Chapter 13

Brandon Cates had promised his new bride that he’d speak to the lawyers about their options. He knew damn well what their options were: stay married, or give Lena the business with a giant red bow on top. Still, he kept his word and made the inquiry.

“Thank goodness you pulled it out of the fire!” his lead attorney, Brock, exclaimed. “I thought we were fucked after they got the last appeal thrown out. How’d you manage to get a bride in one night?”

“A gentleman never gives details, Brock,” Brandon said, “but the lady’s having second thoughts in the light of day and wanted me to ask you what our options are for divorce and annulment.”

“Seriously? You have your ‘get out of disinheritance free’ card and you’re going to give her an annulment? Is she that nuts? Crazier than Lena?”

“No, not crazier than Lena. Just—reluctant. I’m not going to keep her hostage.”

“I’m not suggesting that. I’m suggesting you do your best to be persuasive. I’ve seen you schmooze at dinners and get people I thought would give you the finger to end up signing on the dotted line. So turn that charisma on this girl and she won’t know what hit her. Crank it up to Extinction Level Event. This is not negotiable. You lose this girl, you lose the entire estate.”

“Well, don’t bother sugarcoating it on my account, Brock. I’m a big boy, and I can handle the truth,” he said sarcastically.

“Joke all you want, Brandon, but this marriage has to last, and it has to look as real as it gets,” his lawyer said, and hung up.

He knew this already, truly he did. He just wasn’t sure how to break it to Marj, who he liked. She was bold and quirky and gorgeous. A little on the hysterical side, perhaps, but waking up married wasn’t a usual situation, so he could make allowances for her seeming a little high-strung. She was going to freak out when he told her that it wasn’t practical for them to separate and that he needed her cooperation. That sounded so much like he was taking a hostage. You won’t get hurt as long as you cooperate...He shook his head. He needed a better tactic. Maybe Brock was right and winning her over was as simple and devious as winning her heart.

So he set to work, ticking off items from the list in his phone, to plan her perfect evening. Brandon arranged for an intimate rooftop dinner by candlelight, a few romantic extras to entice her. He checked her social media to get a bead on what sort of music she liked and made sure the soundtrack of their evening was perfectly in line with her preferences. It wasn’t spying. It wasn’t manipulation. He was just personalizing their romantic evening. It bespoke romance...only for the very discriminating bride and groom, in his opinion.

Or for the hair-tearingly desperate.

He even looked at her Pinterest boards. Good lord, women took those things seriously. She had about eleven thousand things pinned, mostly clothes and shirtless men. At least her interests leaned toward him and his lifestyle—he was a man willing to remove his shirt and buy her clothes. He knew it was more complicated than that, but he flicked through her Dream Guy board for ideas of what he should wear. It was humiliating, really, but he had to package himself for the utmost appeal. Marj was in marketing, so she’d appreciate the effort even if she didn’t (hopefully) realize he’d stalked her Dream Guy board in a most undignified manner. Too many pictures of that cowboy bastard Scott Eastwood, Brandon thought.

She had several photos of men in tuxedos with the ties undone, the shirts unbuttoned. He put on a tuxedo, but when he unbuttoned the shirt in front of the mirror, he looked too much like he was auditioning for Chippendales travel crew, so he buttoned himself back up and went traditional. After all, what woman could resist a man in a tuxedo with chilled champagne and her favorite foods and music? One who was dead set on a quick divorce, he reckoned grimly.

When he got the text from Rafael that they were on their way, he grimaced. He’d been waiting. Brandon Cates was not a man who waited. He had answered some emails and gone over his schedule for the coming days, checked the headlines and made his displeasure known about the delay on his personal jet, which now would not arrive before midday tomorrow. There had been a mechanical anomaly when the pilot did his inspection and a minor repair had to be done. That left him with either the delay or a commercial flight, the latter of which was intolerable. So he would wait, seemingly, both for his plane and his woman. It was humbling.

Brandon was surprised to get a text message from Marj to apologize for running late. She didn’t make any excuses, only said that she’d be later than planned and she was sorry. He respected that, the fact that she didn’t fall into the trap of whining about crowds or traffic or how it couldn’t possibly be her own fault she was late. She just owned it. He liked that—liked it and several other things about her. Things it was best not to dwell on when he had an inheritance to secure. She was already a loose cannon, an accomplice who was the lynchpin of his entire strategy but whose cooperation was by no means guaranteed. Heaping messy complications of attraction and affection atop an already wobbly tower was unwise.

