The Boss's Fake Fiancee (4 page)

“You think he called a reporter and made up this whole story because he was jealous?” Garth stared in astonishment. “That’s absurd. Who would do such a thing?”

“Mark,” she said, still looking out the window.

Garth narrowed his eyes. “Are you sure
you
weren’t the one who talked to the reporter? If you were trying to make Venshiner jealous, this would have been right up your alley.”

Melissa spun around, her mouth falling open in surprise. “You think
I
planted the story? That’s crazy. Besides, if I’d done something that dumb, I obviously wouldn’t have told you about it.”

Garth shrugged. “Forgive me, but nothing about your story is particularly rational.”

He regretted the words the minute he saw Melissa’s back snap straight, and her face flush. Damn it, how could the simplest observation make women so emotional?

“The guy cheated on me, okay? I was hurt and embarrassed. I wanted a little revenge. Haven’t you ever done anything crazy because you were hurt?”

His gaze flickered to the full lower lip that she’d caught between her teeth. Something about the curve of that lip made it hard to maintain his anger. “I still don’t understand why he would have said anything to a reporter,” he said, forcing his gaze back to her bright blue, pleading eyes.

“Mark knows how private you are,” she said. “He must have figured if he spread a story like this, it would piss you off, and you’d make some public statement about how we aren’t together. He wanted to humiliate me, and he figured this was the best way to do it.”

Garth pictured Nan’s eager face when she held out the paper. He gritted his teeth at the renewed flare of anger. “Did you have any idea how much trouble you could cause? Didn’t you think for a minute about who might be affected by this?”

“I thought it was a harmless story.” Melissa spoke through clenched teeth. “I’m sorry for causing problems for you, but it’s not like this isn’t causing problems for me, too. I have no doubt my mother is flipping out right now, my brothers are probably ready to string me up for hiding this from them, and it will take me a week to respond to all these emails.” She gestured toward her computer, which had been steadily pinging with the arrivals of new messages.

Garth crossed his arms over his chest. “So sorry for your email troubles, but my grandmother caught sight of that picture. She’s absolutely convinced we’re getting married.”

“So?” Melissa shook her head. “Surely she knows you well enough to know it’s just a story.”

“Nan tends to believe the things she reads in the paper.”

“That’s why you want to pretend we’re engaged?” Her brows knit together in a confused line. “Because your grandmother believes it?”

“I tried to explain the truth this morning and she refused to listen. Once she gets something in her head, it can be impossible to shake.”

Garth couldn’t believe he was actually explaining himself to her. Yet, as furious as he was with her for what she’d done, he had to admit he needed her help. He could hardly pull off a fake engagement on his own.

“So you need me to marry you because your grandmother read in a tabloid that we were engaged.” Melissa blinked. “You’re joking. You’ve got to be joking.”

“Nan’s recovering from pneumonia.” The words were an effort. He hated that he had to reveal so much. “She’s also got a bad heart. She’s incredibly weak and needs to rest and recover without any stress. She worries about me being alone, and thinking I was engaged gave her a moment of peace.”

“I’m really sorry about your grandmother,” Melissa said, “but surely you can’t think I’d marry you simply because she’s sick.”

Garth tried not to imagine the joy on Nan’s face when he entered the room that morning, or the pain she’d feel if he tried to tell her the truth. His voice felt like it was coming from far away. He didn’t want to beg—he
wouldn’t
beg—but he needed Melissa’s help. “We wouldn’t really get married—we’d just pretend for a few weeks, until she’s recovered enough to hear the truth. She started on antibiotics last week, and her doctor said if all goes well, she’ll be able to start getting up and about by the end of the month. Then we can break it off and go on with our lives.”

“The end of the month.” Melissa paused and pursed her lips, as if consulting some mental calendar. “And today’s October 11. So in three weeks we just break it off? How would I explain it to my friends, my family…?” She spread her hands in bewilderment.

“You’ll have to figure that out,” he said tightly. “You made this mess, Melissa, and now you’re going to fix it.”

“I said I was sorry!”

“Great. You’re sorry.” He nodded in acceptance. “Consider this one big apology.” He pulled open the door of her office, hoping like hell that he had correctly interpreted her look of defeat. “Now, cancel any appointments you have for the rest of the day and meet me in the lobby in fifteen minutes. We’re going to get a ring.”

