Three
Everything about this day felt off-kilter to Adelaide as she followed Dempsey up the brick steps onto the sprawling veranda of his house. Fittingly, she limped up the steps in her broken heel, unable to find her footing around him.
He'd commissioned the home when he'd first taken the head-coaching job in New Orleans, though it hadn't been completed until last spring. As if the Reynaud family complex hadn't been impressive enough before, now Dempsey's stalwart white mansion echoed the strong columns of the main house where he'd grown up. His place, just under ten thousand square feet, was only slightly less intimidating than Gervais's historic residence on the hill that had been built in the same style two centuries prior. She could see the rooftop from here, although the live oaks gave the structures considerable privacy. It helped to have the billions from Reynaud Shipping at their disposal, though the generations-old wealth was one of many reasons Adelaide had always felt out of place here.
Today, she had even more reason to feel off her game.
From the erratic pounding of her heart to the all-over tingle of awareness that lingered after their talk in the back of the Land Rover, she felt too dazed to don her usual armor of professionalism. What had he been thinking to focus that kind of sensual attention on her? She'd been so breathless when he'd bracketed her between those powerful arms, his chest just inches from her own, that she hadn't been able to think straight. Hadn't been able to question why they needed to enact this crazy charade for his family that had always intimidated her.
She slipped off her unevenly heeled shoes at the door and walked barefoot into his house. Once she shook off this fog of attraction, she would talk sense into Dempsey and leave. She'd wanted a clean break from him, and now he'd changed the playing field between them so radically she didn't know what to expect. Should she put her product launch on hold? Or should she keep fighting to end her commitment to the Hurricanes? She needed to sort through it all without the added confusion of this new sensual spark between them.
"You might remember from the blueprints that there's an extra bedroom upstairs and one downstairs." He led her through the wide foyer past a grand staircase. He used an app on his phone, she realized, to switch on lights and lower blinds as they moved through the space. "Both have en suite facilities. I can send Evan to your place to pick up some things for you when he retrieves your car."
They paused in an expansive kitchen at the back of the house, connecting to a dining area with floor-to-ceiling French doors that opened onto the yard overlooking the lake. There was another set of French doors in the family room, also accessing the back gallery and lawn. It was a perfect place for entertaining, although she would be surprised if Dempsey had hosted many people here. She certainly hadn't been invited to any private parties at his home even though she'd helped choose any number of fixtures and had spoken with his contractors more often than he had.
But in all fairness, Dempsey had always spent the majority of his time on the road or at the office. She doubted he'd spent many nights here himself.
"The house is beautiful," she said finally. "You must be pleased with how it turned out. I know I looked at the plans with you when you first approved the blueprints, but seeing the real thing... Wow."
She shook her head as she took in the ceiling medallions around matching chandeliers that were either imported antiques or had been designed by a master craftsman. The natural-stone fireplace in the kitchen gave that space warmth even when it wasn't lit, while another fireplace in the family room had a hand-carved fleur-de-lis motif that matched the ceiling medallions.
"Thank you. I haven't spent much time here, but I'm happy with it. Why don't I order some food and we can hash out a plan for the next few weeks while we eat?" He set his phone on the maple butcher-block top of the kitchen island, one of the elements of the house she'd helped choose, along with the appliances.
But when she'd been comparing kitchen options on her tablet, she'd simultaneously been investigating a wide receiver's shoulder injury and a competing team's new blitz packages. No wonder she'd all but forgotten the details until now.
"Anything is fine." She wasn't in the mood to eat, her body still humming with awareness and a sensual hunger of a more unsettling kind after those heated few moments earlier.
Even in this giant house, Dempsey's magnetic pull remained as potent as if they were separated by inches and not feet. When he walked toward her, her breath caught. Her heart skipped one beat. Then two. It had been one thing to ignore her reaction to him when he'd always treated her as a friend. But now that he'd opened that door to a different kind of relationship, teasing her with hints of the possible chemistry they might have together...her whole being seemed to spark and simmer with the possibilities. That kind of distraction would not make figuring out her professional life any easier.
First she needed to strategize a method for dealing with him and this fake engagement, then find a way out of the house as soon as possible. She couldn't survive spending twenty-four hours a day with him, especially when she wasn't sure if he genuinely felt some kind of attraction, too, or if he'd always known about the feelings she thought she'd kept well hidden. Would he be so cruel as to use that attraction now to his advantage?
"Gervais has a full-time chef at his place now that Erika is having twins." He gestured in the general direction of the house on the hill where his older brother had settled his soon-to-be wife, a beautiful foreign princess who would fit right into the Reynaud family. "It's easy to have something sent over."
"I'm too wound up to eat." She shrugged. "I would make some tea, though." She peered around the kitchen, not seeing a kettle or any other signs of basic staples.
"Tea." He typed in something on his phone and shook his head. "I'll ask for a few things." He set the device aside. "Evan will bring it over in half an hour or so. I'll show you the rooms so you can choose one. You'll be safer from the press here. You have to know that my family's security rivals that of Fort Knox."
The very last thing she wanted to do was choose a bedroom in Dempsey's house, especially when her pulse fluttered so erratically just to be near him. It didn't matter to her body that she was angry with him and his high-handed move. Some fundamental part of their relationship had shifted today; a barrier that she'd thought was firm had caved. She felt raw from having that defense ripped away.
He stalked through the family room into the western wing of the house and pushed open the door of an expansive bedroom with carpet and walls in blues and grays, a king-size modern bed with a pristine white duvet and a white love seat in front of yet another fireplace, this one with a gray granite surround.
The en suite bath on the far end of the room had a stone bathtub the size of a kiddie pool, spotlighted with an overhead pendant lamp on a dim setting. Gray cabinets and white marble were understated accents to the dominant tub.
"You didn't take this one for your room? I thought you had chosen that tub especially for you," she asked over his shoulder, realizing as she said it that she'd allowed herself to stand very close to him to better see the whole space. If she leaned forward just a little, she could rest her cheek against his back where broad shoulders tapered to a narrow waist.
It didn't help that she'd been thinking about him lounging in that huge custom tub, muscles glistening.
"The view is better from the suite upstairs." He turned to face her and it was all she could do not to scuttle backward. She did not need to have both Dempsey and a bed in her field of vision. "I'll show you the bedroom near mine."
"No. I mean-there's no need." She would sleep downstairs by herself if it meant they could end this tour faster. "I can sleep here tonight."
She wasn't committing to spending any more time than that in this house. One night was bad enough, but she had too much to work out with him to leave just yet.
"Are you sure you'll be all right alone down here?" He frowned. But then, he knew when they traveled she preferred a room close to his. Her house had been broken into as a teenager-after he'd moved away from her. And she felt jittery at night sometimes.
"I'm certain. Your family's security rivals Fort Knox. Remember?" She nodded, knowing she wouldn't sleep well under Dempsey's roof for entirely different reasons than that long-ago robbery where she'd hidden under her bed for half an hour after the thieves had left. "But you mentioned discussing a plan for the next few weeks?" She backed up a step now, out into the hallway away from the warmth of his broad shoulders. "I'll rest easier once we talk through this. Actually, if we can come up with a plan, I'll say good-night and leave you to watch your game film."