A Symptom of Love (GERI Labs #1)

22. Relationshipping

22

Relationshipping

“ I f anyone asks, Aiden is my boyfriend,” Eleanor notifies Alannah when they meet again.

“Oh, so now it’s finally official?” Alannah muses, trying to balance several tote bags and a handful of colorful tubes, brochures, a double-helix-shaped squishy and a stuffed animal that looks more like a… chromosome maybe? The results of her latest freebie-hunting at the vendor show.

“Yes… I mean, not exactly. My fake boyfriend, kind of. Unless someone from GERI asks—then no.”

“Ah, and who exactly are you faking it for?” Alannah stifles a laugh.

“My ex, apparently. Of all people in all places, I had to run into him here. What are the odds?” Eleanor stops to take a breath. “And Aiden, I don’t know what’s gotten into him… He appeared out of nowhere and introduced himself as my boyfriend, and now—”

“Professor Kowalski did what now?!” Alannah raises an eyebrow.

“Well, Oren, my ex was kind of asking for it.”

“So Professor Kowalski got jealous and decided to claim you.” Alannah is clearly enjoying this soap opera episode.

“Claim me?”

Why is the thought of it making her all warm and tingly inside?

“Yes! Wow, I’m impressed! Didn’t know he had it in—” Alannah’s gaze shifts abruptly.

“There you are, baby. ” Aiden’s voice appears in her ear before his arm loops around her, creating all kinds of new sensations.

Did he just purposefully put an emphasize on her new pet name?

He sweeps Eleanor away from smiling-winking Alannah, who’s telepathically transmitting ‘ your kinky games are safe with me’ vibes.

“We need to talk.” His voice has an edge to it.

“Oh, do we?” Eleanor chuckles. “Which of the gazillion items that come to mind should we discuss first?”

“Your goddamn tattoo,” he growls. “Now.”

“As my fake boyfriend,” Eleanor says mischievously, resting a hand on his tightening chest, “You might want to find a more private spot to get me naked.” He’s so close she could just reach out and seize those lips that are busy pouting at the moment.

But Aiden remains motionless, studying her intently with his beautiful blue eyes, which are now wild and hungry. And puzzling.

Eleanor takes his hand and pulls him back to where they left Alannah. “I’ll take your stuff back to the room,” Eleanor offers, jumping on the excuse to relocate this heated conversation to a more private location. Alannah, perfectly reading the room, nods in agreement and hands Eleanor her collection of sweepstakes and freebies.

“So now you’re my fake boyfriend?” Eleanor asks incredulously as the two of them are alone in the elevator.

“I’m asking the questions now,” Aiden orders, provoked.

“Hmmm… A commanding, out-of-control version of you. I like it when my fake boyfriend gets all domineering like that.” She smiles teasingly.

“Jesus, Ellie, how many fake boyfriends have you had?”

Is that a new vein in his forehead?

“Aiden, I was just joking with you, you’re my very first one.” She laughs as he grunts. “Gosh, what’s gotten into you?”

But he remains quiet, tightly clenching his jaw, until they get to the room. Eleanor swipes the keycard and opens the door, laying Alannah’s treasures next to her friend’s bed.

Aiden walks in after her, so tall and broad he takes up the whole space. The last bit of oxygen is now gone too. She takes her high heels off, deepening their height difference. But it feels good to be standing on stable ground again. She can feel the tension level rising, if that’s even possible. He’s so close that she can’t help but rest her hand on his chest again, tracing the ridges and grooves of his muscles through his pressed shirt. His breath hitches.

“Don’t,” he commands, grabbing her palm. “Before I lose control.”

“Oh, believe me, there’s nothing I want more right now than see you lose control—"

“What fucking ass tattoo was this guy talking about?” Aiden backs her against the wall. His eyes are so dark she can barely see the blue in them.

“You don’t get to pull the possessive boyfriend card on me,” she warns. “Although it is kind of sexy.” Seeing him all worked up, for her, makes her want to pull him by his shirt and kiss him hard. “You’re just pretending to be my boyfriend. We aren’t even dating. Remember? Your very smart brain somehow decided to come up with this hoax less than an hour ago. It’s not like I was hiding crucial information from you.”

“Show me.” His eyes are furious, voice is low and… still commanding. He’s clearly not thinking this through.

Why does it turn her on so much? She could easily jump him right now.

“I need to see it,” he says. Something in his tone shifts, sounding pained. “Please.”

“I’d love to show you.” Eleanor can’t help the smile creeping up on her face, despite his desperation. “If you’re willing to waive your ‘no seduction’ rule.”

“The one that you’ve been ignoring completely,” he admonishes.

“Yes, that one.” She tugs on his conference badge. “ Ass tattoo , remember?” And before he has a chance to take it back, she slides her pencil skirt up her thighs, turning to her side, giving him a front-row view of her past connection with Oren Hason.

