by Virna DePaul
“Yes, but I’m not sure me just telling them that is going to change their minds.”
“No, but maybe me telling them will. Not just as your friend, but as something more.”
They stumbled to a halt and Jamie tightened his hold on her. He’d given this a lot of thought, and it seemed like such an easy way to help her. And while he usually hated dishonesty in any form, this was Lucy and Lucy’s niece and they’d both been through so much already. He wouldn’t allow Mason’s family to make Lucy feel bad about herself, especially when Mason had done such a good job of that already.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“I have an idea that I’m not sure you’re going to like, but hear me out, okay?”
“Okay…” she said again, obviously even more nervous now.
He sucked in a deep breath and said, “What if you and I pretend to be engaged?”
Lucy’s eyes went wide and she started to protest but he put his finger to her lips. “Hear me out. Please?”
She nodded, but her eyes stayed wide as he went on, “We pretend we’re engaged, announcing it before my sister’s wedding. I’ll get my sister to invite Mason’s family.”
“Why on earth would your sister invite Mason’s family?”
He shrugged. “Their social circle overlaps my family’s slightly. The Lancasters have long been on the fringe, just waiting for an entrance into high society. Recently, Evelyn Lancaster served on the same charitable organization as my mother, so it wouldn’t be unheard of that they get invited to the wedding. Then there’s the fact you recently saw them again, and had a prior relationship with their son…”
“And that they just happen to be contesting guardianship of Milly. They’ll see right through us.”
“Maybe not. I was with you the night of the accident, remember?”
“And you really think being engaged to you, even if they believe the engagement is real, will make a difference in the custody dispute?”
“Yes, because, although we both know they’re wrong about you, we also both know that it’s difficult for people to let go of preconceived notions about someone. From what you’ve told me, your parents and Mason’s parents are impressed by social standing. Respectability. That’s one thing my family has lots of. Being invited to Coronado Island as guests of a family who are multi-billionaires would impress the hell out of them—because it would impress their friends. It would mean they’d made it into the upper echelons. We make sure they’re given the best five-star accommodations and they’re treated like royalty while they’re there. We also make sure they see us together, see that you fit in with my family and my family’s lifestyle…and thus would fit into theirs.”
“I don’t know if I can do that,” she said. “I hate being fake, pretending to be something I’m not for the benefit of other people…”
“Of course you do. The fact that you’re comfortable in your own skin is one of the things I love most about you. But if pretending for a few days can get them to drop their objection to you getting custody of Milly…wouldn’t it be worth it?”
“Of course. But, Jamie, what would you get out of this?”
He almost said he didn’t want anything out of it. All he wanted, all he ever wanted, was for her to be happy and get what she wanted out of life. He wanted her, but that wasn’t what this was about. He would never resort to using something like this to gain her affections. The problem was, Lucy was always so suspicious and she wasn’t likely to believe that. He suddenly had another idea.
“Whitcomb Enterprises is trying to reopen what used to be an old automotive plant and turn it into a factory to produce airline parts that will literally revolutionize the way planes are made. The townspeople are a little suspicious of us. They’re not an affluent community, and they don’t trust easily.”
“So you’re suggesting I use you to get custody of my niece, and you use me to get poor people to like you?” she said.
Jamie shook his head. She could be the most stubborn, insolent woman he’d ever known sometimes.
“You wouldn’t be using me by accepting my help. And I don’t want you to help me win over people because they’re ‘poor’ but because they’re people who view me with suspicion because of my family’s bank account, and you know all about that. Whether you like it or not, you straddle both worlds, Lucy. You know what it would take to merge them.”
“But we’re just supposed to be friends.”
“We can be friends and still do this. I’m not requiring that you sleep with me in exchange for pretending that we’re engaged.” Of course, that didn’t mean he didn’t want to sleep with her. After their time together, he could barely think of anything else. But he wasn’t going to say or do anything that would make her feel that accepting his help was somehow dependent on her willingness to have sex with him.
She bit her lip. “I don’t know, Jamie.”
“What’s the matter?” he said. “Afraid that being around me will be too much temptation?”
When she didn’t deny it, he said, “Just say you’ll think about it.”
Lucy sighed and then she said, “Okay. I’ll think about it.” She looked at her watch. “I have to get back to the hotel and finish packing. I need to check out and get to the airport and…” She had a thoughtful look on her face.
“What?”
She looked embarrassed. “Oh, nothing. I was just thinking, if I take you up on your offer, I have a few rings I don’t get a chance to wear too often. I can pretend one’s an engagement ring…”
The fact she was even thinking about wearing a faux engagement ring filled Jamie with hope. “Actually…” He slipped his hand in his trouser pocket and pulled out a white velvet box.
* * *
Lucy stared at the box even as her stomach started doing flips. “What is that?”
“A prop,” Jamie said.
“A prop you just happened to have in your pocket?”
“I bought it because it was beautiful, and I figured I may never find one like it again.” He shrugged. “I brought it with me in case you said yes to my proposition. Why don’t you take it while you think about it?” He held it out.
