Riley was waiting for me at Winters House. I parked in the garage and went in through the kitchen, hoping to stay low key and out of sight. I'd made the decision to follow through with the fake engagement, but I wasn't happy about it.

Riley had carved my heart into pieces, and I was nowhere near ready to deal with him, much less pretend we were madly in love.

I stepped into the family room, hoping to sneak down the hall, and he was there, sitting in an armchair, a cup of coffee beside him, his laptop balanced on his knees. I gave him the coolest glance I could manage and breezed by saying, "I have to change."

I measured my pace as I walked down the hall. I would not rush. Riley would know I was running from him. All I had left was my pride, and that was hard enough to salvage after the way I’d lost it the day before.

No more crying. No more hysterics.

I had to focus on moving forward. We'd catch the stalker, and Riley would go away. Once he was out of my life, I could take a deep breath and set my mind and heart to getting over him.

He didn't follow me to my rooms. Inside, everything was neat and in its place, all signs of Riley wiped away. Relief lightened the weight on my shoulders. I’d told him to move out of my rooms, and he'd agreed, but I hadn't been absolutely sure he’d do it. If I was going to do this, I needed a sanctuary from him. I needed time to myself to shore up my defenses.

I showered and dressed, taking a little more time than usual with my makeup and hair. It wasn't about Riley. I wanted this charade of a relationship over as soon as possible, and the best way to do that was to get out there and let people see us together. We could start with going to Annabelle's and getting a mocha.

If that went well, we’d stop by Sloane's gallery and start that ball rolling. It was time to move on with my life, and that included exploring what, if anything, I could do with my photography. I knew how to wait tables, make a mean cappuccino, scrub a toilet, and take pretty pictures. I'd done all of the above to pay the rent, but I'd prefer to make a living off the pretty pictures if Sloane could sell them.

Ready to face the world, I went back to the family room to find Riley still bent over his laptop. He raised his head when I walked in, his hazel eyes probing and concerned. He was wearing his glasses again. I tried to ignore the tug at my heart.

It didn't matter how hot he looked in glasses.

He was a liar.

He’d lied about everything, from the beginning. I was holding out for a hot guy I could trust.

That wasn’t Riley.

"I think we should go out," I said, crossing my arms over my chest and staring him down. "I want to go to Annabelle's and get one of those mochas, and then I think we should stop by Sloane's gallery."

Riley nodded and gestured to the chair opposite him. I didn't sit until he said, “Good plan. And if we stop by Sloane's, she'll tell everyone and hopefully get this whole thing moving in the right direction. First, we need to talk."

I sat back in the armchair and crossed my legs, trying to look composed and unaffected. I don't think I pulled it off. It would've been better if I could bring myself to meet his eyes, but every time I did the emotions simmering there shook me off balance. I needed to hold it together. I needed to remember that I couldn't trust Riley.

I was a client. Our engagement was a job, and we had to finish it.

"I'm done talking about us," I said, looking at the wall behind him. "There's nothing to say."

"There’s everything to say," he disagreed, "but you're not ready to hear it yet. I can wait. I don’t want to talk about us. This is about your mother."

That took me by surprise. Why did Riley want to talk about my mother?

"At the engagement party,” he said, “Melanie Monroe commented on how much you look like your mother. It started me thinking—what if this isn't just about you? What if the stalker has something to do with your mother?"

"My mother didn't have a stalker," I protested. "And I don't look that much like her."

"According to Melanie, you're practically a carbon copy."

"That's ridiculous," I said. "My hair is darker than hers, and I'm taller than she was. If you look at the pictures—"

"Pictures don't always tell the whole story, Lise. Melanie admitted that your features weren't the same, but the way you hold yourself, your eyes, are exactly like your mother. I looked at pictures of you as a teenager, when this all started. Your hair was lighter then, and you hadn't hit your full height. At sixteen you looked exactly like your mother at twenty."

"My mother had been dead for seven years when I started getting the flowers and the notes. I don't see how they could be connected."

"No, you don't want to see how they could be connected. None of you do." Riley shut his laptop and set it on the coffee table. "Even the Sinclairs—you're all blind. You have too much history, and you’re too close to see this all rationally."

"My mother—"

“Your mother had a lot of secrets. Maybe not from your father, but from everyone else. She had a child no one can find, and his father is a mystery. That's a big fucking hole in her life we know nothing about. The Sinclairs are running into roadblocks right and left trying to find this kid, and right now it's looking like Maxwell Sinclair is the one who put up those roadblocks."

"Maxwell's dead," I said.

I didn't want Riley to be right. I didn't want him to make sense. I didn't want this to be about my mother. In my memories she was perfect. Surrounded by flowers, her arms open for a hug, she was love and light and everything good from my childhood.

She had nothing to do with the crazy man fixated on me. Nothing.

Riley let out a huff of air in frustration. "Is he?"

