by Lauren Layne
And when she’d left, she’d made it quite clear that Clarke had never met those standards. And he’d told himself and everyone else that it hadn’t mattered.
But the truth was, her dismissal had burned. Because though he hated to admit it, even to himself, Clarke had been trying. He’d been trying to be everything Elizabeth wanted, everything, even, that his parents had hoped him to be. For the first time in his life, he’d put in actual effort to please someone else. He’d learned how to cook. He’d brought home the damned just because flowers that women were always claiming were so important. He’d learned how to make the weird loose leaf French tea Elizabeth had loved so much, and he’d dutifully gone to every lawyerly dinner party and fund-raiser, no matter how boring, and they’d been excruciatingly dull.
The worst part was, Clarke had thought he’d been pulling it off. He’d thought they’d been on a steady, albeit slow, path to maybe ring shopping in the not-so-distant future. Elizabeth, on the other hand, had made it quite clear when she’d taken the job in DC without so much as a conversation, that he was the fun guy you dated before you married—not the guy you actually married.
In hindsight, he was relieved. He was fairly certain that they’d never have made each other truly happy. In the moment, though, it had hurt, both his pride and his feelings, and he had no interest in repeating any of it. Ever.
“Couldn’t you have just asked me if I wanted to get back together with Elizabeth?” he asked his mom tiredly. “Didn’t the engagement party feel a bit much?”
She smiled. “I was curious how far you and Audrey were going to take this thing. All the way, it seems.”
“Well, not all the way,” he said, smiling back in spite of himself.
“Good, because I’ll happily host a fake engagement party, but I do draw the line at hosting a fake wedding.”
“Noted. How’d you know?” he asked curiously.
“That your engagement wasn’t real?”
He nodded.
“Well, that’s the thing about being a mother. You get to know pretty quickly when your son is just trying to push your buttons.”
“There’s a little more to it than that,” Clarke said, thinking of the petty Scandal Boy bullshit.
“I figured. Leave it to that girl to turn even marriage into a dog and pony show.”
Defending Audrey to his mother had always been a waste of breath, but Clarke had never quit trying. And he wasn’t going to stop now.
“You know,” he said, taking another slow sip of his drink, “in all the years I’ve known Audrey, she’s never not been there when I needed her.”
“And?”
Clarke shrugged. “I’m just saying, there are two types of women. The ones who stay by your side. And the ones who move to Washington, DC, without asking you to go with them.”
Leaving his mother to stew on his parting shot, and maybe, just maybe, realize he could manage his own life better than she could, Clarke began making his way toward Audrey, stopping to shake hands and accept congratulations along the way. Strange, that although this party was all for show, the congratulations misplaced, none of this felt in the least bit odd. Shouldn’t this advanced game of pretend feel wrong?
A hand caught his sleeve, and Clarke turned, smiling when he saw Naomi Powell and Claire Hayes. No, Claire Turner, he amended, remembering her spontaneous marriage to Scott Turner a few months earlier and her decision to take her new husband’s name.
Clarke had thought Audrey’s relationship with these two strange at first, considering how it had begun. Clarke had known enough women over the course of his life to think that a friendship between three women who’d all slept with the same man couldn’t possibly be built to last.
He was wrong, though, and happy to be wrong. The three of them may have come together over their shared scorn for Brayden Hayes and their desire to protect one another from future heartache, but whatever had kept them together was much stronger than any man. Of all Audrey’s friends, and she had dozens, these two ladies were perhaps his favorites.
Clarke cared for Audrey more than anyone, save perhaps her immediate family, but he knew Claire and Naomi came close in terms of being willing to do just about anything for her.
Which is why, seeing the troubled look on both of their faces, he dropped his smile immediately. “What’s up?”
Naomi nodded her head to the side of the room, away from the crowd, and Clarke followed.
Wordlessly, Claire handed him her phone, Instagram already pulled up.
Clarke immediately went on high alert when he saw the account in question. @ScandalBoyNYC.
Alert turned to disbelief as he read, before finally settling on a deep and quiet anger.
He handed the phone back to Claire. “That bastard.”
“Who, Randy or Scandal Boy?” Naomi asked.
“I want to pummel both, but Randy’s first in line,” Clarke said. “He was married?”
“Apparently,” Claire said. “Even if Scandal Boy made it up, a rumor’s every bit as damaging as the truth.”
“Especially this rumor,” Naomi said. “It’s already all over that she was dating a married man. When people find out it happened twice…”
“They already have found out,” Claire said glumly, thumbing through Instagram. “It’s only been an hour, and already there are a thousand comments on Scandal Boy’s post. Even worse, they’ve started commenting on her most recent post.”
“What’s the gist?” Clarke asked.
Claire’s shoulders lifted. “About what you’d expect. Once a home wrecker, always a home wrecker. Find your own man.”
“But she has found her own man,” Naomi protested. “Or she has at least as far as they know.” She pointed at Clarke.
