He exhaled loudly, pensively. “If you really think a year is long enough to be believable and to show the dictator we’re serious, then we’ll do a year.”

I couldn’t help laughing a little. “Like a prison sentence?”

He glanced at me then returned his gaze to the road. “Never.”

His response was so intense, emphatic, but I couldn’t help worrying about what Holden was getting himself into. However, he was a big boy—I glanced at his hands on the wheel at that thought and, yep, big—and I was exchanging a quarter-of-a-million-dollar investment for the privilege of his time and…

“A year then,” I said, biting down on my insecurities, some of which had to do with those large hands and… I could not let my mind go down that road.

I turned my attention out the window as we drove past the old-fashioned white church on the right, some scattered houses on both sides, the Barn Bar on the left that meant we were at the outskirts of town. The town where I’d be living again for the next twelve months.

“Chloe,” he said, expelling a noisy breath, “do you understand that you’ve offered me the world? Marrying you is not a hardship. We’re friends. We’ll be roommates. We’ll be business partners. To me, being able to open a brewery is worth everything. We might even have fun with it.” He sobered up instantly. “Unless you’re thinking it’s going to be torture to be with me and you’re wanting out for your sake.”

It was going to be torture, but not for the reasons he thought. Not for any reasons he would ever know.

Surely it would get easier to spend time with Holden, though, without giving in to the attraction I’d always felt. Right?

I forced my tone to be light and nonchalant and said, “There’s nothing torturous about a stout business deal.”

He shook his head, grinning, and I expected him to volley back a pun. Instead, he reached across the console again and this time gave my thigh a squeeze. “It’s more than business, and everything will work out. There’s one more thing for us to discuss,” he said as he signaled to turn into Tripz, the convenience store a couple of blocks from the heart of town. “When can we tell Kemp the good news?”

“Which good news are you referring to?” I asked with a laugh, knowing full well he meant the investment bit and not the wedded bliss bit.

“I think he’ll be more excited about the money, but only by a little.” He winked at me, and that shouldn’t have had an effect on me, but naturally it did. Holden and I shared a secret, at least for now, and the intimacy of that fact and that wink and the handsomeness of that face and the alluring sparkle in those eyes…