He looked down at me, and I saw in those dark blue eyes that I hadn’t ruined everything. “It’s okay, Nina. No need to apologize. Thanks for the compliment.”
“I’m just glad you’re not mad. I’ll see you in thirty and we’ll head out.”
Gage stepped out of the dressing room in a dark grey suit and black dress shirt. I’d picked out a few combinations for him and this was by far the nicest looking. Much bigger than Tristan, he still wore a suit well, even if there was a lot more of him to fit inside one.
Standing stoically in front of the tri-fold mirror, he didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands suddenly, stuffing them into his pockets and then pulling them out to let them hang at his sides before he fiddled with his shirt collar. The salesperson, a silver-haired older man with a long face who’d introduced himself as Phillip and had an interesting way of slowly buzzing around the periphery while Gage stood admiring himself, made a cooing sound of appreciation behind me. I had to agree. The suit looked good on him.
“Well, how’s it feel?” I asked as Phillip swooped in to begin his job.
“It looks fantastic on you,” he beamed as he gently tugged on the sleeves near Gage’s shoulders. “Fits perfectly.”
Gage looked back at me in the mirror with a look of discomfort that made me laugh. Nearly twice the size of the salesman, he looked like he was under attack but didn’t know how to fend off the older man.
“Do you like it?”
He looked back at me and nodded. “It’s a nice suit.”
Phillip looked appalled at Gage’s tepid reaction to what was definitely more than a nice suit. Nice suits cost a couple hundred dollars. The one he wore at that moment came in at over a grand. A little more than just nice.
“I can tell by the look on your lady’s face that she likes it,” Phillip said in a singsong voice. “Whatever the occasion, this suit will be the right one.”
That same look of discomfort crossed Gage’s face at the salesman’s mention of me as his girlfriend. I merely smiled and played my part in Tristan’s charade, convincing enough it seemed for Phillip, who interpreted my smile as approval for the suit and scurried away mumbling about picking out the perfect tie for the occasion. That he didn’t know a thing about the so-called occasion didn’t seem to matter.
I took my place next to Gage in the mirror and whispered words of support. “The first test wasn’t so bad, was it? He seemed to believe we could be a couple.”
“He did. If he was paying attention to my face instead of the suit, he might not have, though. I need to work on that.”
“I thought you were experienced in this. Looks like you need to work on your gazing longingly technique.”
My joke made him laugh, easing the tension, thankfully. Phillip returned a moment later with a stunning black and turquoise swirl pattern tie that truly was the perfect tie for the suit. Placing it in my hand, he watched as I held it up against Gage’s chest, all the while staring into the mirror in an attempt to let him know now was the time to practice that gazing skill.
“Doesn’t it look great, dear?” I teased. “Perfect indeed.”
“Wonderful!” Extending his arm, Phillip pointed toward the register. “I’ll take you over here when you’re ready. Take your time.”
As he walked away, Gage looked at me in the mirror. “Laying it on a little thick there, weren’t you?”
“I was just practicing my doting girlfriend bit. Think I should dial it back a little?”
“Yeah. I think if we can find some happy medium between you and me, we might pull this off.”
“I don’t doubt it for a minute. Go get changed and I’ll deal with Phillip.”
Gage walked back into the dressing room while I paid for his new look, careful to drop heavy handed hints about how happy we were as a couple as the very nosy salesman hung on every word. Handing me back my credit card, he winked and leaned toward me. “You make a lovely couple.”
“Thank you. My fiancé thinks so too.”
Assuming I meant Gage was the man I planned to marry, he began to chatter on about how lucky he was to have me as his intended. I smiled, more at my cloaked reference than Phillip’s compliments. I had to find the bright spot in all this somehow.
With his new suit in hand, Gage escorted me to the front door of the store, stopping just before we stepped outside. Leaning down, he whispered, “Plans have changed. Daryl’s made sure we’re seen. He wants us to go to Malone’s a few blocks away for lunch instead of dinner. I’m assuming the men standing around outside are here for us, so be ready.”
I looked out the glass doors and saw the small crowd of men I recognized as photographers waiting for us. Daryl sure did know how to put on a show. Taking a deep breath, I walked past Gage as he held the door, very much like the boyfriend he was playacting but leaving me wide open for the throng of press to surge toward me. Instantly overwhelmed, I was surrounded by a sea of eager faces pushing toward me as their cameras flashed. I frantically looked around for Gage as I scrambled to make my way to the car, totally unprepared for how close they got to me. From all sides, they yelled for me to look their way, wanting to know how I was holding up with Tristan gone and presumed dead and how long I’d been with my bodyguard. The insinuation was clear—I was a heartless bitch who could forget one man easily and replace him with another even easier.