She burst through the door to the suite. He was beginning to see that Marj didn’t merely enter a room, not ever. She exploded into it, talking a mile a minute about the absurdities that she’d witnessed, making acerbic remarks about the people she’d had to deal with.

“There was a woman in front of me at the department store who was wearing fur. Real fur from a dead mammal. In Las Vegas, where it is freaking two hundred and fifty degrees out. Like she had to advertise the fact she was so rich that she’s above petty considerations like climate or animal cruelty,” Marj groaned.

Rafael trailed after her with a few carrier bags, fewer than Brandon had expected, frankly. He had told her the night before that she needed a wardrobe. Four bags was not a wardrobe. This suggested a recalcitrance about using his money, about considering it their money. He took it as a warning sign and filed it away, but didn’t mention it.

“Did you have any luck?”

“Yes. How about your meeting? You’re all dressed up. I hope you didn’t wait around for me before you left. I don’t want to make you late,” she said solicitously.

“That’s good of you, but my date is here now, so I’m finished waiting,” he said warmly, trying out a little smolder on her.

Not taking the bait, Marj actually looked back over her shoulder as if she expected to find some supermodel lounging in the doorway Rafael had just vacated—some hot date who had arrived in the past four seconds.

“You mean me?” she asked dubiously.

“Who else would I mean?” He dialed his smolder up a notch since this one was deliberately being difficult.

“I didn’t realize we had plans. I mean, I knew we were going to discuss our options regarding separation, but I expected a more informal, room service kind of situation here. I bought a plain outfit, not a ball gown,” she said, obviously trying to make light of it but seeming discomfited instead.

Brandon knew it was up to him to put her at ease. He rose from his chair, which he realized belatedly he should have done as soon as she’d entered the room—he’d been to good schools, for goodness’ sake, and he had been taught manners there. He strode smoothly to her side and took her hand and kissed it.

“I’d be honored if you’d have dinner with me, Marjorie. I think you look amazing just the way you are, but if you want to get ready somehow, I’ll wait. You’re worth waiting for,” he said, congratulating himself on that line.

She actually flushed slightly, as if the hand kiss plus the flattery had registered with her. He wanted to whoop with triumph—she wasn’t totally oblivious to him. She was just a challenge.

“In fact, I had something brought around in case you felt like dressing for dinner,” he hinted. “There’s a package waiting for you in the dressing room.”

She looked at him a little suspiciously, and he watched her walk into the bedroom and through to the massive closet and dressing area where he had placed a long white box on the tufted chaise.

Brandon had ordered her an evening dress. When the shopper had asked what he wanted, he had specified something fearless, for a woman with a great body. The store had sent two possibilities, and he had rejected the bright pink bandage dress as too tacky. Marj was stunning and sexy, not tawdry-looking. The one he’d chosen was no full-skirted Cinderella-style ball gown, but a body-conforming mini dress, black with sheer gold panels slashing down the sides and across the shoulders to hug her form and give the shadowy peek of her flesh. He waited for her reaction.

There was no yelp of surprise, no delighted squeal, no aggravated slam of the box against the wall. Only a worrying silence. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and waited, debating the wisdom of going in to check on her. He checked the time, then checked it again because he hadn’t paid attention to the numbers the first time. When he looked up, there she stood.

His bride, breathtaking in the body-hugging black-and-gold dress, her auburn hair tumbling loose in curls down her back. His eyes swept her from head to toe and back again. A sly smile played at her rosy lips, and she did a slow turn like a model on a runway and his mouth went dry. I must be thirsty, he thought reasonably. His dry mouth had nothing to do with one hell of a body barely contained by that tantalizing dress. She looked provocative. He had to rein in this rather inconvenient enthusiasm for how delectable she looked.

“I thought I’d show you the roof terrace, since we have the penthouse,” he said, offering his arm.

To her credit, Marj took his arm as if it were something she did every day, which he doubted. There wasn’t enough formal arm holding, in his opinion, especially when it involved Marj close by his side, her red manicure bright against his black sleeve as she squeezed his bicep appreciatively.

