“You’re dating Zach Canning?”
Abby had barely plopped down at her desk outside of Olivia’s office when Rachel, the token office gossip—correction: most of the administrative assistants were gossipy, but Rachel was the one to corral them with the freshest news—breezed by to ask the question Abby had been asked, repeatedly, by friends and strangers alike, all morning.
When she’d left her Brooklyn apartment, standing in the corridor to lock her door, one of her neighbors who had never made eye contact with her much less utter a single word to her in all the time she’d been living there had approached with brazen curiosity, needing to know. When Abby had gotten to the subway platform, not without being accosted by others with the same curiosity her whole walk there, she discovered that her favorite news stand was peppered with tabloids featuring the new ‘Zach Canning’ rumor—that he had a girlfriend. And there she was, Abby’s flaming red hair framing her heart-shaped face, on Zach’s arm and smiling—not too awkwardly, thank God!—for the cameras. The break room at Tate & Cane had obviously been no better, which was why she’d kept her head down as she’d doctored two cups of coffee for herself and Olivia, having foregone her usual pitstop at The White Rabbit. It wasn’t that she needed a break from their aromatic dark roast. She didn’t realize how all this media attention, and in-your-face attention on the street and at work would make her feel off balance and out of sorts. It wasn’t lost on her why she wasn’t proudly eating all the attention up like she’d thought she would.
The movie premiere night had ultimately turned into a complete disaster.
“So, are you?” Rachel pressed after Abby had stalled, making something of a performance out of placing her purse in the bottom drawer of her desk, blowing on her coffee, booting up her computer, anything to pull herself together, mentally and emotionally, so Rachel wouldn’t be able to tell that while she was dating Zach Canning, a conflict had begun warring inside of her. She needed to work on her poker face.
“Yeah, how crazy is that?” she said, keeping her tone easy sounding.
Rachel’s eyes widened as round as saucers and the grin on her face lifted. Abby knew that look. It meant tell me everything!
“Where did you meet him? How long have you been seeing each other?” Questions were tumbling out of Rachel faster than Abby had a prayer of addressing. “Do you think he’ll come by the office? I’m having a party next weekend. Would you invite him? Okay, I know that’s really forward of me, but I’m floored, Abby. I’m totally floored. I mean, I see celebrities here and there. I’ve spotted them. But I’ve never known someone who was dating one.”
Rachel had launched into her chatterbox M.O. which was lucky for Abby since she wouldn’t be able to get a word in edgewise. Plus, the chuckling smile it brought to her face did wonders for masking the utter confusion she’d been wrestling with all night and all morning. Confusion as to whether or not Zach really wanted to correct his image. Well, that was an aspect, but not the heart of the matter. The real confusion that had kept Abby tossing and turning in bed had everything to do with the complete clash between the intense feeling that had come over her when she’d first locked eyes with Zach in The White Rabbit—a feeling that had felt as close to love at first sight as she’d ever felt in her life—and the fact that if she wasn’t mistaken, he’d basically treated her like a piece of ass and when he couldn’t score, he’d moved on to the next bimbo who was more than happy to stroke his ego and apparently—ahem!—other parts of him while he did drugs out in the open for anyone to snap a photo of. So, which was it? Did he want Abby? Or did he want to use Abby to smooth over a potentially career-ending mistake? Was Abby simply the most naïve person in the world to think Zach might actually find any of this meaningful? If she really thought about it, his publicist Darlene had been straightforward with her from the start. Abby essentially had a job to do. She served a sole purpose. Prove to America that Zach Canning wasn’t gay so that his cult following a screaming ‘tween-age and teenage fans wouldn’t abandon him for the next heartthrob, and ultimately save his contract with #Blessed. And according to Darlene, what would Abby get out of it? She’d be the girl on his arm for a contractual six months.
But Abby wanted more. So. Much. More.
If this wasn’t real, then what was the point?
And why the hell hadn’t she thought about any of this before she signed on the spot?
“Abby?”
“Hmm?”
Rachel beamed a huge, knowing grin down at her and decided, “You must have had one hell of a hot night with Zach Canning, because you just floated off into a fantasy.”
More like a nightmare, Abby responded but only in her Zach-fogged mind. Out loud she said, “I don’t know how I’ll concentrate today and I really have a ton of work to do.”
