Excerpt of Her Stand-In Boyfriend by Kelly Jamieson

All through college, and even after, she’d dated other guys. Every time she’d started seeing someone, it was like a knife stabbing into his gut. Watching her flirt and hold hands and kiss guys, seeing her sit on their laps at parties and make out had made him nuts. He’d dealt with it by dating other girls, telling himself he’d find someone else, which had never been fair to the other girls because it was never going to happen, as he’d come to realize.

Maybe it would happen if he stayed the hell away from Lexi. But she wanted to be friends, and he was weak when it came to her, as helpless as an addict who needed a fix.

He didn’t bother going home to change after work since she’d insisted on him wearing a suit. The car service he used dropped him off at her apartment, and he asked the driver to wait.

Lexi opened the door, and he took one look at her in some sparkly, shimmery ivory dress that hugged every curve, swallowed, and said, “Hey. Got any beer?” “Pre-gaming?” She moved to the fridge.

He followed behind her, his gaze tracking from her bright coppery hair down over that hot little body and long, sleek legs. “Got a problem with that?” “Not at all.” She opened the fridge door and bent over.

Christ. Her dress stretched over her ass, cupping it and displaying it most excellently. His dick instantly hardened, as usual. Then she rose and turned, and damn, he had to jerk his gaze away from her ass fast. Shit. She’d noticed him ogling her.

But as usual, for her it was no big deal. She grinned. “Like my dress?” She walked toward him in bare feet and handed him the beer.

“It’s very…sparkly.” He took the beer, twisted off the cap, and lifted it to his lips, guzzling with near desperate haste. “You look like a Christmas ornament.”

She gave a shocked gasp. “What? A Christmas ornament?” She looked down at herself.

Hell. He did this all the time. He wanted to tell her that she was so f**king gorgeous she blew his f**king mind. Instead, what came out was an insult. He forced a grin, used to this game. “Kidding. It’s nice.”

“Nice? Huh.” Her smile went crooked. “Two hundred dollars worth of nice. And that was on sale. But thanks.”

It was a simple dress—round neckline, cap sleeves, ivory color. It was the way it fit that made it sexy, hugging her body all the way down to right above the knees. Swirls of sequins and beaded ribbons, all in clear or ivory, made her shimmer.

“I guess I have time for a drink, too,” she said.

“Sure.” Mac wandered over to sit on her couch. “Car service is waiting downstairs.”

“I thought you said we’d take a taxi.”

“Car service. Taxi. Whatever.”

She smiled and shook her head at him. She liked to bug Mac about his money. To him it was no big deal.

With a glass of wine in hand, she sat beside him on the couch. The snug dress rode up a little on smooth thighs,

attracting his attention yet again. And again, he dragged his gaze off her gorgeous legs.

“I can’t eat anything tonight,” she remarked.

He lifted an eyebrow. “Why not?”

“Well, A, the dress is tight.”

“I hadn’t noticed,” he murmured.

“And B, it’s ivory. You know what I’m like.”

“True. White wine it is.”

Lexi had an entirely deserved reputation for spilling things on herself. And on anyone standing near enough to be in the danger zone. He and her other friends liked to tease her and exaggerate it, but she totally made fun of herself, too.

“You look nice.” Her gaze skimmed over his charcoal suit. He’d lost the tie after his last meeting of the day, and his dark shirt was now open at the collar.

“Thanks,” he said dryly. She could do understatement as well as he could. Except she was being real, and he was desperately trying to keep his tongue from hanging out of his mouth.

“Why did you have such a bad week?”

“Lots of shit going on.” His shoulders tensed briefly, and he looked at his beer.

“Tell me.”

“Well, for one thing, Justin quit.” Justin Karp was one his best developers.

She blinked. “Whoa. Why?”

Mac shrugged and leaned back. “Better offer somewhere else.” He knew his voice held an edge. He and his business partners took pride in keeping their staff long term, which wasn’t the norm in the tech biz where people bounced around like pinballs, sometimes ending back at the same company multiple times. “Wish he’d talked to us before he took the job.”

“Yeah. Shit. What are you going to do? Promote someone else? Recruit from outside?”

“Not sure yet. Pete and I spent half the day talking about it and looking at who we already have working for us. We have lots of talented people.”

“Yeah. You do. And you guys have a great reputation.”

He shrugged. Lately there’d been a bunch of blog articles written about him and the company, sometimes with other successful young entrepreneurs under thirty years old. When he’d first graduated from college he’d worked for a big web developer for a while, then started his own business. Centric was an online media company and information provider that created content for web professionals—developers, designers, programmers, freelancers, and website owners. Since then, his business had spun off several others—a graphic design studio, a firm that bought and sold websites, and a company that developed web and mobile applications. Now they had people knocking on their door looking for opportunities to work with them.

“But you have HR people now, right?” she continued.

“They’ll help with hiring.”

“Yeah. But you know I’ll need to be involved.”

She smiled as her lips touched the rim of her wine glass.

“Really? I can’t believe that.”

He turned his head and gave her a narrow-eyed look, but they both ended up laughing.