She eyed me, then pointed to her bag. “You can bring my rock collection in.”

I watched her walk in and plop down on the bed with a bemused expression on my face. This fucking woman.

I dragged her suitcase in and closed the door behind us. “Honey, I’m home.”

“That’s not funny,” she said.

I shrugged, moving to sit in a chair across from the bed. Our room had a King bed, a window couch in a wood-paneled nook with a view of a wooded valley leading down the mountain. There was even a little desk. I sat backwards in the desk chair, resting my arms on the backrest as I faced her. She was sitting on top of the comforter with her arms crossed over her stomach and leaning against the headrest.

“So, how are we going to play this?” I asked.

“Not like whatever that was in the lobby, for starters.” Her voice said rage with a side of ice, but her cheeks were flushing red and something in her body language told me I wasn’t the only one who enjoyed that kiss more than expected. At the moment, I wished she wasn’t just my fake girlfriend, because I would’ve enjoyed plunging my hand between her legs to see exactly how much she’d enjoyed that kiss.

A wise man wouldn’t have teased a woman in Pearl’s current state. It would’ve been the same kind of instinctual wisdom that said you shouldn’t stick your hand in an open alligator’s mouth or poke a snake in the face. Unfortunately, that form of wisdom wasn’t my specialty, so teasing her was exactly my plan.

“Just to clarify,” I said. “When you stuck your tongue in my mouth and made that little moaning noise, it was coming from a place of outrage and disgust? Am I getting this right?”

“I did not moan. And you were the one who stuck your tongue in my mouth.”

“It slipped.” I grinned, and she didn’t seem like she could hold eye contact with me. “And I quickly corrected my mistake, only to find your tongue following after mine.”

“I’m not having this conversation. And I did not moan.”

“You did, but we can agree to disagree. So no more passionate, mutually enjoyable kissing and ass grabbing. What else?”

I could see her calculating whether to bite on my bait or not. She chewed her lip, as if it was the only way to stop herself from continuing to argue. With a deep sigh, she lifted a palm to the air. “We keep pretending. What else can we do? I’m assuming Maxwell Pollard wouldn’t appreciate learning that his top consultant lied about dating one of his employees, right? You probably can’t afford for this to fall apart any more than I can.”

That not-so-wise part of me reared its head again. “Well, I could simply say we had a fight in our room and broke things off. I’d get a separate room, you’d get your space, and we could go our own ways. Simple as that. I mean, it’s not as if I’d be hurting for cash if I lost my contract.” I was bluffing in some regards. I didn’t need the money, but I needed the purpose this work gave me. I didn’t want to lose my job with Maxwell Pollard any more than Pearl wanted to be fired. But I waited, watching to see if my bet was correct. Because if this was going to be as fun as I wanted, I needed to remind her that she wasn’t the one doing me a favor. This would be considerably more fun if she remembered she needed me. Badly.