He brought her to the spiral iron staircase leading up to the rooftop and followed her up, admiring the curve of her backside in the clingy dress, the strong, lean thighs that were revealed every time the hem hitched up for her to climb a stair. He wanted to loosen his tie from the heat. She’d said Las Vegas was about two hundred degrees outside. Perhaps outdoors wasn’t the best locale for a romantic meal, he thought now, hoping that there would be a cool breeze on the roof. He knew there was ice water. Maybe he’d just casually dump the entire contents of the champagne bucket over his head to cool down from the heady combination of her long legs and the memory of those legs wrapped around him.

The rooftop was set up as breathtakingly as he’d ordered. A ring of votives flickered their patterns of light on the white tablecloth, a small crystal vase of lush white peonies in the center of the circle of candles. Two chairs tucked in at the intimate table bedecked with white and platinum china. The silver champagne bucket stood alongside the table. Brandon pulled out her chair and pressed the remote by his plate. A uniformed waiter appeared with glasses of cabernet for them. She sipped with a smile and replaced her glass.

“Will you be having the seared sea bass or the roasted vegetable napoleon?” the waiter inquired.

“Sea bass, please,” she replied with a smile.

Brandon made a mental note that she liked having a choice. He was glad he hadn’t just ordered for both of them.

“What’s the occasion?” she asked after the waiter withdrew.

“We need to have a conversation, and we need to have a wedding dinner. I saw no reason not to combine the two,” he said gallantly. “Is the dress to your taste? I’m afraid I erred on the side of selecting something I’d like to see you in myself,” Brandon continued.

“It’s gorgeous. It’s shorter than what I would choose for myself, but I still like it,” she said quickly.

“The shop also sent over some sort of pink bandage dress. It was very pink,” he grimaced.

“Hey, I like pink,” she laughed.

“Then perhaps I should not have sent it away. It was offensively bright,” he said.

“You’re such a grouch. You probably think I’m offensively bright, too,” she said cheekily.

“Not at all. I find you uncommonly lovely, in fact. Lovelier than I’d like to admit,” he said, taking her hand.

“Why is that?” she asked.

“Because I need a wife to secure my inheritance and a business arrangement would have been preferable. I made a mistake...” he began.

“We both made a mistake. I take equal blame for this,” she interrupted.

“No, I don’t think you understand, Marjorie. Please let me finish. I made a rather serious error in that I married a stranger and as luck would have it, that stranger is someone I can feel myself falling for. I don’t want complications like this. I wanted a nice cut-and-dry arrangement so I could get what I deserve. I didn’t want you to be charming and funny and gorgeous. Pleasant and calm would have been better, someone who didn’t interest me much at all. What I’m saying is I think I got myself in too deep when I married you. I don’t think there’s much chance of my getting out of this unscathed. I meant to put a few million on the line, but never my heart.”

Marj looked down, looked away from him, lifted her hand to swipe beneath her eyes.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

“No, I’m the furthest thing from all right. Don’t say sweet things like that to me. You don’t mean them, and I just got done with a guy who didn’t mean a damn word he said to me and it didn’t end well. So don’t. Just because you want me to do something, don’t flatter me and try to lead me on. That’s bullshit, and I’m not built for the games. I played them myself for a long time, trying to snare a man. Then I got played and I figured out a few things, like the fact that I’m not the kind of woman who wants to play with anybody’s feelings. And I damn sure don’t want mine toyed with.”

She stood and tossed her napkin on the table with finality. With a strange puffing noise, the linen napkin that had landed on a votive caught fire. Angry orange flames licked up the fabric. She seemed like she was frozen there. Brandon took her arm and pulled her back, dashed his own spring water on the blaze, and watched the once-exquisite tablescape transformed into a sodden, grayish mess. The stink of smoldering fabric and smoke settled on the table. He knew he should say something, but nothing appropriate, nothing the least bit romantic or persuasive sprang to mind.

“Wait till I tell Britt. She always said I had a flair for the dramatic. I tried to flounce off with what was left of my dignity and I set the table on fire,” she said with a sudden peal of laughter.

Brandon looked at her. She wasn’t mortified. She wasn’t falling all over herself apologizing. She wasn’t angry or blaming him. She was laughing. He felt something uncoil in his chest, and there was a sense of rightness to it. A laugh rumbled from him in answer to hers. Soon, her eyes were streaming from laughter, and he was sure he’d heard her snort at least once. He offered his handkerchief.

“If you promise not to ignite it,” he warned, and she nodded, wiping her eyes.

The waiter came out onto the rooftop with a silver-domed tray and surveyed the damage with admirable aplomb.