Claire kept reading the comments and gave a sad shake of her head. “Apparently they’re not buying it. Someone posted that at her ‘engagement party’—that’s in quotes—the so-called couple hasn’t spent so much as five minutes together or touched even once. Now everyone’s theorizing that you’re her damage control ‘beard,’ ” she told Clarke.
“Well, they’re not entirely wrong,” Naomi admitted, “but this also means that someone at this party is busy posting updates on Instagram.”
“Who!” Claire demanded, looking up and glaring around the room, her anger palpable.
“Could be anyone. Probably a few of them,” Clarke said, already thinking of a couple of catty attendees who’d always resented being the distant Plutos to Audrey’s sun. He could think of a couple more whom he’d dated over the years who liked to imagine it was Audrey’s fault that Clarke had dumped them.
“This is our fault,” Claire said, the distress in her voice clear. “We agreed to protect one another. She’s held her end up of the pact flawlessly for both of us, and we let this happen to her?”
“Simply suggesting Randy was a dud wasn’t enough,” Naomi said in glum agreement. “I knew there was something off about that guy. I should have handcuffed her to my side until that flea went to bother someone else.”
“No,” Clarke said. “You two have done plenty for her. I’ve got this one.”
“You already fake proposed,” Naomi pointed out. “I don’t know what else you can do.”
He handed his drink to Claire. “Hold this. It’s time Audrey and I started selling this thing.”
* * *
Audrey was a little surprised by how much she was enjoying herself. She’d always loved parties, but she’d expected this one to feel awkward given the circumstances. Instead, she was relieved to find it just felt like a group of people together in the same room celebrating love. And they were celebrating love. Friendship love, of the non-romantic variety.
“It’s going great,” her mother said, linking her arm with Audrey’s and grinning happily. “Did you hear the story I told about you calling to tell me about the proposal?”
Audrey rolled her eyes. “I think multiple time zones probably heard that story based on the level of zeal
in your voice.”
“Was it too much?”
Audrey kissed her mom’s cheek, more grateful than ever for her fun-loving, up-for-anything mother. “It was perfect. Though, I feel like one of us should inform Clarke that he rode a white stallion bareback through Central Park before someone else asks him to verify the story.”
“You can fill him in right now,” Kathleen said, patting Audrey’s arm and nodding toward Clarke making his way over to her. She took Audrey’s champagne flute out of her hand. “I’m going to go check on your father, and I’ll get us some refills.”
Audrey nodded in acknowledgment, then smiled at Clarke as he approached. “Hi! I haven’t seen you all night.”
“Yeah, that’s sort of a problem,” he said quietly.
Her smile fell as she registered the terse note in his voice and the tension around his eyes. “What’s wrong?”
His gaze dropped to her clutch. “You haven’t checked your phone?”
Audrey’s stomach dropped. “No, I’ve been too busy making the rounds. Why? What’s happened?”
Clarke looked up, noting, as she had, that people were done giving Audrey a reprieve and wanted a moment with the guest of honor. Guests, now that Clarke had joined her.
He stepped closer and gave her a fleeting smile, lowering his voice even further. “They’re onto us, darling.”
“What do you mean?” But she already knew what he meant. Knew that their engagement being a sham had somehow hit the rumor mill. And judging by Clarke’s atypically serious expression, something beyond a little petty gossip was at play.
“Smile,” he instructed, stepping even closer and sliding his hand around her waist. She smiled automatically, even as she registered that his hand had slid low on her back, his face needlessly close to hers.
“Clarke—”
“Brace yourself,” he said out of the corner of his mouth.
“What—”
His lips closed over hers.
Audrey’s eyes went wide in surprise before they fluttered closed, her hands waving helplessly for a moment as she tried to register the strangeness of Clarke’s mouth against hers before they instinctively lifted to rest on his chest.
It was no big deal, she told her thundering heart. Just a perfunctory stamp of a kiss to get the doubters to back off. It’d be over before she knew it.
Clarke’s lips moved against hers, his head tilting to the side, deepening the kiss slightly as his hand slid up her back, pulling her more firmly against him.
Audrey felt something strange and unfamiliar flutter in her stomach. Before she could identify it, Clarke lifted his head. His gaze stayed locked on her lips for a long moment, giving her a second to gather her thoughts.
Damn. He’s really selling this, she realized. She knew it was all for show, but she still could have sworn she felt heat in his gaze, as though he were silently willing the rest of the room away so it was just the two of them.
His eyes lifted to hers, and she thought she saw a flicker of confusion before he straightened and grinned at his colleague and her husband, who were watching them with bemused smiles.
“Leslie!” he said in a cheerful voice. “So glad you could make it. Apologies for the, ah—moment,” he said with a wink.
“I get it,” she said with a laugh. “Chris and I were young once, too.”
“You say that like I have a walker,” her fifty-something husband grumbled.
“And yet, you don’t kiss me like that anymore,” she said teasingly.
Nobody kisses like that, Audrey thought.
She desperately wanted a moment to gather her thoughts, to find out what had prompted the kiss, but she couldn’t let Clarke carry the show alone, so she linked her arm through his and chatted with the middle-aged couple. “I’m so glad you could make it. I haven’t seen you since, what, Joel’s wedding last summer?”
