“No. No more chances. He had a chance twelve years ago. To choose to stay faithful to you and the commitment he made to you and his family. But he chose to throw all that away.”
Zac glanced over at Carmen, who was watching their exchange. Dots of color had returned to her cheeks and her eyes glittered with angry heat. His heart stumbled anew. This was her special night, the whole reason he was here, and now it was ruined. Because of him. Because of his lies and his deception. He really was no better than his father.
The worst wasn’t over, however, because his father had regained some composure and was not backing down.
“You want to do this here? Now? Fine,” his father said, his dark eyes glittering with determination. “I’ve got nothing to hide. All my secrets were laid bare for the world years ago. But can you say the same, son? I’ve apologized for what I did. I’ve made amends. I’ve tried to live better since. People are fallible, son. We fall down. We make mistakes. What happened back then was a horrible mistake on my part, but I’ve spent every day since making reparation to your mother. We put it behind us and made a new future—a better future. One I’d hoped you’d be a part of. But I can see now that the real thing you inherited from me was stubbornness. You’re alone? You’re afraid to commit? You don’t trust people? Take a look at your own choices, son, before you go laying that on me. I talked to Dustin this evening. He told me about you and your lady friend, here, staying in the suite upstairs. You think I don’t see that engagement ring on her finger? Were you planning on even inviting us to the wedding?”
“There is no wedding,” Zac said, before he could think better of it. But thankfully, Lance and Priya were still gone and Ellen and Liz were up on the stage. “We faked an engagement so Carmen could get a job she wants in California. Not that it’s any of your business. We’re just friends. Nothing more.”
He’d meant for that chilly statement to put the quick kibosh on his parents’ questions about his relationship with Carmen, but he didn’t miss the tiny pained gasp from the woman beside him. Zac hid his own wince and hazarded a side-glance at her.
“We’ll talk about it later,” he whispered. “In our room. Alone.”
“Why?” Carmen asked, her arms crossed and her toe tapping against the plush carpet beneath her high-heeled sandals. “You seem to have no problem airing all your dirty laundry right here in front of everyone. Why not this too?”
“Because I’m trying to stick to our deal and keep your secret,” Zac said, keeping his voice down.
“Secrets and fake engagements, eh?” his father said, narrowing his gaze. “Looks like you’ve got your own issues to deal with. Can’t go blaming all this on me, son.”
“I said don’t call me that,” Zac growled.
“Don’t talk to your parents that way,” Carmen said, scowling.
“Stay out of this. It’s a private matter. It doesn’t concern you.”
Zac’s heart pinched at the way Carmen blanched, but dammit. This was getting out of control. He needed to keep things separate. He needed to regain his cool composure. He needed to sort through all this and find the right way forward.
Unfortunately there was no time to do any of that, because the next thing he heard was the voice of the MC, booming over the PA system in the dining hall.
“And now a special announcement from the primary sponsor of this year’s conference—esteemed businesswoman and midwife, and lifelong advocate for women’s health, Ellen Landon!”
* * *
The master of ceremonies stepped aside and applause filled the dining room. Carmen did her best to hide the hurricane of emotions swirling inside her—hurt, anger, regret, heartache. She took a deep breath and forced herself to smile, since all eyes were focused on her at that moment.
This whole mess was her fault. Zac was right. He was trying to stick to the deal they’d made at the beginning of this whole fiasco. He was her rent-a-fiancé for the weekend, her fake fiancé. It was her own stupid fault that she’d read more into it than she should. Last night had been special to her, but obviously to him it had been just another quick fling.
“Doh eat de bread de devil knead,” as her mama would say.
This was a tough time. One of her own making, unfortunately. She’d gone ahead and opened her heart to Zac—gone ahead and fallen for him when he’d clearly shown he didn’t want that.
Stupid, Carmen. So stupid.
Lance and Priya returned to the table at last, holding hands and keeping very much to themselves, as they’d done all evening. Strange, that, but Carmen had bigger problems to deal with at the moment.
Ellen smiled down from the podium. “Tonight, we’re pleased to announce the candidate we’ve chosen to be the new head of midwife staff at our Big Sur, California, clinic. It came down to two final contenders—Ms. Priya Shaw and Ms. Carmen Sanchez. Ladies, please stand so we can give you both a round of applause.”
Carmen was only vaguely aware of the cheers around her as Zac stood stiffly by her side, not looking at her at all. She wanted to shake him, and she wanted to hug him. She wanted to demand that he tell her why he’d not told her about his parents or the fact his father owned this entire resort.
He wasn’t the man she thought he was. Not at all.
Stay out of this. It’s a private matter. It doesn’t concern you.
Gah. Why hadn’t she done that? Enjoyed a nice weekend away. Stuck to her original plan. Kept her heart out of the equation. Now it was shattered on the floor, along with any hope of things continuing with Zac past this weekend, of them having more than a few nights of sex, being more to each other.
“Thank you, ladies,” Ellen said. “Now for the announcement. After several rounds of interviews, and extensive face-to-face meetings this weekend, the candidate we’ve chosen for the job is...”
