by Mia Caldwell
He had to think quickly and find that solution if he was going to persuade her to cooperate though. “I can’t marry Brenda. She’s like a sister to me, and I’m sure she found the idea equally reprehensible. My dad’s health is failing, and I’m afraid the stress of my accident, paired with his devastation if he actually goes through with signing over the company to someone else, would trigger a heart attack that might kill him. It’s clear Brenda came to the same conclusion, so she was willing to play along with the insanity to calm my father. That’s basically what I did too, so I told him I had a girlfriend.”
If possible, her expression closed further. “From what I’ve seen in the celebrity gossip magazines and rag papers from Europe and the United States, you have several girlfriends from which to choose, so that still doesn’t explain why I’m here.”
He winced at the bite in her tone, along with the faint hint of judgment underlying her words. She all but called him a man-whore, and while he would like to disagree with her, now wasn’t the time—and, to be honest, he couldn’t really defend that accusation, because it bordered on true.
“My lady friends aren’t the kind of ladies my father wants to see me settled with, and so I had to invent someone else. I ran out of creativity when he expected to meet you…that is her…tonight, and you were the first person who popped into my mind. You’re in the city and always do an excellent job of accomplishing any task.”
She rolled her eyes. “This is quite a bit different from ensuring your favorite bottled water is imported to a hotel in Bangkok, Mr. Blackwell.”
“I know, but I have a plan.” She looked surprised, but it could only match his own surprise as he said the words, because he had no plan and no clue. He opened his mouth, allowing words to spill from it that he hoped made some semblance of sense and sounded convincing.
“I just need you to go along with it for a little bit. Once Dad calms down, you and I can fake an argument and a spectacular breakup. You’ll be off the hook, and he’ll be content for a while that I’m not a complete reprobate incapable of commitment.” He didn’t think there was a chance that would actually work, but for the moment, he simply needed to secure her agreement. “It’s just for a few weeks. Will you do it?”
She frowned at him. “I distinctly remember you and your father setting our wedding date for a month from now, Connor, so how is that supposed to work?”
“Easy. We just go along with everything. We’ll pretend we’re setting up a wedding, and then you can dump me at the last minute, and Dad will be certain my heart is broken and give it a rest for a while. Anyone would need time to recover from devastation like that.” Enthusiastically, he added, “If you jilted me, he’d really feel sorry for me and let me live my own life while saving the company for my sister.”
She let out a sound of outrage. “Not only do you expect me to pretend to be your fake fiancée and ingratiate myself to your family, but you also expect me to be the bad guy who ends the relationship too?”
He gave her a puzzled look. “It wouldn’t do anything to soothe my dad, or calm his need for me to settle down right away, if I’m the one who ruins the relationship, would it?” At the shake of her head, he continued on. “It’s much easier for the relationship to disintegrate by your choice. I’ll give you a huge bonus, and when this is all over, we can go back to the way things were.”
She snorted. “I doubt that, but I don’t think there’s any going back to the way things were after tonight either way, so I guess I’ll help you.”
He beamed at her. “Excellent. Thank you, Angelina. Just keep the ring on for now, and we’ll figure out all the details of our implosion later. For now, we’ll just play along, right?”
She seemed perturbed, but she nodded. There was a hint of wary resignation about her when she waved to the door. “Fine, now if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to go to bed. It’s been a long and strange day, and I don’t even want to think about what I just agreed to.”
It was unusual for a woman to rush him out of her house. Usually, she was busy rushing him in the opposite direction, toward her bedroom, but of course it wouldn’t be that way with Angelina. They were business associates, and perhaps they might form a tenuous friendship during their shared trial, but it wasn’t anything more to it than that.
There couldn’t possibly be, could there? Of course not. He was nowhere near ready to settle down, and she had the kind of responsibilities he didn’t want to think about. This was a short-term business deal for both of them, and though he hoped to retain her as assistant when it ended, he would sacrifice that relationship if necessary to keep his father’s health stable.
He was feeling considerably lighter—though he knew he wasn’t as close to a solution as he had presented to her—as he left Angelina’s house a few minutes later and got behind the wheel of his car to drive away. He’d made it seem cut and dried, basically a simple matter of staging a relationship that didn’t exist and turning it into a breakup from hell, with her cast as the villain, and that leading to his father easing up on the demand for marriage.
He had a feeling William wouldn’t be so easy to fool, and it wouldn’t be quite so easy to break up their fake relationship, but he wasn’t going to reveal that to Angelina until he absolutely had to. Why make things more complicated sooner than he had to?
***
Could things get more complicated? Despite her tiredness from a long day—which had been a rough one for Kevin, meaning it was a rough day for her—followed by the continuous shocks that had started from the moment she answered her boss’s call, she couldn’t seem to fall asleep.
Instead, she tossed and turned while fretting about the agreement she had reached with Connor, knowing it was wrong on so many levels, but also unable to coolly and firmly tell him no and refuse to help him. She tried to tell herself it was for his father’s sake, but she couldn’t fully embrace that lie, since she had barely known William Blackwell all of two hours, and they certainly hadn’t found time for a chat—a fact for which she was grateful.
