Not So Nice by Emma Lyon
Ryan
I thought we’d be heading back to the hotel after the makeover from Beatrix and an equally humiliating session with Pavic, the suit tailor Beatrix sent us to, but then Graham suggested lunch, and I realized I was starving.
We were in a pedestrian-only part of the city, lined with shops and cafés and brightly colored tables. Graham was on the browser of his phone, no doubt looking up directions to some chic, expensive restaurant, but after a day in Graham’s world, I felt the need to balance things out. “How about there?” I said, pointing to a café with a colorful awning and outdoor seating.
Graham looked dubious. “You don’t even know if it’s any good.”
“It looks fine.” Not passing up the opportunity to poke him a little, particularly after the day he’d put me through, I added, “Not afraid of taking a risk, are you?”
He cocked his head as if amused by the jab. “Is that a challenge?”
“Does everything have to be?” One thing I’d learned about Graham was that he was really fucking competitive. I supposed that was a good thing in his line of work.
“It doesn’t hurt,” Graham said, but he put his phone away with an air of humoring me. “Lead the way.”
Outside the café I caught the attention of the hostess, who waved us to one of the empty tables. We found one that sat two, and I settled across from him. The sun was bright, but the table was shaded by the awning, and it wasn’t too hot. Not as hot as it would be in D.C. right now, anyway.
Graham sprawled in the chair across from me, ankle resting on his knee as he took his phone out again to frown down at whatever had gotten his attention. I sighed. In his casual clothes and sleeves rolled up, Graham looked like he was off for a weekend at the Hamptons, breezy and casual. He looked exactly what he was, a well-to-do, handsome man in his prime. I wished I didn’t find that so appealing.
“Do you ever stop working?” I said, mostly to distract myself from staring at him.
Graham looked up from his phone. “You don’t get anywhere in this world otherwise.” But he turned his phone off and stashed it away, holding up his empty hands for judgment. “I’m all yours.”
My heart flipped in my chest, even though I knew that wasn’t how he’d meant it.
Still, I’d seen the way he’d looked at me at Beatrix’s when I came out in that first outfit. If I could, I’d bottle up that look to experience again and again, shower myself in the warm glow of having someone like Nathan Graham stare at me like I was a five-course meal, the intensity in his dark eyes strong enough to turn my insides into butter.
It was the clothes, of course—it wasn’t like he ever looked at me like that normally. But for a second there, it was like he was seeing me as someone he could date. Someone for whom that was not out of the realm of consideration.
Quit setting yourself up for disappointment. This was exactly what Ethan had warned me about, what I knew I was susceptible to. Besides, being someone Graham would date wasn’t any prize, knowing how easily he discarded them.
Still, it had been nice to have him look at me like that.
The server came by with water, and I glanced at the menu. Graham picked his up but seemed uninterested. “Order whatever you want.”
“You’re not eating?”
“Why don’t you order for both of us? Let’s see how well you really know me. We’ll have to sell that tonight, after all.”
Like I said, competitive.
But I wasn’t afraid of a challenge, either. Particularly not this one. When the server came back, I ordered a club soda for me and a white wine spritzer for Graham, then avocado eggrolls as an appetizer, a turkey sandwich for me, and for Graham the steak salad with blue cheese instead of the goat cheese it came with, hold the radishes, with a green onion vinaigrette. If the server thought it was weird I was ordering for the both of us, he didn’t show it.
“How’d I do?” I said, when he’d left.
Graham looked grudgingly impressed. “Passable, except for the eggrolls. I hate avocados.”
“Those are for me. I’m really hungry.”
He laughed. The sound of it warmed me all over. “How did you know I don’t like goat cheese?”
“You make it abundantly clear every time I order you lunch.”
“Hmm,” he said, not letting on any more than that.
“You noticed I left the radishes off too.”
“Yes, but that was a given.”
Silence fell as the server came back with our drinks and we waited on our food, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. There were enough pedestrians walking past the café that I could nominally watch them while sneaking glances at Graham. He was relaxed in a way I rarely saw him. He’d put his hands in his pockets, and the casual pose pulled the collar of his shirt back from his throat, exposing a tempting glimpse of chest hair. The light breeze ruffled his hair, and not for the first time I wondered if it was as silky as it looked.
Graham’s eyes angled to mine. “What?”
I flushed and looked away. “Nothing.”
Graham rubbed his stubbled chin. He was about to say something when we were interrupted. “Are you Nathan Graham?”
Two young women, probably students at the university, had stopped at our table, glancing between themselves and us nervously. The one who’d first spoken said breathlessly, “It’s just that I saw you—him—on TV for that celebrity fundraiser and you look exactly like him.”
Graham gave them what I’d dubbed his media smile. They weren’t any more immune to it than anyone else. I practically saw them melting. “Why, yes, I am.”
Their faces lit up. “Do you think we could get a picture with you? I mean, we hate to be a bother….”