“Allow me to take your meals down to the warmer while I clear this away and provide you with a fresh table setting,” he offered.

“No, thank you. If you wouldn’t mind bringing the food to our suite, I think we’ll eat there. As my wife originally suggested,” Brandon said pointedly.

“Does this mean I can take off my shoes? They aren’t exactly being nice to my toes,” she said, taking his arm confidently.

The waiter followed them down in the elevator and managed to set up the lavish meal, complete with the three undoused votives and the champagne bucket, on a large tufted ottoman. He’d offered to set the vast dining room table in the suite, but Marj had instantly refused.

“I don’t want to feel like I’m in a boardroom. If this is our wedding dinner, I’d like it to be cozy,” she said, shivering prettily in the air conditioning.

Brandon knew a cue when he spotted one and turned on the gas fireplace so the flicker of golden flames played across the wooden floor before the sofa and ottoman. Marj seized one of the oversized cushions from the couch and plopped it on the floor beside the makeshift dining table and sat down. She lifted the dome off her plate and oohed, suitably impressed by the presentation of her seared wedge of maple-glazed sea bass and her cauliflower gratin with a perfect twist of lemon zest on top. She took a bite, then another.

“Oh no. That’s butter. The good kind,” she murmured, and took another bite.

Brandon ate, watching her the whole time. There was truth to what he’d said, more than he’d realized until he had seen that it had upset her, and something had seemed to wrench him then. Because he did not want to hurt her. He wanted to protect her, even from himself and his agenda. Even if it meant that he had to give up his father’s fortune and corporation to do it.

She looked up and caught his gaze.

“I guess I got pretty upset on the roof. I didn’t mean to set a fire,” she said.

“Don’t apologize. I said something that you took issue with. Perfectly normal response, igniting the dinner table,” he said.

“I had a point to make. Conflagration seemed like the best way to make sure you paid attention.” She shrugged with good humor.

“If anyone ought to apologize, it’s me. I overwhelmed you with some probably unexpected ideas. I hope not unwelcome, but unexpected, at least. Maybe I said it badly, that I like you and I’m attracted to you and this would be a much easier situation to bear if I’d said my vows to someone I felt more lukewarm about,” he said. “Does that make more sense?”

“Not really. Does it make sense that I wish I’d had less to drink last night and a clearer head to make decisions? Because this isn’t what’s best for either of us.”

“Not true. It’s totally what’s best for me. I get my inheritance and an inconveniently sexy as hell wife. You’re the one who gets the short end of the stick. You have to be off the dating market while we’re married and go to a bunch of society parties and boring benefits. It basically hijacks your life to preserve mine. And I’m sorry that I assumed it would be a win-win for us both. I figured, hey, what woman wouldn’t want to quit her job to be rich and go shopping and have her hair done? I’m guessing the answer to that question is you,” he said, setting his fork down.

“It isn’t that I don’t want to be rich or that I was looking forward to being downsized by the Wicked Queen. It’s that I don’t want to be married. Not to a total stranger, not to anyone at all, really. I think I’m happier and more secure when I’m not in a relationship. I can go out for fun, but nothing gets too heavy and emotional. Like I said, I’m sick of the whole game. Or maybe I’m burned out.”

“So sit the game out and stick with me. This could work for you, Marjorie. It could work for us both. I’m not saying that just because of the money. I’m saying it because when I upset you earlier, I felt really bad about it. I wanted to make everything okay for you. I realize that may not be possible in the long run, but in the short run, it could be. We stay married. You’re out of the game for a while and being happy and confident and have nothing to worry about financially or romantically because I’m here for whatever you need. We make the deal up front to be friends, to support each other and be honest, no games.”

“You’re playing me now, Cates. I’ve watched you try to manipulate me all night. First with the extravagant date, then with the flattery and emotional appeal, now with a deal in which we’re supposedly on equal footing. I’m in marketing, dude. I’m not this easy.”

“Except that it’s true. As a strategy, it would be scattershot and suspect at best. As the truth, it just is what it is. A man asking a woman to help him. And promising to be straight with her, and look out for her while they’re together. And then there’s this.”

Brandon stood and retrieved a document from his briefcase.

“My team faxed this over earlier. I told you from the beginning that there would be a nuptial agreement providing for you in the event of a divorce after a certain period had elapsed. I want to make sure you’re taken care of, that when this is over, you don’t have to work again if you don’t want to. You can have your independence. If you’ll review the terms, they’re set at ten million dollars post-tax settlement for a six-month duration. If the arrangement continues to one year, you get an additional four million free and clear. Consider this a very well-compensated short-term job.”

