Page 102 of The Billionaire's Fake Fiancée

“I don’t know…” I say. This focus group would be so perfect. If only I was really who I claim to be.

“It’s never too early to gather information,” Gail declares, because she cuts through the bullshit of everything. She points at the twins. “Ten? Right after breakfast?” They nod. The other cousins nod. Somebody’s going to bring somebody else. It’s happening—that’s the power of Gail.

“Everyone likes to give their opinions,” Gail observes once everybody’s gone.

“I’m not seriously considering any of this,” I warn.

“Yeah, I got that,” Gail says in her blunt way, “but I can’t drink mimosas and play croquet this whole time. Rather have something to sink my teeth into. Just for fun, okay?”

“I do have a few angles thought up,” I admit. “I am curious about what they’d say.”

She nods. If she’s hurt I seem to be rejecting her overtures to mentor me and possibly invest, she’s not showing it. “You need to talk about them? Work them out?”

I gaze up at the white flags flapping atop the hot tub deck, three stories above. “I want you to hear them fresh with everyone. I think that would be best.”

She nods. “Good call.”

“Okay,” I say. “Now, something’s bugging me.” I pull out my comb. “May I?”

“What now?”

“Your part.” I comb through her hair, acting like I’m restyling it, though she’s doing a great job herself. “I promise I won’t keep doing this,” I confide.

“Nothing wrong with a perfectionist.”

I nestle the comb into the plastic baggie hidden in my bag. “There. I think the wind undid it, that’s all. You had it styled nicely.”

“You got him relaxing,” she says. I follow her gaze to where Rex is sitting. “First day he’s been out here,” she adds.

“I know. It’s nice to see him finally doing vacation things,” I say, and then I turn to her. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Shoot.”

“Do you think people who came up with nothing have to work harder to maintain their position than somebody in an identical position who came up with money?”

“Coming up, they do,” Gail says. “A man like Rex, he would’ve had to work twice as hard to get where he is. He would’ve been up against people with family connections, school connections, seed money. But there’s more to life than work.” She gives me her eagle eye. “You’re good for him.”

“I don’t know about that,” I say.

“He was a player for a long time,” she says. “I’ve seen him at enough functions. Looking at other women even when he’s with one. It’s not happening now. It’s as if he sees nobody else. Rex is a good man when he wants to be, and you keep him on his toes.”

I nod, feeling my face blush with pleasure.

She points at her left hand. “He was smart.”

For a second, I don’t know what she’s trying to communicate, then I realize she’s pointing to her left finger. The ring finger. Our supposed engagement.

I hold out my hand, watch my ring sparkle in the light, hating myself on several levels at this point. I gaze over at him and catch his eye. He smiles and rises out of his chair. It’s not his real smile, that rare smile he showed me in that moment of forgetting himself, but it’s sexy all the same. “Guess his ears were burning,” I say, beaming at him, and it’s not part of the ruse.

Holding my gaze, he strolls over, all grace and power like a panther. The way he’s watching me as he walks is just for show, but the feeling of him heading for me, having eyes only for me, it feels so real it aches.

I wonder for one foolish moment what it would be like to be the woman Gail thinks I am. The woman who’s captured the heart of this beautiful, complex, secretive man. The woman who would get to work with Gail and make her mark in the fashion world.

He throws an arm around my shoulders and kisses the top of my head. “You two cooking up something over here?”

“A little something,” Gail says.

I nestle myself into the nook of his arm. “An impromptu focus group for tomorrow after coffee,” I say, hoping he doesn’t hate that I’m walking down this road with Gail. It’s not as if I could say no.

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