Page 5 of Pretend You're Mine
His smile had a sneaky quality about it that I didn’t like one bit. When he held out his arm for me, I could only glance at it, surprised, before he let it fall.
“This way,” Xander said, taking my elbow and leading me into the dining area.
I tried not to be impressed with my surroundings or with the fact that Xander was obviously known to these people.
Although I couldn’t help a note of admiration from sounding in my chest at the way waiters, waitresses, even patrons moved aside for him. He made his way through the restaurant with an unconscious authority.
Upstairs was a smaller replica of the dining area below with stone tables and chairs and intricate marble décor. Unlike their room downstairs however, this one was empty.
“I don’t think they’re sitting people here,” I said.
“They’re not,” he said, sitting down without looking at me. “Just us. I booked it.”
I wasn’t quite sure how to respond to that so I just launched right into my reason for coming. “How long do you think the annulment process will take?”
His eyes swiped over me. “You don’t remember last night at all?”
“Not much,” I confessed.
Why did it matter anyway? He clearly wasn’t falling all over me. Although there was something about the way that he looked at me that indicated the odd sex flashes I’d been repressing all day had been spot-on. What I could remember of the sex had been insanely good.
“Not even the great sex?” he raised a brow, confirming my thoughts.
“Nope,” I said, shrugging. If he thought I was going to stroke his ego when he was being shady about this whole accidental marriage thing, then he had another thing coming.
“So, how do you want to do this?” Time to get back on topic. “Can you just do it yourself since you’re a lawyer?”
“Do what?”
“Annul the marriage,” I said, not bothering to hide the aggravation in my voice.
He tilted his head at me, a polite ‘what-do-you-mean’, and I gaped at him. “Over the phone, you said….”
With two adept fingers he took his fabric napkin out of his holder and put it on his lap. Then, he returned his gaze to me. “I said that we would come here to discuss it. ”
I stared for a moment, unblinking, as he deliberately prepared himself for a meal. Did he think we were actually just going to sit here like a normal couple and have dinner? Who was this guy? “But why?” I finally came out with.
Another one of those sweeping gazes, and the tenseness of his features softened. “You really don’t remember?”
I glared at him again in annoyance. Another sip of his water, and then he began.
“Since you don’t remember what I told you last night, I’ll tell you again. It’s my family. Ever since my fiancé left me a few years back, they keep trying to set me up with any half-eligible woman on the planet. Apparently, nothing will appease them except me getting married. It’s gotten to the point where I’ll have women show up at my door, claiming that my family sent them to me. Anyway, they’re coming from Germany for Christmas and I need you to play the part of my wife until they go home and leave me alone,” he stated as plainly as if what he was saying was not completely insane. “Now is the worst time for this kind of distraction. I’m trying to expand my law firm, take on more clients.”
He paused there, perhaps expecting some sign of recognition, which I didn’t give.
“If I can just convince them to move their attentions elsewhere than my love life, everyone will be happy and we can all just move on.”
As he said all this, I could see how much it meant to him. It was written in the flex of the muscle in his jaw, the widening of his eyes on certain words. I understood it too. But that didn’t mean I agreed with it.
“So you’re saying that you’d want me to pretend to be your wife,” I repeated.
“Just for over the Christmas holidays,” he said smoothly. “Then you’d be free to go your way, and me mine. We’d get the annulment as though nothing had happened. And of course, I’d be prepared to reimburse you for your time.”
I jumped in quickly, not wanting to know whatever he had in mind. How dare he suggest that I could be bought?
“I get that you want to focus on your business,” I said. “Thing is, I’ve got my own too. And it’s pretty new, and I can’t afford a distraction either – not like this.” I took a meager sip of my water, in the hopes it would help clear my mind. “Not to mention that you don’t know my parents. They’d flip out if they got any word of this.”
