.

I see the determination set in her foxlike face. “I’ll be the best damn fake fiancée anyone has ever seen.”

And maybe, she’d be so damn good that I could actually enjoy some of these nights with a human that was worth spending time with.

After ironing out some more items in the contract, Kara is putting a pen to the dotted line.

The two parts inside of me war; the devil walking around with his chest puffed out, happy that someone is going to step in and save me from public litany.

And the angel, shaking its head at me, telling me I shouldn’t go down this path.

I ignore it.