At least both statements were true and the implication wasn’t lost on Rachel.
As she started backing away, she suggested, “Let’s get drinks sometime. I want to hear everything.”
Abby bet she did, not that Rachel had ever invited her to drinks before.
She focused on going through her email inbox, tending to some leftover tasks from last week, and making the necessary corresponding phone calls. Soon Abby was in the throes of the rhythm of the day and other than the occasionally flashing memory of Zach’s large hand cupping the sensitive apex between her legs—God, that had felt way too good!—she managed to tackle her responsibilities, and the day, as though she was just plain ol’ Abby and her entire life wasn’t about to get turned on its head thanks to the ticking-clock clause in the contract.
Well, she felt like herself for a little while. Then Darlene Pinkerton called her cell phone and as Abby ducked into the ladies’ room, checking under each stall to be certain she was alone as she held her cell to her ear, and hoped the nervous flutters in her stomach wouldn’t turn on her… If they did, it was probably lucky she was now locked inside the farthest stall where she could get her nerves out in the least ladylike way imaginable—her head in a toilet bowl.
She hoped not.
“You’re doing fabulously,” praised Darlene and much to Abby’s surprise. Had no one snapped a shot of Zach snorting cocaine at the afterparty? “There’s a lot of buzz coming to fruition so I need you to stay with Zach whenever you’re not doing… whatever it is that you do—”
“Work at—”
“You have my cell number, correct?” she asked, bulldozing over the prior answer that Abby had attempted to supply. This question must have been rhetorical, because Darlene didn’t wait for confirmation. “Wherever you go, whatever you do, text me your location so I can leak it to the press.”
Once Abby agreed, Darlene went on to explain the next steps. She was all business, almost clinical sounding, as she detailed how Abby was to proceed and fulfill her contractual obligations.
Zach and her were scheduled to elope in nine days.
Nine!
Darlene had bought the plane tickets. They’d fly to Belize, tie the seemingly love-compelled knot in front of a cluster of paparazzi who of course Darlene was arranging as well, and then start their new, married life together…
Nine days…
Abby had nine days to turn a fake arrangement into something she could live with.
Into something real, she thought from where she sat on the lid of one of the Tate & Cane ladies room toilets.
She was going to have to whip Zach Canning’s cocaine-snorting, bad boy ass into shape, get her parents’ and, most difficult of all, her brother Ian’s blessing, and hopefully along the way—she was praying!—she would discover the real Zach Canning. Discover that he truly was the man for her.
“Abby, would you come in here?” Olivia called out through her open office doorway the moment Abby returned to her desk where, thankfully, she hadn’t missed any calls or new emails.
After responding with, “Certainly!” she grabbed a notebook and pen, smoothed her free hand over her hair to ensure she looked presentable, and padded into her temporary boss’s office to find Olivia looking polished and gorgeous as ever behind a sleek, glass desk, the early morning light cutting through the picture windows to her right and illuminating her to perfection.
“You’ve been really working out,” Olivia complimented, inviting her to have a seat in the white chair across from her.
“Thank you,” she breathed, perched on the edge of the chair, ready for any directive, the ball of her pen poised against paper.
“Relax,” said Olivia with a welcoming smile. “This is just a check in. I want to hear about how you’re liking it here at Tate & Cane.”
She let out a rocky breath, releasing a fraction of the tension she hadn’t realized had built inside of her as a result of her secret bathroom phone call with Darlene, who seemed to be pulling all the strings and none of the punches in the fake relationship that the publicist technically shouldn’t even be a part of…
“I’m definitely liking it,” she assured her blonde, bright-eyed boss, who she wouldn’t mind becoming one day. “I know I’m only a temp, but if there was any kind of permanent position here, I’d love to apply.” Quickly, she corrected what she feared had been an accidental insult. “Not that I’d want to switch over and leave you hanging. I’m committed to assisting you until your full-time assistant returns.”
“Well, that’s good, because I can’t afford to lose you,” she agreed, “and I’m thrilled to hear you’re already thinking about switching to a permanent, long term position with us. That’s what I was planning on discussing with you.”
“Really?” asked Abby, lighting up brighter than the Statue of Liberty after nightfall.
“Of course,” she laughed. “You sound very surprised.”