Aiden drops to his knees. His composed self is all at once broken, his eyes glassy, breath heavy. “Fuck,” he says, his hand gently tracing the two little identical Hebrew letters.

“Why?” he just mumbles.

Why is he taking it so hard?

“I… I can’t see why you’d want to walk around with some guy’s name on your body for the rest of your life.”

Is he … jealous?

“Scientists are not expected to be smart one hundred percent of the time,” she offers.

“Why the hell not?”

“In my defense, Aiden, I was young and stupid. And naive. And in love. And I thought Oren was my forever.”

This idea seems so distant now. Aiden has taken up every ounce of that sentiment so quickly and so profoundly.

“What am I going to do with you?” He shakes his head, and his eyes gradually soften. “I wish I’d met you first. Maybe you’d have a different letter up there.” He removes his hand, taking the warmth away.

Eleanor straightens her skirt and joins him on the floor, taking his handsome face in her hands. “You know, Oren is not the only name that starts with the Hebrew letter Aleph. Aiden does too. You clearly hadn’t been paying attention in Hebrew school.”

“Are you trying to make me feel better? Aiden starts with an A, Oren with an O. I never went to Hebrew school, but I can tell the two sound completely different,” he says, but there’s a spark of hope in his eyes.

“Well, lucky for you, my jealous fake-boyfriend, Hebrew doesn’t work this way.” She gets up, grabs the hotel’s notepad and pen from her nightstand and goes back to the floor next to him. She writes his name on one side of the paper, in Hebrew. Oren’s name on the other side and then her name at the bottom.

No, she didn’t mean it to look like a triangle.

Then she circles the first letter—which is incidentally the same for all three. “See? My name starts with aleph too.”

This seems to make him feel so much better.

Wow…

Never in her wildest dreams did she imagine a guy getting so worked up over her stupid tattoo.

But Aiden is not just any guy.

So she gives him a hug, resting her head on his chest, letting her mind drift off to the loud thrumming of his heart. He reciprocates her hold with his own embrace. And it feels good. Too good, not like pretending should feel. His heart thumps go from a nuclear bombing intensity to maybe a spacecraft take-off. Whatever’s calmer on an explosive power index. She waits for the beats to calm down further, maybe to a grenade level, but that might take some time.

“Let’s go get you something to drink, and work on our backstory,” she offers finally, before she does something she will definitely not regret, but Aiden might. He nods, contrite, and follows her outside the room, back to the elevator.

“Now do you want to tell me what this whole thing is about?” she asks after Aiden’s usual composure is back, at least on the surface level. “Why, after keeping our relationship professional for so long, trying so hard to keep your impossible rules, did you decide to introduce yourself as my fake boyfriend? This would be hilarious if it didn’t make my brain hurt so much,” she chuckles. She’s completely ignoring that one confession on his birthday. Drunk Aiden didn’t know what he was saying.

“Now, this might shock you, but there wasn’t a well-thought-out science experiment behind it. No protocol, no control samples.” He rubs the back of his neck.

“Wow, Professor Kowalski, you never cease to amaze me,” she laughs.

“You looked like you were trying to save face in front of your ex,” he says simply. So there was no master plan, no plan whatsoever.

“Oh, did I now?”

“You’re welcome by the way.” He sighs, running a desperate hand through his hair. Desperate or not, he still looks handsome.

“And what about the complications? You’re not worried about us wrecking our careers anymore?”

“He was gloating about being your mythological ex.” Aiden pinches the bridge of his nose. “This guy broke your heart, made you forever appalled by the word ‘relationship.’ I just snapped. I wasn’t thinking.”

“Not thinking… That’s uncharacteristic of you,” she teases him. Again.

He was being protective. Of her.

“Ellie, nothing I do is characteristic of me when I’m with you.” Those blue eyes look deep into hers, desperately trying to find something.

What is it?

At a loss for any better words he might be hoping to hear, she says, “You’re going to need to up your game, because Oren is staying in this exact hotel, and he wasn’t buying it.”

“He clearly had the upper hand. I was missing some essential data to defend my dissertation,” Aiden says, eyes trailing lower toward where her scandalous tattoo is.

“I just didn’t think my butt tattoo would ever become relevant information,” she says, leading them to a quiet sitting area in the hotel lobby.

“Cherry-picking data, are we?” His tone is a tad more relaxed now.

“It’s not cherry picking!” She chuckles. “I should warn you though, Oren being Oren,” she gives Aiden a serious look. “I’m not sure how good you are at pretending or how long you were planning to carry this through, but my guess is that the show is not over yet.”

Why does her voice sound so excited?

“Good.”

“Good?” Is he for real?! “What if someone from GERI sees us? Mano is here, as you know. And I’ve seen a few others.”

“Alannah has been pretty good at keeping a poker face. We’ll figure out the rest, like you had suggested a while ago.”

“Okay, who are you and what have you done with Professor Kowalski?”

“What can I get you?” A waiter approaches them. A beer would probably be fitting, but they have to stay focused, in case Oren shows up again.