All Carmen wanted to do at that moment was to go back to her room and curl up in a ball to nurse her broken heart, to berate herself for being such an idiot. Whatever had made her think playboy Zac would settle down with her?
“Carmen Sanchez!” Ellen beamed down at her from the stage. “Congratulations, Carmen. We’re so excited to welcome you to our California practice, and we’re looking forward to all the amazing new protocols you’ll put in place soon.”
People rushed to congratulate her.
She responded in a fog.
Zac remained by her side, stiff as a stone, and his parents lingered as well.
Finally he leaned closer and said, “I’m going back to the room.”
He started toward the side exit and his parents followed.
“We’re not done here, son,” his father called, racing after Zac with his wife in tow.
Carmen turned to Ellen and Liz. “If you’ll excuse me? I need to check on my fiancé.”
She hurried toward the exit and was almost to the door when the shaking started. Mild at first, like the vibrations of a large truck passing by on the road outside, gradually getting worse until the large chandelier at the center of the room swayed. A low, distant roar—like a freight train approaching—reached a crescendo and the world shook.
Earthquake.
They were having an earthquake.
Not a bad one, given what she’d seen following the seven point zero magnitude one in Anchorage the year prior, but still enough to send dishes crashing off carts and pictures flying off the walls. People huddled together for safety, and some even crawled under the tables. Several older attendees had been knocked to the ground, but no one seemed badly injured, thank goodness.
Earthquakes weren’t uncommon in Alaska, especially smaller ones, but even so, Carmen’s heart rate tripled, and she braced herself in the exit doorway until the tremor stopped and the roar of the sound waves faded away.
Legs quaking, she fumbled her way out of the exit and into the hall, only to find Zac crouched beside an older man on the floor.
It was his father, with his wife kneeling beside him, weeping softly. “Please, Zac. Don’t let your father die. Please!”
“I’ll do the best I can, Mom. I swear.”
“What happened?” Carmen stood amongst the crumbled plaster and shattered glass on the floor, her brain taking a moment to register it all. “Was it the earthquake?”
“No. I don’t know.” Zac was in full EMT mode, taking the man’s pulse, then ripping open his shirt to start CPR. “Call 911, Carmen. Now!”
She fumbled her phone out of her purse and did as he asked, before rushing over to his side. “ETA five minutes on the ambulance.”
He didn’t miss a beat in the CPR—a credit to his skill as a paramedic.
“Thank you for calling them.”
“Of course,” she said, kneeling and switching into nurse mode, taking over chest compressions while he gave his father life-saving breaths. “Even though it’s a private matter and doesn’t concern me.”
At least he had the decency to look ashamed when she threw his earlier words back in his face.
“I’m sorry...”
The wail of sirens grew closer outside, matching the screeching hurt inside Carmen. He’d been clear about not wanting a commitment up front, but that was little comfort to her broken heart now. She’d fallen for Zac way too hard and way too fast, against all her wishes to the contrary.
She should’ve known better.
She should’ve done better.
Hurt almost overwhelmed her before she shoved it aside, behind a wall of professional necessity. Right now she had a patient to save. Her pain would wait until later.
Same as it always did.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“WE’VE GOT HIM, SIR,” the paramedic said as they loaded Zac’s father into the back of an ambulance a short time later.
They’d had to use the defibrillator to restart his father’s heart. He was breathing on his own now, though Zac knew only too well from experience how quickly a patient’s status could change. His emotions were a mess—anxious, sad, pissed off and remorseful. All at the same time.
He couldn’t help thinking that this was his fault, even though logically he knew that was ridiculous.
“We’ll take him to the hospital in town, then I’m guessing he’ll be airlifted to Anchorage as soon as he’s stable.”
“Thank you.”
Zac helped his mother into the back of the ambulance. She looked so much smaller and more fragile than he remembered. She clung to his father’s limp hand like a lifeline and Zac’s troubled heart fractured a bit more. Whether he understood it or not, his mother loved his father, and she’d be devastated if anything happened to him.
“I’ll come up as soon as I get things settled here at the hotel, Mom.”
He stood back to let the EMTs shut the rear doors of the rig, then watched as they drove off, lights and sirens blaring in the cold, dark night. Just an hour prior he’d vowed to turn his back on his parents and never see them again. Now he was right back into the thick of it with them and he had no idea how he felt about it. It was like a case of emotional whiplash—hating his father one second, then fearing he’d lose the man forever the next.
Behind him, he felt the weight of Carmen’s stare on him and knew he had another hard battle yet to fight. He’d not missed the look of shock on her face when he’d told her the truth about his parents, nor the way that shock had given way to betrayal. A feeling he was all too familiar with from his own past.
“Look, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I should have been truthful right up front.” He turned slowly to see her huddled inside his tux jacket, her arms crossed beneath the expensive fabric and her green-gold eyes spitting fire at him. “I don’t know what else to say except I’m sorry.”