Abby shrugged. “I’m just an assistant.”
“Meaning you’re a dime a dozen?” she challenged. When Abby’s hesitation registered as confirmation, Olivia immediately set her straight. “You aren’t. You’re valuable to me and to Tate & Cane, and this company wasn’t built on undervaluing its assets or worse, letting them go. No, I’d definitely like to see you settle in permanently here.”
As they went on to discuss Abby’s career goals, prior internships she’d had, and where she saw herself in two, five, ten years down the road, Olivia brainstormed different department heads she’d like to have Abby sit down to lunch with.
It felt like she was being mentored and though it was what Abby had always wanted, the highest hope she’d had ever since her temp agency had assigned her to Tate & Cane, her heart sank. Her free time didn’t belong to her. If she was permitted to have a lunch break outside of the office, she was expected to have it with Zach. Thinking about her two and five and ten-year plans had always been a source of great excitement and motivation for Abby, but now when she thought of those milestones, she wasn’t sure if she should envision herself as married… Or divorced.
And worst of all, carrying a secret of this magnitude, one she couldn’t breathe a word of to her friends or family, was starting to weigh on her like a sandbag against her chest.
It had only been a few days, for Christ’s sake!
When she reached the door, Olivia having excused her, she paused when her boss advised, “Be careful.”
A prickling chill skidded up Abby’s spine. She turned and met Olivia’s gaze. The glint in those blue eyes, the knowing smile on her face that seemed heavy with concern, the way Olivia held her gaze as if trying to communicate something that must remain unspoken…
Did she know?
Had she somehow heard about Zach? The contract? The arranged marriage?
Abby was tempted to ask, but she was sworn to secrecy, so she offered her a shy smile and promised, “I’ll be as careful as I can.”
“If you ever need to talk…”
But Abby couldn’t. She was legally bound.
She gave her boss a little nod anyway then started for her desk.
When she reached the street after a long day, there was a cluster of camera-flashing paparazzi waiting for her, but before she could duck her head low and force her way through the fray, a black limousine stole their attention as it crawled up along the sidewalk.
Abby figured she wouldn’t need to let Darlene know that Zach was now arriving at Tate & Cane. If paparazzi were here, it meant Darlene had tipped them off.
She let out a huff and prayed she’d one day get used to all this then lifted her face into a smile, awaiting the limousine coming to a stop in front of her.
If her smile felt soldierly, it turned genuine the second the back window rolled down, revealing Zach grinning up at her, a bouquet of flowers in one hand, a string of red balloons in the other that soon billowed out through the window.
Oh boy was she in trouble…
“Hey, beautiful,” he said, his tight green eyes seeming more worried than anything despite the sexily crooked grin on his slightly unshaven face. Man, he pulled off the just-rolled-out-of-bed-and-didn’t-shave look better than any man she’d ever seen in the flesh or on the silver screen. “I’m not sure I’ve ever apologized before.”
“You’re being serious?”
“Am I doing it right?” he asked innocently, as he offered her a box of chocolates from out of nowhere.
She tried not to laugh, but he really was cute.
After wrangling the balloons and accepting the bouquet of matching red roses through the open window of the limousine, the smile on her face having grown ear-to-ear without her permission, she stepped aside for Zach to climb out and wrap his arms around her, plant a performed kiss on her cheek, and give the press a whole new set of photos to gush over.
Abby urged him back once the spontaneous feel of his greeting had turned contrived, stared up into his eyes, and watched as his playboy grin slipped off his face, his expression quickly matching the serious one that had come over her.
“Can we go somewhere private?” she asked.
His eyes were wide with authentic concern now, and it was encouraging to see that he could be real with her despite the cameras flashing. In fact, in a lot of ways it felt like just the two of them on the sidewalk. No cameras. No media. No limousine. Just her and Zach, looking into each other’s eyes and feeling the connection that had magnetized them to one another in the first place.
“Sure,” he breathed and without hesitation helped her into the back of the limousine, while ignoring the all-too-intuitive paparazzi shouting:
“Trouble in paradise, Zach?”
Abby let out a silent groan and hoped she wouldn’t read that very question on a headline tomorrow morning…
“What about my place?” he suggested.
“What about mine?” she countered. “I need you to see who I am.”