“Are you nuts?” Clive asked. “How are you getting home if I don’t drive you?”

“It’s Hawaii.” And he wasn’t planning on handing it over without a fight. Lily hadn’t exactly been competing fair. She’d forced his hand into convincing his cousin to redesign his coffee shop. It was Marcus who had sought out the senior living center on Merchant Boulevard. It was his sunroom design that Margaret Beckham had originally chosen, his suggestion to add five hundred square feet to the already sprawling grounds of Sunny Acres Retirement Home. It should have been the winning account…in theory.

But when Margaret stopped in to query about extras, Marcus’s idea for a patio redesign fell flat. Meanwhile, Lily swooped in and suggested a koi pond and a greenhouse, and Margaret had been wooed by the idea of fish and plants. Just like that, boom, she locked down the contract.

Now that he thought it through again, Lily might have saved the damn contract.

Still. It was a tick for her column, and he was one shy. He’d done what it took. But her calling him out on “cheating” to win Hawaii was almost as funny as believing she’d survive the night in the mansion and succeed in taking it from him.

Not. Happening.

“How are you getting home, Black?” Clive repeated with a frown.

“Gee, Dad, worried about me?”

“Jerk.” But his friend was smiling. Clive backed away, then halfway down the hill, called in an exaggerated whisper, “Let me know how it goes!”

Marcus waved him off.

After Clive lumbered down to where he’d parked the car at the base of the hill and reversed down the street, headlights extinguished, Marcus turned and unzipped the bag at his feet. He wasn’t worried about being stranded on the grounds. Once he boogeymanned Lily from the house, he was fairly certain he could coerce her into giving him a ride home. Since she understood the nature of their battle better than anyone, she probably expected him to do something juvenile to win.

He smiled. Challenge accepted.

He’d have to try really hard not to rub in the fact that she’d be on his arm at the design dinner this year. She may do it with a look of contempt on her face, but she’d do it. Lily McIntire wasn’t the type of woman to renege on a bet.

It’d be good for him to be seen with someone as smart and design savvy as her. He was aware of his playboy reputation and the assumption that he relied heavily on his charm to make his way in this industry. But while he’d never had a problem landing a date, having just any woman warming his arm for the evening didn’t hold the appeal it once had.

No, this year he’d rather have Lily at his side. And the no-panties thing would be a plus. God, that’d drive him insane, her sitting next to him at the table wearing nothing under her short dress. Not because he’d never been with a girl who went commando, but because he’d bet prim and proper Lily had never, not once in her life, eschewed the common decency of wearing undergarments. And her doing it for him? That was worth fighting for even if he didn’t want to go to Hawaii.

If pressed, he’d admit there was more to it than getting her out of her panties. Her ease in social situations would put him at ease. Especially this year. How the hell was he supposed to graciously accept a Designer of the Year award when he’d be surrounded by several hundred more qualified designers? He could hold a pencil and talk anyone into anything, but…Designer of the Year?

Part of him suspected this awards dinner was the ultimate practical joke to get him back for the pranks he’d played on his coworkers over the years. If it wasn’t a practical joke, well…that was worse. Because then he’d be expected to give a meaningful speech about his early influences, his process, his—

God.

The speech.

Just picturing the podium at the center of the room, imagining the white-hot lights beating down on him from overhead, caused his brow to bead with sweat. He pulled at the collar of his favorite T-shirt and imagined a noose-like bowtie knotted at the front of his neck. How was he going to stand in front of five hundred of his colleagues and not die on the spot when just thinking about the acceptance speech made him break out in hives?

A hooting owl snapped him back to the present. He could worry about the speech later. Right now, he had one mission. He knelt and dug through the costumes until his hand landed on the perfect one.

He pulled the covering over his face and listened to his breath echo behind the mask.

His mission was simple. His target clear.

Scare Lily McIntire out of the house, and win the date he’d wanted since the moment he laid eyes on her.

Chapter Four

Lily folded the cover over her iPad and strained to listen to the silence hanging in the room. She swore she’d just heard something.

A voice.

Not necessarily, she thought with a shiver. She’d spent the last half hour streaming an episode of Friends. Maybe she’d confused the voice on her computer with the voice still echoing inside her skull.

She turned to face the staircase. The room was swathed in darkness save for the circle of light her little lantern cast around the bed. In front of her, the grainy shape of the stairs rose up to the ominous upper floor, but the ceiling kept her from being able to see the landing. She’d spied it earlier, though, and knew there was nothing beyond the top step besides a yawning, cavernous hole. Just imagining the murky darkness made her want to curl up in that warm puddle of light and scrunch her eyes closed.

Maybe you imagined the voice.

It seemed to have come from behind her. Right behind her. A chill clipped its way down her spine, ticking every vertebra along the way. The hair on her arms stood on end. She tried, and failed, to convince herself she hadn’t heard a voice. A voice that had spoken one word, a word now etched in her memory like hieroglyphics.

Go.

She rose from the air mattress slowly, intentionally, her eyes tracking from the staircase to the closed front door. The urge to obey the unseen entity’s command, and bolt outside as fast as her Sketchers would carry her, was strong. But the practical half of her brain—the half logical enough to know a howl of wind could have masked itself as a two-letter word—kept her rooted to the floor.

Blood pounded her eardrums as she pulled her shoulders back and attempted to listen past her jackhammering heart and jagged breaths. She watched the stairs until her eyes blurred and her forehead broke into a sweat. Come on. I know I heard it.

An untimely chime from her phone made her yip. She slapped a palm over her mouth to staunch the pathetic sound and pulled the cell from her back pocket. A text. From Marcus.

Of course.

10 pm. is all well? send me proof.

Bihourly photos were part of the bet. She’d promised to send evidence she was inside the house. A time-stamped photo from her smartphone would prove she hadn’t snapped them all in a span of five minutes then hoofed it off the property.

She tapped her camera app, lined herself up with the mostly boarded-up window behind her, held up her middle finger, and snapped the picture.

A few seconds after it sent, a return text read: ha!

Weirdly, she could almost swear she’d heard the timbre of his deep chuckle coming from somewhere outside the house. But then, she was imagining hearing a lot of things tonight, wasn’t she?

Two seconds later, her phone chimed again. what’s that weird ball of light over your left shoulder?

Before she could stop herself, she’d snapped her head around to look behind her. And Marcus must have guessed she’d fallen for it. The next text read: sucker!