For more than a week after the engagement, there was a palpable tension at home.

But as far as faking it went, Evie and I had never been better.

In fact, I was pretty convinced we deserved Oscar nods for our performances to combat the media. SHE’S GOT THE RING – NOW THEY’RE ON THE ROCKS! That headline and pictures of our heated conversation had been splashed all over the tabloids the morning after our dinner, along with speculation that I was already regretting my decision to leave my “wild bachelor ways.”

It was all bullshit on top of bullshit, but I knew how it looked. My reputation combined with those images created a pretty damned believable narrative. And since I had a job to keep – since I refused to waste all the work I’d already put in – I went with every sappy goddamned date Iain suggested.

And to my surprise, considering the way she’d begun acting since the night of the dinner, Evie went along with them too.

Tuesday, she sat with the WAGs, wearing my jersey fitted tight on her body as she cheered me on to my seventh win of the season. At the end of the game, I jogged over to her by the first base line, flipped my cap backwards and let her cup my face with both hands as I gave her a very public kiss.

“Good game, babe,” she murmured as the WAGs cooed behind her.

By the time I got home that night, she was asleep with her door closed and locked.

The case was the same for the next four nights.

Not only that, she was always out of the house when I woke up and only met me at the location of our public date – whether it was a stroll at the farmers market in Union Square, a sidewalk cafe lunch with Diaz and his wife, or grocery shopping in a ridiculously crowded Trader Joe’s, her favorite store in the world. Whatever we were doing, I found myself with consistently no time or privacy to talk or ask Evie questions – not that I had any by the third night of this pattern.

I knew what was happening.

I wouldn’t talk to her about Tim, so she was reverting strictly to business.

My initial reaction was that of amusement. It felt like a direct challenge from her, and I was always up for one of those. So I laughed to myself, albeit slightly bitterly, and I let that sense of game carry me till Sunday morning, when we went shoe shopping at some store with a big, paparazzi-friendly window up front.

Evie lost her mind over strappy heels, I watched her try a dozen pairs in a pair of little denim shorts, and I was pretty sure neither of us was faking our interest there.

But at the register, the act was on.

“Babe, wait. Which color should I get? The white or the tan?” she asked, her arms wrapped around my neck as she gazed down at the shoes.

“Get them both,” I shrugged. The salesgirl smiled as Evie beamed up at me, saying something about me being the best before she went on her toes and kissed me on the lips.

But it wasn’t a quick peck like I expected – it was a slow, sexy swirl of her tongue as she pressed her tits firmly against my chest, and after a week without contact, my dick reacted immediately. I knew Evie felt it because she let out a sexy little mm into my mouth.

Then the second my hand slid from her hips toward her ass, she pulled away, smiling brightly at the salesgirl who handed over her bags.

I was pretty sure the only reason she waited at the door was because there were a few paparazzi camped right outside the door, and she didn’t want to walk alone. Considering how aggressive those assholes could get, I couldn’t blame her. I was glad she waited.

But after letting me guide her to the car and open the door, Evie slid in and went straight to answering emails on her phone. I could tell the immediate silence was jarring to the driver because he kept peeking at us through the rearview mirror. It was at that point that I wished I’d just called my usual driver Gary instead of using some app, because I was pretty sure this guy was paying far too much attention to us.

“Everything okay, guys?” he dared to ask with a little laugh after about thirty seconds of silence. I gave him an odd look but just as I wondered whether the kid was going to sell a tabloid some tidbit on our failing engagement, I heard Evie purr.

“Babe, I love them so much. I can’t stop looking at them,” she said, peeking into the shoeboxes inside the bag at her feet.

I grinned, partially over her wariness of the driver, but mostly over the little fuck-me voice she was putting on for me.

“I’m glad you like them. You should put them on.”

“Not now. Tonight. When you get home,” she said, leaning back on the window and briefly teasing me by rubbing her ankle against my knee.

It lasted all of two seconds but I couldn’t erase the image of mostly naked legs on display for me like that, so when she went back to her emails, I took advantage of our nosy driver’s eavesdropping and held my arm out.

“Baby, come here.”

Her eyes flicked up at me, and she silent for a few seconds before putting on a light, teasing voice for me.

“I’m doing work stuff, babe.”

“Fuck work. Come here,” I grinned, holding my arm out to her.

I stifled a laugh as she stole an actual eye roll before putting her phone down, resuming a smile and sidling up to me. As I pulled her sexy legs onto my lap, she wrapped her arms around my neck, twisting her body to face me and away from the driver.

I ignored her cocked eyebrow and the way she impatiently mouthed what? Instead, I enjoyed the fake giggle she managed as I stroked the back of her calves and said something about her hair smelling good.

Considering I didn’t get to touch this body at home anymore – considering how she used my own body as she wished in public – I was going to take my sweet damned time here. Hell, I was going to get fucking high off the scent of that coconut shampoo. Maybe I already was, considering I was suddenly imagining Evie lounging next to me on a beach, basking in the sun in a little white bikini.

“We need a vacation,” I smirked, buying more time with her on my lap.

“Mm-hm. The second your season is over, babe. We’ll go.”

“Where do you want to go?”