For the next several minutes, she made small talk and fielded wedding questions, all the while trying to ward off the sense of panic, the sense that things were spiraling out of control. Her panic escalated another notch when after her mother rejoined them, handing Audrey a glass of champagne, Clarke took her free hand, linked his fingers in hers, lifted her hand to his lips, and planted a kiss on the back of her hand as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
“You guys mind if I steal my fiancée for a moment?” Clarke asked the group surrounding them. Audrey noted the way his eyes sought out and found her mom’s and the way her mom immediately took control of the situation, launching into an animated story about how Clarke had come home from college to accompany Audrey to prom after her high school boyfriend had come down with mono. She’d known then and there that he was the one.
Her mom hadn’t known any such thing, but Audrey was grateful for the distraction as she let Clarke lead her through the crowd and out onto the rooftop patio. Since January was too cold to take advantage of the outdoor space, it was deserted. Clarke shrugged out of his jacket, dropping it over her shoulders. She didn’t protest.
“What’s going on?”
He shoved his hand into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone, scrolling until he found what he was looking for. She wasn’t surprised when she saw the issue stemmed from Instagram, but she was surprised by what she saw there.
Audrey’s eyes watered automatically. “He was married? Randy was married?”
“Apparently.”
She looked up at Clarke, blinking quickly to keep the tears from falling and smearing her makeup. “Why?”
He sighed. “Damn, Dree, I don’t know. Men are shits.”
She wiped her nose with the back of her hand. “How did Scandal Boy know?”
“I’m guessing his network outnumbers the rats of this city and is just as gross.”
“And now everyone thinks you and I are just doing this as damage control.” She let out a quick laugh. “Though, I guess they’re right, aren’t they? And now they’re just waiting for us to call it off so they can prove they’re right.”
“So, let’s not,” Clarke said.
“Let’s not what?”
He smiled. “Call it off.”
“Clarke.”
“Don’t worry, I’m not suggesting we get married. I’d make a terrible husband, and I certainly wouldn’t wish that upon my best friend. I’m just saying, what’s the rush in ending the charade? You said yourself that it was fun. Just a few more days. Until this blows over for real.”
“Yeah, but… it’s fun for me because I’m obsessed with bridal magazines, and yeah, okay, I’ve sort of always dreamed of taking my Instagram game into the wedding world. But don’t pretend it doesn’t put a major crimp in your love life.”
“It does,” he admitted. “But.” He leaned forward so they were face-to-face. “Turns out I care about you more than I do sex.”
Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “You do?”
“Eh.” He grinned. “Mostly.”
He held out his hand for her. “Come on, bride. Let’s go tell people about how I proposed.”
“Oh, about that,” she said, setting her hand in his and letting him lead her back inside. “Do you know how to ride a horse…?”
Chapter Seven
SUNDAY, JANUARY 19
Now, you’re sure you don’t want me to stay here in New York a few more days?” her mom asked for the fifth time since they’d sat down at the dining room table. “I always imagined that when you got married, I’d be dress shopping with you!’
“And if I get married, you will,” Audrey reassured Kathleen. If I ever do. “But for the hundredth time, Clarke and I are not actually getting married.”
Her father made a grumbling noise from behind the Wall Street Journal.
“Something to say, dear?” Kathleen asked, smearing raspberry jam onto her croissant and taking a dainty bite as she glanced at her husband.
He took his time folding the paper and setting it aside. “Well, it just seems that in my day—”
“Oh no,�
�� Audrey said, reaching for a cranberry scone on the pastry plate her mother had had delivered from one of their longtime favorite bakeries. “That’s never a good opener.”
“In my day,” her dad said, undeterred, “matrimony was taken very seriously between two people who were committed to each other.”
“Can it, Richard,” Audrey’s mom said, wiping her mouth. “You and I got married because I was pregnant with Anderson.”
“I knew it,” Audrey said in a dramatic, scandalized voice.
Actually, everyone knew it. Her older brother’s birth certificate pretty much said it all. But shotgun wedding or not, her parents had made it work. No, that wasn’t quite right. What her mom and dad have went far beyond mere contentment or making the best of their situation. They were the sort of couple that somehow managed to maintain their individuality while simultaneously hating to be away from the other person.
It was love, pure and simple. The sort of love Audrey had once imagined she’d had with Brayden, and the sort of love that Audrey now approached with extreme caution.
“You already know why they’re doing this,” Kathleen said in defense of her youngest daughter. “Some jealous twats have gotten Audrey in their crosshairs and are trying to take her down. You know all too well what this world can be like. Though, I do miss this house. And Orwashers,” she said, looking lovingly at her pastry.
Audrey’s parents still owned the penthouse on Madison Avenue, and even now that Audrey had moved out, they kept a live-in housekeeper to ensure it was always ready for when they came into town, or when friends needed a place to stay while visiting the city. Audrey had come over for brunch to spend some time with them before they flew back this afternoon.
“I do know how this neighborhood can be,” Audrey’s dad said in agreement. “It’s why I moved to California.” He looked at Audrey. “You should move to California.”