Kerri Carpenter - The Dating Arrangement

They give new meaning to

Fake it until you make it

When a bride falls from a window onto bar owner Jack Wright, he sees it as a sign from above! But event planner Emerson Dewitt is nobody’s bride—much to her society mother’s perpetual disappointment. Then Jack proposes...an arrangement. He’ll pose as Emerson’s boyfriend in exchange for her help relaunching his business. It’s a perfect marriage...er, partnership. Until all that fake dating turns into some very real feelings...

Award-winning romance author KERRI CARPENTERwrites contemporary romances that are sweet, sexy and sparkly. When she’s not writing, Kerri enjoys reading, cooking, watching movies, taking Zumba classes, rooting for Pittsburgh sports teams and anything sparkly. Kerri lives in northern Virginia with her adorable (and mis-chievous) rescued poodle mix, Harry. Visit Kerri at her website, kerricarpenter.com, on Facebook ( Facebook.com/authorkerri), Twitter and Instagram ( @authorkerri), or subscribe to her newsletter.

Also by Kerri Carpenter

Falling for the Right Brother

Bidding on the Bachelor Bayside’s

Most Unexpected Bride

Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk

The Dating Arrangement

Kerri Carpenter

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ISBN: 978-1-474-09132-9

THE DATING ARRANGEMENT

© 2019 Kerri Carpenter

Published in Great Britain 2019

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.

® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Version: 2020-03-02

Before you start reading, why not sign up?

Thank you for downloading this Mills & Boon book. If you want to hear about exclusive discounts, special offers and competitions, sign up to our email newsletter today!

SIGN ME UP!

Or simply visit

signup.millsandboon.co.uk

Mills & Boon emails are completely free to receive and you can unsubscribe at any time via the link in any email we send you.

This ebook contains the following accessibility features which, if supported by your device, can be accessed via your ereader/accessibility settings:

Change of font size and line height

Change of background and font colours

Change of font

Change justification

Text to speech

For John, my happy ending

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Note to Readers

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Extract

About the Publisher

Chapter One

“I’m getting married.”

Jack Wright nodded his head in response. Three things had brought him to this conclusion. Number one, she was carrying a stack of bridal magazines. Number two, she was wearing a rock on her ring finger that was so large, he had to wonder if it needed its own zip code.

But the truly telling sign was the fact that she had mentioned it no less than ten times in the five minutes she’d been talking to him in The Wright Drink, his dad’s bar.

My bar.

Jack silently admonished himself. He now owned the bar and had to start acting like an entrepreneur. First order of business—dealing with the bride-to-be.

“Ms. Mitchell,” he began.

“Soon to be Mrs. Cross,” she added brightly, clutching the magazines to her light pink dress. “But please call me Trina.”

“Right. Trina. I still don’t see how I can help you.”

“My fiancé, Nick, and I met here a little over a year ago. Right over there, at the jukebox.” She gestured in that direction, with a dreamy expression on her face.

“So you’d like to have your wedding here?”

The look of horror that flashed onto her face was so severe, you would have thought he’d suggested she get married in a maximum-security prison.

“I’d actually like to have my bachelorette party here. And Nick, my fiancé, wants to start his bachelor-party night here, as well.”

While he’d attended his fair share of bachelor shindigs, he knew next to nothing about bachelorette parties. Jack pushed a hand through his dark hair and glanced around the gloomy, dank, unappealing bar. The gloomy, dank, unappealing bar that he now owned.

As if reading his mind, Trina blushed. “Although, I hope you don’t mind me saying, this place seems a bit, um, different than when Nick and I met here.”

What a polite way of saying it was a dump.

He sighed. “Well, my dad recently passed away.”

“I’m so sorry,” Trina said with true sincerity.

“The bar was left to me and it’s hit a rough spot. I’m not sure that hosting a party—of any kind—is the best idea at the moment.”

Trina’s eyes widened. “Oh please don’t say that. How about this? Why don’t you think about it? I’ll leave my cell number and you can give me a call.” She grabbed a napkin from the bar, scribbled her number and handed it over.

Jack took the flimsy paper gingerly. He knew he needed to be frank with her.

“Trina, since you’ve mentioned it, I know how the bar looks now. I have to wonder why you’re still so interested in having these parties here when you could go to a much nicer place.”

“Because this place is special to us,” she said simply.

Something about the statement clenched at Jack’s heart and he had to take a deep, steadying breath. The place meant something to her. Shouldn’t he feel the same way?

He couldn’t reply, so he nodded his head again. A smile blossomed on Trina’s face. “Okay, just think about it. If I don’t hear from you in a week, I’ll follow up. Plenty of other wedding plans to keep me busy in the meantime.”