She read the messages, her mum pushing for an answer. They were only five days away from the party and Hannah really needed to let her know what she was doing.

She swore, understanding she really didn’t have a choice.

‘It’s my mother,’ she told Liam when he gave her a questioning look. ‘That anniversary party I told you about is on Saturday and she’s pushing again for me to stay.’

‘Are you going to?’

‘I want to. I just honestly don’t know if I can do it.’

‘So tell her no.’

‘Suggested by someone who has never met my mother.’

‘I haven’t. But I could if you want me to.’ He held her gaze, eyebrows raised in suggestion.

‘What?’

‘I’ll come with you.’

Hannah was taken aback. ‘You’d go to my mother’s twenty-fifth wedding anniversary party with me?’

He shrugged like it was no big deal. ‘Sure, why not? You’re worried about going alone. I don’t have plans.’

‘But we’d have to stay over.’

‘I know.’ He grinned. ‘That’s the idea of me going, right? So you don’t have to stay there by yourself.’

He made it sound so simple when it really wasn’t. How was she supposed to introduce him to her mother? As a friend, as her one-night stand, as the man she had only met last week, who was digging into the past? And what about sleeping arrangements? The house only had two bedrooms, the third having been converted into her mother’s sewing room.

‘I don’t see how that would work,’ she told him.

‘Why not? I stay with you and hopefully you don’t freak out. How would that not work?’

‘Well, my mother is going to wonder who you are for starters.’

‘Tell her we’re friends.’

‘There’s only the one free bedroom.’ As she said it, heat crept up her neck.

‘Oh.’ His grin widened. ‘You know I’ve already seen you naked, right?’

‘That’s not what I mean,’ Hannah was annoyed he was making her spell it out for him. She couldn’t decide if he was genuinely baffled or purposely winding her up. ‘How is my mother going to react if I rock up and introduce you as my friend, then we sleep in the same bed?’

‘I see.’

I see? What was all he had to say?

‘Is your mother prudish about couples who sleep together out of wedlock then?’ he teased.

‘She will be if she knows they’ve only recently met.’

‘Okay, so we don’t tell her that. I’ll pretend to be your boyfriend for the weekend.’

When Hannah simply stared at him like he was mad, he raised his brows.

‘Would that work?’

‘She’s going to wonder why I’ve never mentioned you.’ And rightly so. It was a little unsettling, the idea of Liam posing as her boyfriend.