Lucy was still reeling from Jamie’s suggestion that they pretend to be engaged. Yes, he’d said he was her friend and would gladly help her however she needed, but this…?
Gingerly, Lucy took the box and flipped it open.
Inside was a ring with a huge diamond and sapphires. The design was over-the-top feminine with flowers and bows. It was unusual and classic at the same time.
Lucy loved it. She didn’t love the fact she immediately pictured herself in a white dress, walking down an aisle to Jamie so they could exchange vows in front of all their friends.
“Jamie, are you crazy? You can’t just give this to me. It must have cost you a million dollars.” She closed the box and tried handing it back to him.
He wouldn’t take it. “It didn’t cost a million dollars,” he said. “But it cost enough that it should convince others that we’re not playing games.”
“Shit! Why are you so incredibly nice? You kill me sometimes with all of this niceness. Who lets some crazy chick ‘borrow’ a million dollar ring?”
“You’re not crazy. And I didn’t pay a million dollars for it,” he said again.
“Whatever. Take it back while I think about things.” Like how I’m going to ever move on from my feelings for this man. It wasn’t just physical attraction between them, and it never had been. Jamie was special and for some reason he thought she was special too.
Special enough to wear this amazing ring, even if it was only for pretend.
She held it out again, and he finally took it from her.
“You did get insurance on it, right?”
Jamie laughed. “Yes, it’s fully insured.” He removed the ring from the box and said, “Give me your hand.”
“What?”
“I want you to try it on. In case you want to go forward with my plan, and I
need to get it resized.”
She shouldn’t do it. She wouldn’t. This was all crazy. He was crazy.
But she took the ring and slid it on her finger. It fit like it was made for her.
“So, what do you think?” he said.
“That I’ll have to do more wrist exercises at the gym to be able hold it up.” And that it was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen.
She wanted it.
She wanted Milly.
She wanted him.
Shit, she was in serious trouble.
CHAPTER SEVEN
On the way out of Vegas, Jamie blocked out the conversation between his friends and thought of Lucy instead. Was he insane to have suggested a fake engagement? He was shocked she’d even agreed to think about it. He’d been convinced that she would turn him down flat. He’d like to think the reason she hadn’t was because she was learning to trust him, but he knew that wasn’t the case—she was simply desperate to do right by Milly.
Before Jamie caught his flight, but after he and Lucy had called for a driver to pick them up at Melina’s house, Lucy had dropped her one and only stipulation to his proposal.
“If I agree we’re going to be engaged, then we’ll be engaged,” she had said.
“What does that mean?” he’d asked her with a half-smile.
“It means that if I’m going to wear this rock on my finger, you’re going to give it up while I do so.”
“Give what up?” he’d said, genuinely confused.
“The booty. I want what I got last night, and plenty of it.”
Delighted, he’d almost swept her into arms and kissed her right there. Instead, like a tiger afraid the wrong move would send his prey running, he teased her. “So what you’re saying is you were so blown away by my incredible sexual skill that you want more.”
She’d rolled her eyes and smiled, but considering what she was “demanding” of him, he’d happily given her that. “For as long as we’re pretending to be engaged, yes. After all, it’s not like I’d be able to go out and have my urges satisfied by someone else. Not without risking messing up our plan.”
“No, I can see what you mean. But you’re acting like this would be a sticking point for me.” He’d nudged her lightly with his shoulder, almost like a brother or best friend would.
Keep this light, Jamie, he’d told himself. Don’t blow this.
“Sorry,” he’d continued. “If you’re trying to scare me away, that’s not going to do it.”
But now as he sat on the airplane and replayed it all in his head, he wondered if he had made a grave mistake by agreeing to her terms.
Jamie couldn’t deny it. Before she’d broken things off between them, he’d been halfway in love with her. He’d only gotten closer in the time since.
He was far from ready to admit that out loud, but far too infatuated with her not admit it to himself.
He wanted her, not just for a night, or seven or fifty. He wanted her in his life permanently, but there was no way he could say that, no way he could let her see it on his face. If he did, she’d run so fast he’d never be able to catch her.
Besides, the last time he’d let himself imagine a life with her, she’d found out he was rich and suddenly thrown the brakes on everything. He’d been left hurt and confused. Months later, he still wasn’t over it. How would he feel after they pretended to be a couple and made love on a regular basis, and then suddenly, after she got custody of Milly, it would be “bye-bye, Jamie,” he asked himself.
He’d get his big, stupid, soft heart broken, that’s what. He thought about the risk he’d be taking with his own heart.
And then he thought about Lucy.
He thought about how devastated she was when she lost her sister. He thought about how alone she had been most of her life. She had a chance for a fresh start with Milly. He’d seen the light in her eyes when she talked about that baby, the terrible hope and fear she kept inside her. If he didn’t help her, she might very well lose custody.
He couldn’t risk that.
He knew what he was going to do, and it wouldn’t be walking away.