“Of course,” Graham said smoothly. “Here, get one with me and my partner, Ryan.”
“Are you two together?” This seemed to delight them. “Oh my God, you are so cute together.”
Ignoring the glare I leveled on him, Graham scooted his chair closer to mine and put his arm around my shoulders, leaning in and gesturing for the two women to come to his other side.
They crowded in and the blonde held up her phone to get the four of us in the picture. I did my best to smile. Graham squeezed my shoulders in a way that pulled me far too close to his solid, sexy bulk. I wanted to lean in, turn my head to feel the roughness of his stubble on my lips. My neck ached with the effort of keeping myself from doing it.
While the women swapped positions, I hissed in his ear, “What are you doing? They’re going to post that picture everywhere in the next ten minutes.”
“I know,” Graham murmured back. “It’s perfect. Social proof we’re actually dating. I couldn’t have engineered it better myself.”
Whenever I was in danger of falling victim to Graham’s…everything, he thankfully said something like that to remind me of who he really was.
The phone camera snapped again, and I smiled reflexively.
After a few more pictures, the women chatted a bit with Graham before moving off. Hopefully they didn’t take my silence as unfriendliness, but I was already imagining the social media storm. Graham had a set of dedicated fans and hashtags, and he’d basically just announced to the world that he was dating his PA.
“I don’t think you understand how badly this could go.” My stomach was already tied up in knots. Or is it just pleased that Graham put his arm around you and called you his partner?
Graham, on the other hand, seemed more relaxed than ever. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was smug.
“Relax,” he said, as our server finally arrived with our food. “Everything’s going to be fine.”
* * *
I stared at the bloody remains of my message app when we got back to the hotel an hour later. Ryan, are you dating your boss? Are you sure that’s wise?? That was from my mother.
I’m going to kill him. My Aunt Lindsey.
Ryan WTF CALL ME. That was from Ethan.
Fuck. This was so much worse than I imagined.
Ethan answered on the second ring. “What the ever-living fuck, Ryan.”
“How bad is it?” Not that I wanted to know. But I had to know. I chewed my lip. Everything’s going to be fine, Graham had said. It was so not fine.
“I mean, it’s definitely trending, but I only found out because your Twitter account is tagged so it popped up in my notifications. Don’t worry, everyone thinks the two of you look absolutely adorable together.”
Ugh. I hated that that made me smile.
“Are the two of you actually dating now? When did that even happen?”
Graham was in the bathroom taking a shower, but I still lowered my voice. “We’re just pretending to date so Graham can close this business deal. We didn’t plan on the picture, though.”
“Well, it certainly looks convincing.”
“You think?” I cursed my hopeful tone. “Never mind, don’t answer that.”
“I mean, did you look at it?”
I bit my lip, and then because I couldn’t resist, I opened up the browser on my phone and typed in Graham’s name on the search bar.
The picture was the first thing that came up. Trending indeed. In the caption, one of the women we’d met had written, Ran into Nathan Graham and his boyfriend today! They are sooooo cute!
I scrolled through the comments—most were positive, even gushing, but some were outright toxic, like looks like Graham got himself a twink and what do you call a billionaire’s fuckdoll. But it was the internet so I expected that. Some of the comments made me squirm inside, because it felt so wrong to let people believe things that weren’t true. Like, look at Graham’s face! He’s so in love I want to die.
I looked back at the picture.
“Are you still there?”
I remembered I still had Ethan on the line. “I’m looking at it now.”
The two women must have taken a number of them, because I didn’t remember this particular one. I was looking ahead at the camera lens with a frown on my face, but Graham was looking at me, head cocked and a small smile on his face, almost like he was—
“Nice picture,” Graham said from behind me.
I jumped.
A waft of soap and cedar shampoo washed over me when Graham leaned over my shoulder to tilt my phone his way. He’d just finished showering and all he was wearing was one of the hotel robes. All I had to do was lean back….
“Hm,” he said thoughtfully.
I wondered if he saw it too. The look on his face, like I was someone he enjoyed. Was fond of. Maybe even liked. He’s so in love. I didn’t know what it meant.
“If that doesn’t convince them, I don’t know what will,” he said with satisfaction.
Of course that was all it was. “Yes, great acting there,” I said acidly, snatching my phone away. “I’ll call you back,” I said to Ethan before hanging up. I’d text him later and apologize.
Graham still hadn’t moved from my back. I couldn’t bring myself to pull away either. We stood there for what felt like an eternity, every heartbeat a torture. “Not getting cold feet, are you?”
“Are you?” I turned my phone off and tossed it on the sofa, determined not to look at it anymore. The world could think what it wanted. They would whether I cared or not.
He chuckled. “Not in the least. You’d better shower now if you’re going to. The dinner’s in less than an hour.”
Right. Because that was the whole reason we were doing this.
As if I could be in danger of forgetting.