She let out a small groan as she realized they would have to create the story of how their relationship had progressed at her next meeting with Connor. She was certain her grandmother would have been rolling in her grave right about then.
If Yvonne had still been alive, she wouldn’t have hesitated to show her disapproval of the arrangement, because she wasn’t a woman who had suffered dishonesty gladly. She had raised Angelina to be truthful, and it felt natural to her now to do so. It was completely against everything ingrained in her to carry on this kind of deception, particularly at this scale, but she couldn’t see much of an alternative, especially not after she had agreed to go through with it for another week or two.
It was obvious to her, at least, that she couldn’t maintain a working relationship with Connor after the events of the evening. If she refused to maintain the charade, he would fire her, or things would be strained between them, and his family would wonder why he kept her in his employment if she’d suddenly broken up with him.
That same outcome would occur in a week or two when they staged their breakup, but at least she would have the cushion of a large bonus to fall back on—a cushion she needed to ensure the best future for Kevin and herself. It was completely avaricious, but she could either resign now and force Connor to deal with the mess on his own, ending up with a fraction of what she could get if she maintained the charade a bit longer, or hang in a bit longer and get enough to live on after the disaster.
She hated regarding it in such a coldblooded and calculating manner, but she had to be practical. Without a job, she wouldn’t be able to keep a roof over their head for long. It was difficult to find a job she could do from home, and there was absolutely no way she could leave Kevin alone all day, especially in his current state. Without a well-paying job, she couldn’t afford to place him in even a public institution, let alone the nice facility surrounded by nature that his doctor recommended. An at-home aide was out, since the las
t time she had tried a companion, he had injured the other woman in one of his fits.
The kind of money Connor was talking about, the number he had whispered to her on his way out the door, was the kind that could potentially change her life. It would allow her to enroll her brother into the program while setting up a trust for Kevin’s care, and she could take time to find another job. She could even finish bachelor’s degree and do something different from personal assistant work.
In a way, she was lying to Connor’s family to benefit her family, and it was partially to benefit Connor’s as well. They were sure to be disappointed when they realized the relationship was over, but perhaps it would settle William’s need to see his son married off. She trusted Connor’s judgment on that, because he knew the other man and she didn’t.
Not exactly satisfied with her decision, she had at least settled the worst of her ethical dilemmas with her self-rationalization. As she finally drifted off to sleep, she assured herself continuing the farce had absolutely nothing to do with helping Connor himself, or being unable to resist his pleading gaze.
She dreamed about their wedding.
Chapter Four
The first thing she did the next morning was try to remove the ring, which stubbornly still refused to come off. It wasn’t uncomfortable or cutting off her circulation, so she reluctantly left it on.
The second thing she did was arrange an appointment with the Henderson Center at eleven a.m., wanting to tour the facility that she had only seen through brochures before committing to the idea of sending Kevin there to live. After that, she made a stop by the bank and had just returned home from depositing the fat stack of cash for last night’s charade, which would enable her to pay the exorbitant fees for Kevin’s facility if she signed the paperwork, when Connor showed up on her doorstep with an unfamiliar black woman in tow.
“Good morning, love.” He greeted her with a hug and a kiss that wasn’t…entirely unpleasant.
“‘Morning,” she muttered. “I didn’t know you were coming back already,” she added a touch too sweetly.
“I promised to bring Carly by for introductions.” He put a hand on the other woman’s arm in a casual way that shouldn’t have inspired any feelings of jealousy in even a real fiancée.
So why did she have the irrational urge to scratch out the other woman’s eyes? It was mystifying, and she forced herself to ignore the reaction as she extended a hand to take the proffered one from the Carly woman.
“I’m Carly Winters, and I’ll be coordinating your wedding.”
“Oh.” She was afraid she sounded sour, judging from the other woman’s startled expression, so she made an effort to sound more enthusiastic. “How lovely.”
Angelina led them to the kitchen, offering tea and busying herself preparing it. As she did so, she did her best to respond appropriately to Carly’s questions, though she had little interest in planning a wedding that was never taking place. She was surprised that Connor stayed, taking a seat at the table as well, and accepting a cup of tea from her a few minutes later with a nod of thanks.
She sat down across from him at the round surface, aware of the time ticking by as Carly seemed to ask a never-ending stream of questions. Her patience was growing frayed the closer it crept to ten a.m. She needed to be on the road by then in order to make it to her eleven o’clock appointment. The facility was located farther upstate, which meant she had to drive and wanted to allow plenty of time to reach her destination.
When Carly was just getting around to asking her preference for hors d’oeuvres, she started drumming her fingers on the table. “I’m sorry to cut in, but I have an urgent meeting for which I can’t be late. We’ll have to pick this up another time.” For her part, another time could be never, and she’d be perfectly satisfied. She was tempted to tell the wedding coordinator that she didn’t care what she did, because it wasn’t going to happen anyway, but the reminder of the deposit she had made just that morning, with the promise of more to follow, kept her silent.