* * *
“Do you still agree with my terms?” Lucy, who was back home in northern California, asked Jamie on the phone the next day.
“Yes,” he said, leaning over his balcony and watching as Los Angeles woke up below him. On the horizon smog settled—the one thing that marred the beautiful view.
“That means lots of sex, every night if I want it?”
“You’re an insatiable little nymph, aren’t you?”
“You should have known that about me already. Besides, I have the feeling that if anyone can satiate the insatiable, it’s you.”
Jamie felt his whole body go warm. “Thank you for that, although that is highly dependent on who it is I’m trying to satiate.”
“Thank you for that,” she said, her tone just as lighthearted as his. “Well, so okay. If you agree to my terms then I think…why not? Let’s go forward with your plan.”
“You never answered me before. Did you honestly think me continuing to have sex with you was going to be a problem?”
“Maybe. You told me before how you feel about casual sex.”
“What I actually said was I think the best sex happens in a committed relationship. And in a way, while we’re pretending to be engaged, we will be committed to each other. Like you said, for however long it lasts, there won’t be anyone else for us. That’s not negotiable.”
“Good thing I don’t want anyone else.”
For now, he thought. “Then we’re agreed. We’re committed to you getting Milly. To enjoying each other for the length of this engagement.”
“Well, I guess all that’s left to say is…thank you. For helping me, Jamie. I really appreciate it.”
“You’re welcome, Luce. When do you meet with the lawyer?”
“Later today. Wish me luck.”
“I can do one better than that. I can come with you.”
“You’d do that? Aren’t you busy? With the new job? Your sister’s wedding?”
“Honestly, yes, but I’ll make time for you. I always will when it means something to you, Luce.”
He heard her swallow before she said, “Thank you, but I can handle this on my own.”
“Okay. I’ll be thinking of you the whole time. Let me know how it goes.”
“I will. Before we hang up…have you thought about how we’re going to announce this engagement?”
“What about starting with social media?”
“You want us to what…tweet about it?”
“I thought I could leak it on Twitter, and maybe you could post something about it on Facebook. Hopefully the press would pick it up pretty quickly from there, and then…wa-la!”
“Okay,” she agreed. “But Jamie, I’m not lying to my close friends.”
“I’d prefer not to as well. I won’t tell my family, but I’d like to at least tell Gabe and Cole. Maybe even the others.”
“That’s fine. I’ll tell Grace and Melina. I trust them all with my life. They know all my secrets.”
“Good to know. If I ever need to know something about you, I can just torture it out of one of them.”
Lucy laughed. “You can try, but they’ll never talk.”
“You sure about that? I’m a very persuasive man, Luce.”
* * *
Lucy couldn’t possibly deny how persuasive Jamie was. Look what he’d talked her into—faking an engagement so she could convince others she was proper maternal material. But she’d agreed to his proposition and now it was time to jump in the only way she knew how—full throttle.
Lucy hung up the phone and went to her computer. She signed on to Facebook, and then she sat staring at the status update box for ten minutes before she finally typed, Guess who got engaged?
Then she snapped a photo of her gorgeous antique engagement ring and attached it. Before she pressed the post button she sent a text on her phone to Grace and Mel
ina that said, “What you read on Facebook is not true. I will explain later, but in the meantime, please go along with it if anyone asks you.”
Then she pressed post and waited… For the next twenty minutes, she got message after message asking for more information. Social media could be a blessing or a curse. She wasn’t sure which one this was going to be.
She finally typed in: Engaged to Jamie Whitcomb…So happy!
The responses, mostly from colleagues at the university, poured in even faster:
OMG! That’s amazing!
Congratulations Lucy, Jamie’s a great guy!
Love the ring!
How did he propose?
When’s the wedding?
And her personal favorite: Damn! One less single billionaire in the world.
Apparently, there were others who knew Jamie came from money. She just happened to think it extremely tacky that someone would refer to it online—so she deleted that post.
Lucy answered a few others, stating they hadn’t set a date yet and thanking them for their well-wishes. She wondered if their plan could possibly work. Could it really be this simple? Fake an engagement to a respectable wealthy man and then all of a sudden she’d be deemed respectable too?
She hated lying.
She hated pretending to be anyone but herself.
But Gail had wanted her to be Milly’s guardian and it seemed right that she do whatever it took to make sure that happened.
As she sat there and watched the messages accumulate, her phone began ringing. It didn’t surprise her to see that it was Grace.
“What in the world is going on?” Grace asked as soon as Lucy answered the call.
Lucy laughed. “Well, hello to you, too.”
“Forgive me,” Grace said. “Hello, my friend. Now tell me, what the hell is going on?”
She told Grace about Jamie’s idea. “So that’s basically it. The engagement isn’t real and I’m not sure if I’m doing the right thing or not. All I know is…I failed Gail as a sister while she was alive. I don’t want to fail her again. And I don’t want to fail Milly. I need time to think, but I also need the ability to act on whatever decision I ultimately make, and that means making sure I’m granted guardianship.”