Chapter Four

Over the next fifteen minutes, Melissa ignored ten more phone calls, canceled four meetings, sent quick text messages to her mother and brothers Ross and Joe, and then turned off her cell phone so she didn’t have to see their responses. With a mountain of email still staring at her, she shut down her computer and slipped on her cherry-red trench coat. The deliberately cheerful garment had little impact on her bleak, overwhelmed mood. She met Garth in the Solen Labs reception area, and then followed him to the parking garage located under the building.

“What did you tell your family?” Garth asked

“I said things were moving fast and I’d call later tonight.” Was she really doing this? It all felt so impossibly unreal. She wasn’t even sure she had a real choice in the matter. She was acutely aware that Garth held all the cards in their relationship, and if he wanted to force her to participate in this game, he could.

“Our arrangement will have to be kept a secret. From everyone.”

Her chin jutted out stubbornly. “I’m not going to lie to my parents.”

“Then don’t talk to them at all. But I won’t have you telling them the truth. The more people that know, the more chance of something going wrong.”

“Like what?” she cried. “What
else
could possibly go wrong?”

“How about an even bigger headline?” he said. “Like ‘Garth
Solen’s
Fake
Fianc
é
e.’ Forgive me if I’d rather not see
that
on the front page of the
New York Star Herald
. Nan isn’t the only one who would freak out, you know. I’ve got Natalie Orelian to worry about, too.”

“The ThinkSpeak investor? Why are you worried about her?”

“The woman is obsessed with protecting her family name. If she hears a hint of scandal—about the product or about Solen Labs—she’ll disappear. I know she will. But once I get her to sign the investment agreement, it doesn’t matter.”

Melissa paused. Only Garth Solen could make an utterly ridiculous plan sound logical and rational. “We’ve only known each other for three months,” she said. “No one will believe we’re really engaged.”

“You were just telling me how believable it is,” he pointed out.

“I’m terrible at lying,” she warned.

He surveyed her with an impassive gaze. “Right.”

Melissa’s mouth dropped open. “Now that’s uncalled for!”

“Uncalled for?” He frowned. “First of all,
I
didn’t even say anything—”

“I can tell what you’re thinking,” she interrupted.

“Second of all,” Garth continued, “I’m not the one who made up a story about us dating and spread it to her vindictive ex-boyfriend!”

“Yes, and we’ve established that was
dumb
,” she grumbled. “That doesn’t give you the right to be mean.”

“I’m being mean?” He gestured in frustration. “How in the world did this become
my
fault?”

“What about afterward?” she pressed. “Three weeks from now, you dump me
and
fire me? Oddly enough, that doesn’t sound too appealing.”

Garth made a sound, low and garbled, in the back of his throat. “So you can dump me. I don’t care.”

“And my job?”

He paused. “At the risk of insulting you
again,
I’m not sure it’s a good idea for you to keep working for me after this is over. People won’t understand. It will seem…odd.”

With that simple, rational statement, a piece of Melissa’s heart shattered. She loved her job at Solen Labs. Every day she came to work, she discovered some new challenge. Her brain was alive here as it had never been before, and the thought of losing her work was devastating.

But she had to admit Garth had every right to ask her to leave. She’d lied about him and created a terrible situation as a result. She deserved to lose her job.

Something of her heartbreak must have shown in her face, because Garth sighed. “Why don’t we play it by ear? Maybe the fuss will die down more quickly then I imagine. If not, I know some other people working on projects like yours. I’ll help you find something new.”

Melissa nodded. “Thanks,” she said, defeated.

It wasn’t perfect, but it was better than nothing.

“Will you get in the car now?”

She nodded, and Garth unlocked the door. For a moment, she was transported back to the night before. The surprise comfort and ease she’d felt in his presence. The rapport they’d established talking about work. The passion in his voice when he’d talked about ThinkSpeak.

Of course, any supposed closeness was gone now. Melissa got into the car and Garth roared out of the parking garage with a squeal of tires. As soon as they were out on the highway, he pulled out his phone.

“I need to talk to Tori.” His voice could have split a glacier.

Tori must have been waiting beside the phone, because Garth started talking almost immediately. He explained in a few, terse statements what had occurred, from Melissa’s theory that Mark had planted the story, to his own concern for his grandmother. After making the entire fake engagement sound utterly and completely reasonable, Garth handed the phone to Melissa. “She wants to talk to you,” he said.