“Of course, Miss Walsh,” said Carly with perfect manners, looking not at all offended or put out that she had been interrupted in mid-hors d’oeuvres survey. “I’ll leave my card, and you can call me to set up a time that’s more convenient for you in the next few days. We just have a lot to accomplish if we’re going to put the wedding together in a month.”
She nodded, taking the card and slipping it into her pocket as she walked them to the door. She was surprised to find Connor lingering and not stepping out with the wedding coordinator. She looked pointedly at him. “Doesn’t she need a ride somewhere?”
He shrugged. “She brought her own car, and I grabbed a cab since it was more convenient.”
“Well, as I said, I have to leave, and Mrs. Kearney from next-door is watching Kevin for me this morning.”
“I’ll come with you. That will give us a chance to get better acquainted, and we can suss out more of the details about where we met, and how our relationship evolved.”
She let out an annoyed sigh. “I don’t want you to come with me, Connor. I have to drive upstate to tour of facility for Kevin. It’s really not the sort of thing I could impose upon you to accompany me for.”
He gave her a small grin. “It’s not imposing on your fiancé at all.”
Out of tactful ways to make it clear she didn’t want his presence, she let out a heavy sigh and accepted that he was either thickheaded or stubborn as a mule and deliberately refusing to accept her subtle rejection of his presence. She supposed to she should just get it over with, since it would allow them to safely plot their history and agree on minor details without the fear of someone interrupting them. “
Well, come on then,” she said less than graciously as she reached for her purse and keys by the door, ensuring he was out on the porch before she slammed it behind her and locked the deadbolt. They lived in a fairly safe neighborhood, considering it was the Lower East Side, but she was still cautious.
It felt strange to get the car out of the garage, since it hadn’t been driven in a few years. Yvonne had been the last one to drive it, and she taken great pride in her old Ford Granada, so the car looked almost as new as it had been when it was purchased in 1975. Most of the time, it was far more hassle than it was worth to drive a car in the city, so other than being started on a regular basis, the car had set forlornly in the garage/storage area behind their condo.
Reflecting its continued maintenance, the ugly green car started with the first attempt, and she re-familiarized herself with the feel of being behind the wheel for a moment before cautiously backing out and finally merging into traffic. The streets were busy, and when Connor started to speak, she shot him a brief look. “Not now. Wait until I’m on the freeway. I can’t talk and navigate the road at the same time.”
He fell silent, as requested—or ordered, depending on one’s point-of-view and interpretation of her tone—until she was safely on the freeway. Once she had merged into traffic that was thick, but far easier to navigate since they were all going the same direction without random stops and fewer idiots crossing lanes dangerously, she let out a rough sigh and nodded her head in his direction. “Okay, what are you saying?” To make up for the way she’d snapped at him while ago, she made an effort to sound pleasant that time.
“I was just going to ask if you had any thoughts on how our relationship developed?”
“Since I’m the bad guy, I really don’t care how you spin it. Just tell me what happens, and I’ll play along.”
He was silent for another moment, and when he began to speak, his tone was faintly husky, almost seductive, and she was surprised to find herself enthralled by his words.
“I wanted you from the day I met you, of course. How could I not? You were so beautiful, and clearly nervous, when we met at the hotel bar for the interview. I could tell I’d unsettled you that day by insisting we meet for a drink instead of in an office.”
She nodded, keeping her gaze firmly on the road both as
a necessity and as a way to avoid looking at him when he was speaking to her that way. It didn’t matter that it was fake, because it sounded really good and almost made her wish his words were true. “I expected an office, not realizing at the time you didn’t have one.”
“I wanted to ask you out then, but I knew I’d be traveling too much, and I didn’t want to risk our working relationship. However, as the months passed, and the more I talked to you, the more I wanted to. Whenever I saw your face on Skype, it made me want to see the real thing in person instead.”
“Your voice was in my mind all the time,” she whispered softly, hoping he would believe it was just part of the narrative they were creating together. “When I started dreaming about you, I knew there was more to it than attraction or simple infatuation.”
“It got to the point where I couldn’t stand it anymore, so the next time I was in the city, I had to ask you out. I was as nervous as I was the first time I ever asked out a girl, and I was certain you would turn me down, but instead, you said yes.”
“I was afraid I’d lose my job if I didn’t,” she said with a hint of bite in her voice, trying to counteract the mesmeric effect of his words on her libido.
He laughed, but ignored her contribution otherwise. “I was thrilled you said yes, and I know you expected something different for me, perhaps the whole fancy restaurant and dinner in a limo, but I wanted to make it plain from the start that this was something different. Something special, and something I’d never felt before.”
“What did you do?” she asked, reluctantly drawn into the fiction and wondering what he would have done that was different from the expectation for their first date—if there had actually been a first date, of course.
“You seemed surprised when I took you to a Knicks game, where we stuffed ourselves stupid on hot dogs and drank too much beer.”