Keeping Kennedy (2 page)

He shrugged. “Name it.”

She managed a weak smile. If only it were
that simple. “How long have we known each other?”
Go for the
guilt first
.
Build a case he can’t refute.

Appearing thoughtful, he rubbed his unshaven
chin. “About three years or so. Why do you ask?”

“And during those three years, since your
housekeeper refused to do so,” she proceeded, ignoring his
question, “how often have I taken care of Iggy for you?”

He shrugged. “Every time I’ve gone on
location for a shoot.”

“The way I figure it, approximately two weeks
out of every month during the past three years I’ve come to your
apartment twice a day to feed and water that…Iggy.”

“That’s probably a fair estimate.”

“And several times since moving here and
becoming your neighbor—and friend,” she added pointedly, “I’ve
driven you to the airport when you would have missed your flight
otherwise—even when I was already running late myself. Not to
mention that I’ve rescued you from a number of disastrous dates
over the years.”

He nodded. “You have. You’ve been a very good
friend, Kennedy.”

“Not once have I ever asked you for anything,
right?”

He considered the question for a time, his
gaze narrowing suspiciously. “Come to think of it, you
haven’t.”

“Well.” She crossed her arms over her middle
and lifted her chin. “I’m about to call in all of my markers.”

He shoved his hands into his pockets which,
to Kennedy’s irritation, widened the gap at his zipper, revealing
even more silky black hair. “Like I said, name it. If it’s within
my power and it’s not illegal, I’ll do it.”

“It’s definitely not illegal, and certainly
within your power.” Now, if she could just push the words past her
lips. “You know how it is when you’re happy just as you are. Your
career is going exactly like you’ve planned it and life is good,
but your parents don’t seem to get it.”

He scratched his chest and shrugged again.
“Not really. My family doesn’t interfere with the way I live my
life. It’s kind of an unspoken rule with us Drakes.”

Kennedy blew her bangs out of her eyes. She
had to get on with this, time was wasting. “Well, I’m not so lucky.
My parents think that because I’m not married and having babies
like all my cousins that I’m not happy.”

A grin spread across his face, revealing
another of his assets: straight, white teeth. “I can’t imagine
that.”

Offended, but not certain how or why, she
looked him up and down. “You can’t imagine what?”

“You and babies.”

Annoyance creased her brow. “What’s that
supposed to mean?” Though she certainly didn’t want children at
present, she was perfectly capable of bearing and attending to them
if she were so inclined. It wasn’t as if the idea were
unthinkable.

“You’re just—” He passed a hand over his
face. “I don’t know, all work and no play.”

She narrowed her gaze at him. “And that’s
precisely the attitude that has gotten me into the predicament I’m
in now.”

He chuckled. “I didn’t mean to insult you.
What I meant—”

“I know what you meant. Anyway” she glanced
at her watch once more “you know that I only manage to get home
once or twice a year.” She frowned. “In fact I haven’t been home
since last Christmas.” It was October. She did the math…ten months.
Had it been that long? “And that was a disaster,” she continued
morosely. “My last single cousin had just gotten married. My folks
hounded me every time they called for months after that. It was
hell! Finally” she moistened her lips and summoned up her resolve
“to get them off my back, I told them I was engaged.”

He made a dismissive face. “So what’s the big
deal? You told your folks a little white lie.”

“Everything is a big deal with my folks,” she
lamented. “They’ve spent the last seven months telling everyone in
town I’m engaged.” She sighed. “Now I have to go home and face the
music—so to speak.”

“Tell them you and your boyfriend broke up,”
he offered. “It happens all the time. People get engaged, and then
they break up. It’s a no-brainer.”

Kennedy swallowed. “I can’t do that.”

“Why can’t you?”

“Because of the reunion.”

“Reunion?”

She crossed the room to stare out the window
at the busy street below. She loved D.C. She loved the excitement,
the energy. She loved her job. Kennedy closed her eyes. How had she
gotten herself into this mess?

“Tell me about this reunion,” he said
quietly.