“You don’t trust me.” She looked anywhere but at him. “I get it. This whole weekend was about pretending. You played your part well. I guess I thought we were friends, but I shouldn’t have expected that to change anything. I mean, like you said, it’s not my concern. I’m not important enough for you to tell me the truth about your identity.”
Not important enough?
He lowered his head to stare at his feet. Dirty icy slush covered his shiny black loafers, and if that wasn’t a metaphor for this disaster of an evening then he didn’t know what was.
“We are friends.”
And I wanted us to be so much more...
Instead of saying those words, however, he bit them back out of old habit. “And you are important to me, Carmen. I wanted to tell you so many times over this weekend, but the timing was never right.”
He cringed, his father’s words from earlier ringing in his head.
People are fallible, son. We fall down. We make mistakes.
Well, Zac sure as hell had made his share of them where Carmen was concerned.
He scrambled to keep his head above water. “If it helps, I’ve never told anyone in Anchorage about my true identity.”
“It doesn’t help.”
Yeah, he hadn’t thought it would. Worse, he deserved all the ire she could pour out on him after the way he’d deceived her. Deserved to lose her, same as his father had almost lost his mother, because he was no better than his old man.
A liar. A cheat. A fraud.
Just as he’d always feared.
Well, if things were going down the drain, he might as well get it all out there in the open.
“Look, at first I didn’t tell you because I didn’t trust you—though it’s not just you... I don’t trust anyone. But later I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to ruin your big weekend. And I didn’t want to lose what we had last night.”
“I see.”
The small crowd that had gathered in the parking lot after the earthquake were slowly making their way back inside now the building inspectors had deemed the structure safe.
Carmen moved closer to him, out of the line of traffic, her expression dark. “You didn’t tell me so I’d keep sleeping with you?”
“No. That’s not what I meant.”
“Well, that’s what you said.”
She’d crossed her arms again and was tap, tap, tapping that toe of hers on the ground. Never a good sign.
“I always knew you were a player, but that’s low even for you.”
“We had an agreement. No strings. Your rules, not mine.”
He hated bringing it up, but she had him on the defensive now, and with everything else going on he felt raw and vulnerable and way too exposed, so he lashed out.
“This whole fiasco wouldn’t have even happened if you hadn’t asked me here, Carmen, so don’t go blaming me if things didn’t turn out the way you wanted. I played my part. I acted like your doting fiancé. Based on how much you enjoyed yourself last night, I’d say you got your money’s worth. Because that’s all I was here for, right?”
Her face had paled beneath the overhead lights, but he was on a roll now.
“You don’t see me as anything but your fake boy toy. Because you work too damned much and too damned hard to have time for a real relationship. All you do is sacrifice for others and never take anything for yourself. Poor Carmen, martyring herself on the altar of everyone else’s happiness and well-being. I thought maybe a weekend away might show you the error of your thinking. But I was wrong. You’re alone because you like being alone. So fine. Be alone. Enjoy.”
“How dare you? I cared for you, Zac. Beyond friendship. Way beyond liking. I—” She stopped herself and cursed under her breath. “Fine. Whatever. As far as I remember, you enjoyed yourself as much as I did. Then again, you enjoy yourself with a lot of women. Like father like son, apparently. Who knew bed-hopping was genetic?”
Zac froze, fists clenched at his sides, livid. Her words had struck far too close for his comfort. Dammit. He didn’t have time for
this. He needed to come to terms with the fact that the entire universe he’d carefully constructed these last twelve years had crumbled at his feet. He needed to get away from Carmen before he said something else he’d regret forever.
He brushed past her, ignoring the pain in her eyes that slashed his heart into pieces. “Congratulations on your new job in California.”
Tonight had been a huge mess, and now he needed to pick up the shattered pieces and get on with the rest of his life.
Or what was left of it.
* * *
Carmen went back to the suite in something of a daze, too numb to cry. This evening had not turned out like she’d planned. Not at all. She’d gotten the job of her dreams and had a bright future ahead of her—could take care of her mother and her sister as she’d always wanted. And yet it all felt hollow somehow.
Far too amped-up to sleep, despite the late hour, she began packing instead. That way when Zac returned he would see she was ready to put all this behind her and move on.
Once her bags were packed, and she’d showered and changed into her PJs, Carmen slumped down on the sofa in the living room and stared out the window at the approaching dawn. It was going on six a.m. now and there was no sign of Zac returning. Just as well, since she was in no mood to see him again at the moment anyway.
How dared he accuse her of playing the martyr, of overextending herself for selfish reasons? He knew nothing about her. Not really. He didn’t know her struggles. She snorted and looked around at her lavish surroundings. Apparently he’d grown up in the lap of luxury.
Carmen closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the cushion. Images of the hallway after the earthquake haunted her—Zac performing CPR on his father while his mother wept at his side, the desperation on his handsome face. That hadn’t been the look of a man at peace with his life. That had been the look of a man who’d made major mistakes and feared he’d never have a chance to atone.
A Weekend with Her Fake Fiancé Page 14