"What do you mean, is he? Maxwell was in a car accident. He's dead. He's been dead for years," I protested, trying to ignore the niggle of doubt in my chest.

Riley worked for Sinclair Security. He’d been around when Maxwell was still running the company, and he'd been with them when Maxwell had died. I couldn't pretend I knew more about Maxwell's death than Riley did.

Proving me right, he said, "Maxwell Sinclair drove off a bridge. His body was never recovered. Maybe he's dead; maybe he's not. All I'm saying is that between your mother, your missing half-brother, Maxwell's supposed death, and your stalker, there are a lot of crossed lines and a lot of loose ends. All of you have been working on the assumption that your stalker is a stranger. Some random person fixated on you. It's possible. More likely than usual because you were in the public eye at a young age and any freak show could have seen you. But I don't buy it. This has been going on way too long, and this guy finds you too easily. My money says he knows you. Knows your family."

Every cell in my body rejected what Riley was saying. It couldn't be someone I knew. How could someone I knew torture me like this? Who could hate me this much? I didn't want to consider it was linked to my mother. The image I had in my head of her was a fairytale and one I held onto with both hands.

I knew she was human; I knew she had a past, she’d made mistakes. I just didn't want to face them. I wanted the fairytale. I wanted my perfect mother, who smelled of flowers, and hugged me tightly.

I drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. Burying myself in memory was just another way of running. So was ignoring Riley. He had a point, and if I wanted this to be over, I had to be smart.

"We should go to their house," I said, slowly, hating the idea. The house I'd grown up in, my parents’ house, sat in the woods only a quarter of a mile away. I hadn't walked through the door in years, but if there was a clue about my mother's past, it was probably there.

Satisfied, Riley nodded and stood. "After Annabelle's and the gallery," he agreed. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the engagement ring I'd thrown in his face the day before. The big square stone caught the light, the platinum bands shining with a dull gleam, one of them sparkling with inset diamonds. It was a beautiful ring. The perfect ring. If you'd shown me a thousand rings, I would've picked that one.

I looked away, shoving my hands in my pockets. An impassable gulf stretched between my commitment to our fake engagement and the reality of putting that ring on my finger.

I had to wear the ring. Being seen in public with Riley and no ring would cause the wrong gossip. The point was to stir up the stalker by flaunting our engagement, not satisfy him with hints that there was trouble in paradise.

Bad enough if it somehow got out that Riley was no longer sleeping in my bed. Being seen around town without my impressive engagement ring defeated the purpose of having a fiancé in the first place.

I forced myself to hold out my left hand, squeezing my eyes shut as he took it in his and slid the ring on to my finger, carefully easing it over my scraped knuckle. I didn't look at it. I didn't look at him. Needing a second to get myself together, I said, “Let me get my purse. I'll meet you in the garage.”

Riley seemed to understand that I needed space. He was quiet on the ride and said little once we were in Annabelle's. Annabelle herself was behind the counter, her long cinnamon hair pulled back in a messy bun. Her always-bright smile flared when she caught sight of me, and she dashed around the counter to pull me into a hug.

Rocking me back and forth she said, "I heard you were back! What took you so long to come in?"

Letting me go, she stepped back and gave Riley a long look, then smiled at me and said, “Oh, yeah. I heard all about this."

She lifted my left hand and studied the ring. To Riley, she said, “Nice work." To me, she said, "I'm short staffed today, or I'd sit with you guys. I know you're busy planning a wedding, and I'm practically chained to this place, but let's get together soon. I've missed you."

"Soon," I promised.

Soon this would all be over, and I could have a life. A life that included friends. Annabelle was just one of the people I'd missed over the years.

The line for coffee had grown behind us. We stepped out of the way, waiting only a minute before Annabelle gave us our drinks and sent us off with a wave.

The stop at Sloane's gallery wasn't as fun as seeing Annabelle. Sloane, in turn, kissed my ass, made snide comments about my looking old, gross comments about how hot my twin brother was, and sent Riley long, lascivious glances that left me itching to smack her.

I did not know how Maggie and Vance tolerated her. The weird thing was, Sloane's husband Rupert was a genuinely nice guy. He deserved so much better than this grasping, catty harpy.

We didn't linger at the gallery. I set an appointment with Sloane to bring in more of my work, accepted a sample copy of the contract to review, and took a spin around the space to admire the work she had displayed. Half of it was Vance's, his metal sculptures dominating the airy gallery.

On the tall, white walls she'd hung various pieces ranging from paintings to collages, all of them well executed and interesting. All of them priced obscenely high. No photographs, but I could imagine how my work would fit into her collection. If her customers paid the prices she had marked, signing with Sloane could be a very good move for me.

Something to think about later.

Later when this was over. Later, when my life could start.

Sloane would be merciless when Riley and I called off the wedding. I pushed that thought aside. What did I care what Sloane had to say? Nothing. I didn't care. I'd be happy when both the stalker and Riley were out of my life. I had to be.