She looked up to find him at her side. Too
close. She scooted away from him. “It’s my ten-year high school
reunion.”

He nodded once in understanding.

“I can’t face all those people and allow them
to believe for one second that the only guy who asked me to marry
him dumped me,” she said wearily.

“But you haven’t been dumped,’ he reminded.
“You weren’t even engaged.”

“I know that and you know that, but they
don’t.”

She shook her head. “I can’t let them think
I’ve failed. If I don’t show up with a fiancé they’ll all know the
truth.”

“So, tell them your fiancé is on assignment
somewhere and couldn’t come along.”

Kennedy faced him, determined to make him
understand the full ramifications of the problem. “I have to show
up with a real, live fiancé. I want to be absolutely positive that
they all believe my…my story. Don’t you understand? I won’t see
most of these people for another ten years. By then, this will all
be ancient history. But right now I have to do this. It’s a matter
of principle.”

“Don’t you mean pride?”

“Whatever.” She released a beleaguered
sigh.

“Okay, okay,” he relented. “I get the
picture. Now, what does this have to do with me? You want me to
find you a fiancé or what?”

“Nooo!” she protested, planting her hands
firmly on her hips in frustration.

“What then?” he prodded, his gray eyes
searching hers a bit too closely, a hint of amusement shimmering in
their clear depths.

She pinned him with a look that had won over
more than one stubborn client at the public relations firm where
she worked. “Because I told my parents that
you
are my
fiancé.” She almost laughed at the look of unadulterated disbelief
on his face, but there was nothing remotely funny about any of
this.

“Me?”

She nodded. “You.”

He choked out a laugh, then closed the
already too small gap between them. He considered her in a way that
could mean a number of things—none of which she wanted to
deliberate at the moment. “You told your folks, who told all your
friends, that
I’m
your fiancé?”

“What are you, dense? Yes, that’s what I told
them. When they asked for a name, yours is the only one that popped
out.”

He gave his head an odd little shake and
stifled another distressed chuckle. “But you and I have never
even—”

“Dated,” Kennedy supplied before he could day
something coarse. “I know.”

“Okay,” he said slowly, maintaining that
irritatingly intent eye contact. “I need you to tell me exactly
what it is you’re asking me to do, Kennedy.”

He wasn’t making this easy. He had to know
what she wanted—needed. She’d never even contemplated that he might
actually say no. But that seemed a distinct possibility now.
Persuasion was her business, and she was a master at her craft. She
could do this. She
had
to do this. “I’ve taken the week off
from work…”

He lifted one dark eyebrow in skepticism.
“You’re joking, right?” A grin tugged the corners of his full lips
upward. “Sidney T. Booker, public relations wizard, is going to let
his number one spin doctor take a whole week off. Have they
evacuated the White House? Closed down Capitol Hill? How will D.C.
politicians survive without you around to keep them smelling like a
rose after they dive headfirst into a barrel of sh—”

“I’m not the only damage control expert in
our firm,” Kennedy interrupted curtly.

He leaned in closer. “Ah, but you are the one
the President himself asked for on two different occasions in the
last year.”

“Back off Drake, you’re in my personal
space,” she hissed through clenched teeth.

Still holding her gaze without so much as a
blink, he retreated a step.

“Why do you do that?” Kennedy glowered at
him. They had gotten completely off track. The man could be so
infuriating. How could she ever spend an entire week with him? She
should just hire someone to play his part. Except she couldn’t. Her
parents had seen his picture.

“Do what?” Fake innocence radiated from his
distractingly handsome face.

“Crowd me. You always invade my personal
space. Eighteen inches, Drake. Don’t you know anything? You are
completely uncouth,” she added for good measure, then realized her
mistake. She was supposed to be winning him over to her side, not
pushing him away.

That metallic gaze suddenly sparkled with
mischief. “That’s a fine way to talk to the man you’re planning to
marry,” he offered glibly.