Away from you, was what she conveyed with that big, inaudible sigh that made her shoulders slump. Still hanging onto my neck, she glanced back at her phone on the seat. I couldn’t help but break into a huge grin because apparently insolent Evie was also a turn-on. When she turned back to me, she had her game face back.

“Oh, I don’t know. Anywhere at all as long as I’m with you,” she said with a saccharine sweetness meant to irritate me. It somewhat worked.

“Name a city,” I said. “London? Paris? Milan?”

“No. I need a beach. It’s already been too long since I’ve been in the ocean,” she said, almost accusingly, as if I’d been keeping her from it myself.

“What, you a water baby like me?” I asked as she avoided my eye, gazing longingly out the back window like she preferred to get out in the middle of traffic than sit on my lap.

“Please. I’m more of a water baby than you,” she mumbled.

“Doubt that. I was born and raised in Florida. What do you got, Massachusetts girl?”

Just as I hoped, that set something off. I tried not to laugh as Evie pinned a brief but hot, incredulous stare on me.

“For your information, there are lots of beautiful and famous beaches in New England,” she started sharply, clearly about to school me. I was all for it. I’d set her up for it because as much as I enjoyed the sweet, breathy voice she used with me in public, I missed the sound of her real one talking about real things. “Palm trees are not a requirement in order to be considered a beach. Ever heard of Cape Cod? Martha’s Vineyard? Good Harbor Beach?”

“I’ve definitely never heard of the last one. That sounds like someone got tired while naming beaches.”

She snorted but caught herself.

“Stop. Don’t be rude,” she said tartly. “That was my beach growing up, and it’s beautiful.”

“Probably still half as good as the worst beach in Florida.”

“There was white sand. Lighthouses. Nice people,” Evie seethed adorably. “It’s even pretty in the winter. I hitchhiked at least once a week to get there.”

“Hitchhiked? How old were you?”

“When I first started? Thirteen, fourteen.”

I must’ve looked fucking horrified because she slid her eyes back to me and actually laughed.

“What?”

“Nothing. Must’ve been a good beach,” I remarked.

“It was. It was my one place where I could pretend I was normal,” she said, her sentence getting progressively quieter before she suddenly frowned to herself and pulled to get off my lap. “Let me go,” she whispered under her breath.

“What do you mean pretend to be normal?” I lowered my voice.

“Nothing,” she said, though I already had the answer pictured in my head. At the beach, she didn’t have to think about her rocky home life or the lack of money. She had sand, sun and water like everyone else. It was the universal pleasure of beaches. I had the same in Florida.

“Drew, just let me sit back down,” Evie repeated quietly but sternly. “Okay?”

I held her tight but said nothing in reply because I didn’t have an argument here. If she wanted to get off my lap, I was supposed to let her. But I hated the way my body felt whenever she physically pulled away. It was a sudden loss of this peaceful feeling, like getting a warm blanket ripped off your body while sleeping.

It was actually easier to bear in the four-day stretch this week when I didn’t get to touch her at all. But getting to run my hands on her soft skin then feeling it get taken away felt like shit.

So for a minute or so, we were engaged in a standoff.

But this time, I had a feeling she might win.

“Drew Maddox. I’ll make you regret it if you don’t let me go right now,” Evie whispered. Apparently just the tingle of her breath so close to my lips was enough for me to risk it.

“Make me regret it then.”

She succeeded in the first second.

Climbing onto my lap, she squeezed my hands over her tits and kissed me deeply. The groan I let out was instantly greedy, ravenous. Every hard inch of my body was starved and at her fucking mercy. We were three minutes from home and I was already running late to get to the stadium – I knew that, she knew that, and that was why she was comfortable doing this. I couldn’t be late for stretch and I wasn’t going to fuck her right in this car in front of our creep of a driver.

So she was using this bit of time to torture me, and I was a willing participant.

“Let me taste them,” I hissed when she let me yank down her neckline and the cups of her bra.

“Uh-huh,” she exhaled breathlessly as I sucked her tits into my mouth, swirling my tongue all over them and relishing every sweet lick before I felt the car slow to a roll. The app dinged to signal the end of the ride just as the car stopped, and before I knew it, Evie was breathlessly covering up and reaching to grab her bags off the floor.

“See you tonight, babe?” she panted, her lips wet and swollen as she moved to get out of the car. She dug her nails into my shoulder as I pulled her hand off the door and grabbed her shirt, pulling till her tits sprang free again. Her pussy grinded against my cock as I sucked her nipples hard, like I’d never get a chance to again.

We stopped abruptly when the car behind honked and just like that, she threw the door open.

“You gonna stay up for me?” I asked.

“Mm-hm,” she hummed sweetly before getting out of fast and shutting the door.

Then as I sat there recovering, telling the driver where to go next, I let myself picture Evie actually staying up for me tonight, her sleepy head popping up from the couch the second she heard me coming in.

I used to love that couch – now I harbored a vague sense of resentment for the way it failed me every night. Seeing it unoccupied was once the post-game norm, but now it was a letdown.

So I envisioned her sprawled out there tonight, in a little tank top and shorts. I knew it wouldn’t actually be the case, but I wanted to believe it. And as tired as it had me, I’d gotten pretty damned good at the whole business of pretending.