The quiet electric engine of Garth’s Telsa did little to cut the silence that hung over the small space. She took the phone awkwardly, making sure not to touch his fingers.

“Hi, Tori,” Melissa said cautiously. She almost dropped the phone when the other woman’s voice jumped out through the receiver.

“Geez, Melissa, you’re still alive, right? Any bleeding? Visible wounds?”

Melissa hid a smile. Tori tended to be a bit dramatic. “Of course I’m alive. I just texted you an hour ago.”

“Yeah, but now Garth has you stuffed in his car. I can’t believe he hasn’t killed you.”

Melissa darted a quick look at the steely-jawed man beside her. Her heart skipped a beat. It was like riding in the car with freaking James Bond—his dark gaze intent, collar unbuttoned, one hand resting confidently on the steering wheel as he darted in and out of traffic like they were being pursued by a pack of Russian bad guys. A bright electronic control panel illuminated the middle of the dashboard, depicting a street map along with a variety of statistics about the car’s performance, and she imagined it having a secret button that would turn the car into a plane, or high-speed motorboat.

Thinking of James Bond made her think of her eldest brother, and her stomach twisted. “Is Brit there?” she asked Tori, ignoring the comment about Garth.

“No. He’s out hiking up a mountain with some guys he met in a pub last week. I swear, he’s trying to go local, Melissa. He’s even growing a beard!”

Melissa paused to try to take in the image of her exquisitely groomed brother growing a beard. She shook her head. “You’ve got to be kidding me. My brother? Growing a beard?”

When Melissa was a freshman in college, Brit had taken over as CEO of Excorp, the family business. Over the next ten years, he’d turned around the small, failing business, eventually taking it public for millions of dollars. Along the way, he’d played the part to the hilt, working eighty-hour weeks, dating a series of supermodels, and living in an incredible penthouse apartment in Manhattan. It wasn’t until he’d met and fallen in love with Tori that he’d realized he had lost himself somewhere along the way. Three months ago, he’d taken an indefinite leave of absence from the business to fulfill a lifelong dream to travel to Scotland. Melissa was thrilled that he was finally taking time to do what he wanted, and even more thrilled that he’d finally stopped playing overprotective father to her and her other two brothers.

Tori giggled. “I think he’s developing an accent, too. It’s hilarious. I’m going to have to start calling him Scot instead of Brit.”

“As long as he’s not bothering me,” Melissa said, “more power to him.”

It wasn’t that Melissa didn’t have a father. She did. And a mother, too. But her parents had never been particularly…well…
parental
. Brit had always been the one Melissa turned to for advice and support, and part of her longed to do that now. But even as she imagined him swooping in to protect her and fix her mistakes, as he always had in the past, another part of her knew she needed to handle this on her own. Brit had driven her crazy trying to “fix” her depression, and his meddling had almost cost him the love he now shared with Tori. They both needed a little distance, and this time, Melissa was determined not to let him get involved.

“Are you going to tell him?” she asked Tori, dreading the response.

“You mean, am I going to tell him that Garth is strong-arming you into playing his fake fiancée?”

Melissa closed her eyes. “Um, yeah.”

“Not bloody likely,” Tori said cheerfully. “He’d probably cut the trip short just to throttle you
and
Garth. He’s starting to get over his father-complex, but I suspect that might just push him back over the edge.”

“So what are you going to say?” Melissa asked.

“Hopefully, nothing,” Tori replied. “The papers here don’t really give a rip about it. I only know because I have an alert that notifies me if anything pops up about Garth on the Internet. As Garth’s lawyer, I don’t like surprises. Frankly, neither does he.”

“So I gathered,” Melissa said dryly.

“He’s pretty pissed?”

“You think?”

“Well, don’t tell him I said this, but I completely understand why you did it. People do crazy things when they’re hurt.”

Melissa blinked away a sudden tear. She couldn’t talk to Tori about Mark. Not now. Not in front of Garth. “Look, I better go. Let me know if Brit hears anything, okay?”

“Got it. You take care of yourself. And don’t think too badly of Garth. He comes off a bit brusque, but there’s a sweet guy underneath it all.”

Sweet? Melissa could think of a lot of adjectives to use at that moment to describe Garth Solen, but none of them were anything like “sweet.”