“Like a hooker,” she said dryly.

“Not at all. In fact, this requires not a sex worker, but a clever woman willing to extend herself in social situations to represent a multinational corporation as part of the public face of my father’s business. The love story and the image building are things you, as a marketing professional, understand. Your training and experience make you uniquely well suited to this position as my temporary wife.”

“You will not quit trying to sell me! You’re offering me money,” she said rather grimly.

“It’s a fair compensation for the service you’d render Power Regions, Ltd.,” he protested. “And I’d thought you’d be pleased that you wouldn’t have to give up Starbucks to make rent ever again!”

“I am, I just—I can’t believe you’d do this. That you’d make sure I was taken care of. That you thought of the life I’d be going back to and what I have to contend with now on my salary. It doesn’t seem like anything that someone like you would concern himself about.”

“Someone like me?”

“A rich guy, someone who’s used to getting whatever he wants without worrying about consequences for anyone else. If I do this, I come out of it divorced but I have enough money to live where I want and not have to scrimp and save. I’m not even sure I know how to do that. But I always thought Ireland would be nice. I look good in a sweater,” she said, her voice thick with emotion even as she tried to make light of it.

“Is this something that you want to do? Because, not to belabor the point on the whole marriage thing, but it’s a commitment. You have to stick with it for at least six months or I basically lose my ass. So I’m asking you to promise to stay with me for half a year. At least. If it’s working out well, I’d rather stay married for a year. The six months is how long it will take to probate the will. The extra six would be for appearances,” he said more awkwardly than he had intended.

“I don’t know why I can’t seem to tell you no,” she said, her voice softening. “Maybe it’s because I want to be married to you even if it’s just for show. We could have fun, couldn’t we?”

“We could try. I don’t consider my life to be a great deal of fun, but I think you could make it a lot more pleasant. Indiscreet or not, I have to say that last night was incredible. You’re a woman who knows what she wants.”

“Which is fine as long as I don’t decide I really want you,” she said.

“That would be more than fine with me, Marjorie,” he said.

Brandon wasn’t sure anymore if he was trying to charm her or if what he’d just said was true. The lines were blurring. She was shocked that he’d really settle enough money on her for subsistence after their parting? How badly had she been treated, to learn to expect so little from people—from men?

Brandon leaned in and kissed the top of her head, her auburn hair silky against his lips.

“I don’t want to fall for you. I’m afraid,” she said huskily.

“Then just lean back and watch the fire. Give yourself a minute to breathe.”

Marj shifted, snuggling against him, her head on his shoulder.

“This is nice,” she said. “I could handle six months of this, easy.”

“I wish I could promise you that. It’s not likely to be much like this. There isn’t a great deal of stillness in my life. I have meetings and charity events, and sometimes I think I’m on a plane as much as I’m on solid ground.”

“Wouldn’t it be good to have someone with you, then? Less lonely?”

“It would be grand, but—and I’m optimistic that you even asked that, I’m not trying to talk you out of it. I only want you to know that lounging by the fire after supper isn’t something that happens very often. A late dinner meeting followed by a Skype conference, some emails, and then a few hours’ sleep, workout, then back to work.”

“Tell me again why you want this job so bad if that’s all your life is?”

“It’s—a connection to my dad, I guess. It’s what he raised me to do, what he sent me to school for. I can’t stand the thought of Lena squandering all of his life’s work, of wrecking it...”

“This company isn’t his legacy, Cates. You are. You’re what he left behind. And he probably raised you because you were his son and he loved you, not because he needed a placeholder,” she said, stalwart.

“You didn’t know my father,” he said, his voice a bit hollow.

“You’re right. I didn’t. If he married someone like the Wicked Queen, he probably wasn’t my kind of people. No offense, but I doubt we would’ve been besties. As for what you do now, your dad doesn’t get a vote. You do. So what do you really want? Not what you think you’re supposed to do, but what you want.”

Brandon shifted uncomfortably, not liking the solemn tenor of the conversation or the inconvenient fact that the woman beside him, his two days’ bride, was the first person to ever ask him what he wanted out of life. The question was disturbing. The answer was worse.

“I think I want you,” he said.

“Good answer, Cates,” Marj said with a sly smile.