Total pages in book: 154
Estimated words: 148473 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 148473 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
But I’m grinning too. In the pic, she’s not wearing any pants, so really, I won. I’ve got a photo of my wife in her two-week anniversary shirt that says Quick-Draw Maeve.
She looks so spectacular, so…Maeve. Playful, sexy, all the things that make her, well, her, that I take matters into my own hand.
Happy anniversary to me indeed.
Later that morning, while I’m riding the exercise bike in the hotel gym before we take off for the next city, Everly marches in with a too-pleased smile on her face.
I pull out my earbuds, and she says proudly, “I’ve got some press requests about you,” she says, all business now. “And they involve Maeve.”
Didn’t have that on my bingo card today. “Everything okay?” I ask, ready to do battle for Maeve if I have to.
She holds up her hands like she’s telling me to stand down. “It’s mostly feel-good stuff. You want the details?”
“I do,” I say, still pedaling, my heart and legs pumping fast.
She rattles off a few lifestyle news sites that I’ve never heard of that want to do features. Stuff she can mostly handle on our behalf. Then, she adds, “Webflix has an entertainment news show that’s pretty popular. The Good Stuff.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard of it.” It’s a soft show, focusing more on lifestyle than gossip.
“They love you and Maeve and the whole viral kindness thing. And they want to do a piece on the two of you.”
Well, that sounds like something the Sea Dogs would eat up, and it’d raise Maeve’s profile on her own merits, not just mine. “I’m interested. What’s the catch?”
Because there’s always a catch.
Everly glances around the workout room to check if the coast is clear. Then, lowering her voice, she says importantly, her meaning crystal clear: “They want to shoot it in your home. Where they think you and your wife live together.”
I stop pedaling, my feet freezing mid-motion. “They think—” I start, but the rest of the words stall. We live together.
Then, they speed up on a loop in my head—we live together.
My pulse kicks into overdrive. This feels like Christmas, my birthday, and our anniversary all rolled into one, wrapped in a bow of dangerous temptation.
30
INSTANT WIFE, JUST ADD PLANTS
Maeve
“Put the ponytail palm next to the plastic orchid,” I say, setting my real plants beside Asher’s Lego creations in the spacious living room.
Beckett looks at me, frazzled. “Which one is the ponytail palm?”
Reina rolls her eyes dramatically at her husband. “The one that looks like a ponytail,” she says, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world.
“It’s the cute one,” I explain, pointing to the small succulent with long, wild green leaves shooting from the top like an untamed hairstyle. “It looks like it has crazy hair.”
“Like when I wake up,” Reina jokes, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.
Beckett raises both hands in surrender. “I’m staying out of trouble on this one, since your hair always looks beautiful,” he says, backing away from the chaos that’s taken over Asher’s home. Me—I’m the chaos.
The door code Asher sent felt like an open invitation, and now here we are—setting up house. It’s weird, no doubt about it. But also…kind of fun. “I’ll handle it. It’s highly recommended for any aspiring plant ladies,” I say, grabbing the ponytail palm from the foyer table where Beckett had set it when he lugged in my plants from his car a few minutes ago. It’s next to a stack of mail and a couple boxes that arrived for Asher this week. Things he asked me to bring in when he gave me the code. Like a wife would do and vice versa. Yep, we’re playing house.
I carry the plant to the corner table in the living room, placing it beside the fiddle leaf fig I positioned earlier, adding another layer of green. My fingers brush against the smooth plastic of a Lego rose, and I pause, touched. I knew Asher had built the Lego orchid I gifted him years ago, but I didn’t realize he’d made so many more. There are easily a half-dozen Lego plants now—roses and sunflowers and tiny shrubbery too. The table is a mix of real greenery and his creations. It’s an odd contrast, but it works.
“This’ll look good for the TV crew, right? Sort of a his-and-hers vibe,” I say.
“Yeah, his-and-hers weird plants,” Beckett teases.
Reina swats him lightly. “They’re not weird.”
“They’re a little weird.”
“You strip in your sleep. That’s weird,” she shoots back.
I cover my ears. “Okay, okay. I don’t need to know about my brother’s weird sleeping—or stripping—habits,” I say, then drop my hands with a grin.
I adjust the fake and real plants a bit more. The evening light filters through the windows, bathing the room in a soft glow. It’s Thursday. I spent the day working on color palettes for the mural scenes Eleanor approved.