Page 33 of #Awestruck

Tinsley waved. “Nia! Bring our guest of honor in here so we can all say congratulations!”

“Seriously, I’m not engaged. I barely even tolerate him.” There were still long-standing feelings of hatred that I was trying to get over.

“Everybody here thinks you’re engaged. It’s being reported on every tabloid, sports, and news site.”

This was totally surreal. I did not get it at all. I wanted to turn around and run back into the elevator so I could go home, crawl into my bed, and figure out what was happening.

As if she sensed my instinct to run, Nia slid her arm through mine and led me into the dining room. Where everyone went completely silent as I walked the ten steps from the foyer to the table. “Just smile and nod. After this is over, you need to give me all the details. I’ll help you get it all straightened out.”

“There she is!” Tinsley proclaimed, walking over to hand me a flute of champagne. She leaned in to do an air kiss, which I had never done in my entire life. “I thought we should celebrate your engagement! How long have you been seeing Evan without us knowing? And at my party you two acted like you barely knew each other. But I saw the looks he gave you. Even though you were supposedly there with Reggie! Sneaky!”

Everyone was smiling at me, and I felt like I really had stepped into Wonderland, because nothing was making any kind of logical sense whatsoever.

My phone buzzed, and as a reflex, I looked down at the screen. Brenda. Again.

I knew better than to keep her waiting any longer. “Can I use your restroom?”

Tinsley told me to go down the hallway and take the second door on the left. After locking the door behind me, I sat down on the closed toilet lid and dialed my boss’s number.

“Where have you been?” she demanded, not even saying hello.

“My phone died, and I recharged it, but I forgot to—”

“Never mind, I don’t care. These photos do not reflect what you have been telling me about your relationship with Evan.” She sounded furious.

“What photos?”

She sent me a text message, and I put her on speaker to open her attachments. There was a picture of Evan kneeling when he’d picked up the napkin ring. Somebody had shot this from outside our private dining room, out on the patio or at the marina. I didn’t remember seeing a flash. But if someone didn’t know the context, it absolutely looked like he was proposing.

The next photo made me catch my breath. It had been taken just after the moment that Evan kissed my cheek, and from this angle it looked like we were about to make out. Or like we just had been.

I could see how people might jump to conclusions, but none of it was true. “In the first one, I’d dropped something, and he picked it up for me. In the second he kissed me on the cheek to say good night. Like I was his little sister. Nothing else happened.”

“You’re sure nothing happened?” Brenda sounded slightly less angry and also a bit disappointed.

“Yes, I’m sure. Seeing as how I was there.” Living it and not taking creepy pictures of it. “He apologized, and we reminisced a little bit. Then I drove home in my car, and he went home in his. That was it. I can’t believe somebody took pictures of us.”

There was a long pause. “I was worried that you weren’t being completely honest with me. I had one of our photographers follow you. Just in case.”

I gasped. It was such a violation of my privacy. I wasn’t a public figure. Or at least I hadn’t been before Brenda made me one. “In case what?” I asked. Did she imagine Evan would be so overcome with lust that he would throw me on the table and ravage me? Like we were the R-rated floor show for the other diners at the restaurant? Totally ridiculous. And I was trying to be completely outraged, but parts of me tingled at the thought of Evan grabbing me and kissing me.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It matters that the entire world now thinks I’m engaged to Evan Dawson.” No wonder my mom had called me so many times. She was probably freaking out.

“Let the world think it.”

“What?”

There was a muffled sound, as if she had covered the mic on her phone to speak to someone else. “This is completely perfect. As his fiancée, do you have any idea how much more credibility your story will have when you tell the world the truth about him? You need to stay engaged.”

“That’s not really a one-sided decision. He hasn’t actually asked me to marry him, and I can’t exactly just start pretending like we’re together.”

“We’ll strategize on Monday. For now, don’t deny it if anyone asks. If you get approached by the press, just say no comment. There has to be a way for us to use this to our advantage.”

I agreed to do as she asked, not knowing what else to say. It all seemed so preposterous. The truth was obviously going to come out. It seemed dumb to deny it. But she was the woman who held my future in her hands. I just had to go along with it.

We hung up, and I contemplated calling Evan. But he was probably in team meetings or doing run-throughs in preparation for Sunday’s game.

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