“Do you like chocolate milkshakes?” she asks Aiden. He shrugs. “Good, it’s my favorite. So a large one for me and my boyfriend to share,” is her order. Because sharing a large milkshake sounds like something a good fake couple might do. But mostly because it’s been a while since she’s had a chocolate milkshake.

“I see you’re starting to like the idea of our fake relationship.” A ghost of a smile, finally.

“Don’t mind if I do.”

The milkshake arrives quickly and she moves closer to be able to share their giant serving, which has whipped cream and a cherry on top. “I love milkshakes!” Eleanor says after her first vocal sip, winning herself another almost-smile from her handsome fake boyfriend. “So, how did we meet?” she asks, resting one hand on his thigh. Might as well take advantage of the situation.

“At the airport, you fell into my lap. Quite unforgettable,” he says. “There’s no need to make up a new backstory, just stick to the facts.”

“Okay, that’s easy. And how long have we been together?”

“Since that pivotal day we met at the airport, love at first sight.” His eyes say so much, yet she can’t uncover a single thing.

“I thought you wanted to stick to the facts?” She laughs but he remains unreadable.

“Hey you two!” Oren’s voice, this time in English, sounds from a distance. They turn their heads toward him. Oren is clutching a beautiful brunette in a mini-dress beside him. The two bodyguards from earlier are close by. “This is Tiffany, my girlfriend,” he says. Funny he never mentioned her earlier.

“Nice to meet you both,” Tiffany says brightly. She has an incredible charm and an obvious knack for people, like Oren’s perfect girl would. She might actually enjoy the press’s attention, the fans screaming, and paparazzi sightings. Something Eleanor was not quite successful at. Not that she ever intended to be.

“Nice to meet you, Tiffany, I’m Eleanor,” Eleanor gets up and shakes Tiffany’s manicured hand. She has beautifully painted nails, the kind that would most definitely be peeling under the constant wear of latex gloves and one-handed tube-opening at the lab. “And this is Aiden, my boyfriend,” she adds. She can’t believe how this new title glides out of her mouth so effortlessly.

Aiden gets up to shake Tiffany’s hand politely and then sits back down, pulling Eleanor with him, wrapping a protective arm around her. Then, playing his part as the dotting fake-boyfriend, he shifts Eleanor’s hair gently off her face and plants a small kiss on her cheek.

The gesture feels exhilarating. And real. And Eleanor is grateful for that, because it makes this whole situation of meeting her ex’s new girlfriend surprisingly easy.

“We’re going to catch a movie later, would you guys like to join us? A double date?” Tiffany suggests, either oblivious to Oren and Eleanor’s history or just confident enough to not care.

“We actually have plans.” Eleanor makes her best attempt to avoid a potential pressure-cooker, but comes up short on the specifying-the-actual-details part.

“Yes,” Aiden takes over, giving her a very not-typical mischievous smile. “I’m taking Ellie to Toys “R” Us. She loves toy stores.”

Such an Eleanor-tailored plan! He remembered. Can a heart literately swell?

“Oh, that’s so cute!” Tiffany says. “So maybe join us for dinner afterward?”

“Hmmm, I promised my boyfriend my undivided attention tonight…” Eleanor lifts her eyes to Aiden, resting her hand again on his thigh, suggestively. He plays along, fingers grazing her rib cage.

Gosh… What a small motion of this man’s hand can do to her.

“Come on, it will be fun, and you’ll have each other all to yourself later. Tonight is just one night of many, right?” Tiffany retorts cutely. “I barely know any of Oren’s Israeli friends.”

Friends? Does Tiffany have any knowledge of the past romantic nature of this specific friendship? It was all over the Israeli gossip magazines and social media, but probably didn’t make it outside of their small country.

Eleanor shoots a ‘you better come clean’ warning glance at Oren. But he seems unbothered. Or doesn’t own those mind-reading skills any longer.

“Yeah, guys, dinner on me tonight,” Oren says. “I insist.” He shoots a meaningful look between her and Aiden.

Aiden’s eyes lock on hers. He has an adorable, playful look about him, an unspoken reassurance that whatever decision she makes—he’s game.

“Okay then,” Eleanor says finally. She can’t resist the temptation of testing Aiden’s limits. “Dinner. After our toy store date.” She turns to Aiden again, to make sure this dinner doesn’t stretch for too long. “Then you’ll have my undivided attention.”

“So, what did you have in mind?” Aiden asks after the royal couple and entourage finally leave. His fingers are still sprawled across her ribs from their make-believe just minutes ago, the playful look still on his face.

“What?” She’s having a hard time keeping track of any piece of conversation under these conditions.

“Your plan, to give me your undivided attention,” he smile-chuckles.

Since when does this man smile and chuckle at the same time?

“Oh, it depends,” she lets her hand climb up his thigh by the slightest. “As my fake boyfriend, do you still adhere to this impossible book of rules?”

Aiden clears his throat. “No more rules.”