She rolled her eyes. “Pleeease.” She
shuddered at the thought. Never in a million years would she marry
a man who crawled through jungles, climbed mountains, crossed
deserts and was foolish enough to call it fun. Adding emphasis to
her thought, Iggy scooted across the floor, his long tail swishing
back and forth on the shiny hardwood. “Just because we’ve never
been…intimate,” she informed him, “doesn’t mean I don’t know you
well enough to know that you’re not my type. Not my type at
all.”

A grin that literally left her breathless
stole across his chiseled features. Before she could fathom what he
intended, he had backed her against the window and braced his arms
on either side of her. He leaned in so close that she could feel
his warm breath on her face. Her heart did a couple of somersaults,
then dropped into her stomach to quiver there.

“Never underestimate what’s in the package,
Kennedy, until you’ve opened it.” He moistened his lips all the
while looking at hers. Her heart was pounding so hard she was sure
he heard it. Why was he behaving like this? Just when she was
positive he might do something crazy like kiss her, his gaze
reconnected with hers. “Now tell me,” he whispered in a low, husky
voice that sent a shiver over her skin, “what is it exactly you
want from me?”

For the first time in her adult life, Kennedy
found herself at a loss for words. Unsure of an already-made
decision. Reluctant to follow through with something she’d started.
But she had to do this. No way could go back to Friendly Corners
without her faux fiancé. “You know what I want,” she managed in
spite of the sudden tightness in her throat.

“Say it, Kennedy,” he murmured.

Held captive by his gaze and tamping down
something that felt entirely too much like sexual awareness, she
went for broke. “I want you to go to my hometown with me and
pretend to be my fiancé for one week.”

Chapter Two

“Hold still just one moment longer, Mr.
Drake.”

Drake felt like a mannequin being rigged up
for display or—more likely—hanging. He cast a doubting glance at
Edward, the man folding and tucking and adjusting the silk suit
jacket Drake now wore.

Apparently satisfied with his final
adjustments, Edward queried the woman in charge, “How’s that Ms.
Malone?”

Kennedy paused midstride, then turned in
their direction. “Hang on, Carol,” she said into the cell phone
that Drake fully believed to be permanently attached to her ear.
Her coral-colored lips puckered thoughtfully, she gave Drake’s
Versace-clad frame a long, slow sweep, then shook her head. “Go
with the Armani,” she instructed before returning to her
conversation with a business associate.

“Good choice,” Edward agreed. He slipped the
coat from Drake’s shoulders with practiced ease.

Kennedy paced back and forth across the plush
carpet. Her free arm giving dramatic emphasis to her every word,
she appeared immensely distressed over some decision her associate
had made. Drake hadn’t spent much time with Kennedy in a social
setting, with the exception of the one time he’d taken her to
dinner to celebrate the publication of his latest collection of
photographs. But that one time had been enough to get a fix on
her.

Strictly business. That had been his first
impression of Kennedy Malone and time hadn’t changed his mind. She
worked long hours, her social life was non-existent as far as he
could tell, and she was his friend. A frown furrowed his brow at
the thought. Not that he charmed every woman he met, but he wasn’t
oblivious to the fact that women—most women he happened to
meet—were somewhat attracted to him. He was well aware that his
looks were an asset in that department. And for the first thirty
years of his life he’d considered himself a very lucky man indeed.
But things had changed in the last three.

There was always another pretty lady right
around the corner waiting for a good time, but no keepers. No one
who wanted to move beyond the physical. No one who moved him in
that direction. Not that he didn’t enjoy a damned good sex life—he
did. But somehow it wasn’t the same anymore. It just wasn’t quite
enough.

He had a great career—money, prestige,
travel. But there was something tremendously unsettling, well,
lonely
about being thirty-three and waking up alone more
often than not. Maybe women didn’t want guys like him for husbands
or fathers. Drake dragged his fingers through his hair and cursed
his nostalgic mood.

What the hell was wrong with him? His
interest continued to follow Kennedy’s every move. It had never
bothered him before that she looked at him with indifference. Maybe
the problem was too much sun and not enough sleep. That was
probably the answer. He’d be himself after a good night’s sleep,
assuming he ever got one with Kennedy the Tyrant leading him around
by the nose.