Something deep inside pushed me to answer that I still loved Tristan, but when I opened my mouth to speak, Gage inserted himself in between me and the men, shielding me from them and quickly getting the two of us into the car. “Jensen, we need to get to Malone’s. The quicker the better too,” he said calmly as I struggled to stop my hands from shaking.
Turning toward me, he frowned. “Are you okay? I’m sorry about that. I was so wrapped up in acting like a boyfriend that I didn’t do my job as your bodyguard. That’s always got to be my first concern, no matter what Daryl wants. I need to remember that.”
I heard in his voice the anger he was feeling. Trying to help, I rested my palm on his forearm. “It’s okay. Nothing bad happened. We’re good. I’m Jezebel and the press is eating it up like it’s candy.”
“Nina, although I’m not entirely clear on what danger you may be in, I do know a slip up like that could let someone close enough to really hurt you. My job is to make sure that never happens. We may be pretending to play house, but Tristan Stone expects me to keep you safe from every kind of danger, even one that only looks like a nuisance like those photographers.”
I hung my head, not caring about whatever danger there was around me. Those photographers had gotten to me, their words echoing in my mind.
Who’s the new man, Nina? How long have you been together? What do you plan to do if Tristan Stone ever returns?
The mere thought of Tristan’s return as an
if
instead of a
when
hurt. I’d thought with Gage’s help I could do this pretending thing, but I didn’t realize it would be so hard. I didn’t want to be with anyone else, and making people think I did felt wrong.
“You okay?”
I looked over at Gage and forced a smile. “I’m fine. I just wasn’t ready for that.”
“They’re vipers, but that’s their job. If you think about it that way, it might be easier.”
Looking down at my left hand as it rested on top of my other one in my lap, I regretted ever agreeing to this. The finger where my engagement ring should have been looked like I felt. Empty.
“I guess. I want to go home.”
“We need to eat at Malone’s before we get to head home,” he said, sounding almost apologetic.
“Fine. We’ll do that, but then I want to go home.”
Chapter Seven
Nina
Malone’s was exactly the kind of place I dreaded and exactly the kind of place I knew Daryl would send us to. Small and intimate, it was dark even in the daylight and screamed romantic rendezvous. God, I wished Daryl wasn’t so good at this.
The hostess escorted us to a table near a window looking directly out to the street. I quietly protested, but Gage simply showed me his phone and a text from Daryl indicating this was exactly where he’d arranged for us to be seen.
Fucking fabulous.
I held the menu up in front of my face as a small group of photographers began to gather outside. Nothing on it sounded even remotely appetizing, but I tried to convince myself that as long as the bar could whip up a chocolate martini or two, I might make it through our latest performance.
“Nina, I understand you’re not happy, but hiding behind the menu isn’t really what Daryl wants, I’m guessing.”
“I don’t care what he wants,” I said from behind my menu.
The waiter arrived to take our order, entirely too chipper for my mood. I listened as Gage ordered his meal of a steak cooked medium and roasted red bliss potatoes with steamed asparagus dressed in parmesan. Ordinarily, that would have sounded good, but at that moment, just the thought of it nearly made me sick.
“What will Miss be having?” the waiter asked as he turned and looked down at me.
“Chocolate martini. Make sure the glass is sugared.”
He tugged on my menu, forcing it from my hand, and smiled fakely before turning away. I looked across the table at Gage and saw a look of pity on his face. I hated his pity. Self-pity I was all about, but pity from someone who barely knew me just felt wrong.
“Liquid lunch?”
“Yeah.”
We sat in silence as the waiter brought Gage’s soda and my martini, the crowd outside growing the whole time. What the fuck had Daryl told them? Did they think they would catch us having sex right there in the window of Malone’s?
Gage slid his hand across the table to touch mine. “Nina, I know this is hard, but we have to try.”
“I don’t want to try. I want to drink. I want to forget that I’m sitting here with people watching our every move and waiting for us to act like we care about each other.”
“Maybe if I tell you something about me and Angela that might help?”
“Sure,” I mumbled as I focused on the taste of my martini as it sat on my tongue, all chocolately goodness.
He didn’t move his hand away, keeping it on top of mine and giving the photographers something to snap away at, which they did. Every part of me wanted to take my hand back, but I kept it there as he began to tell the tale of the woman he’d loved.
“I remember the first time we knew we thought more of each other than just bodyguard and client. She was on location in Spain. We’d been pretending to be a couple for months, but one night, it all just came together.”
“Was it love at first sight?” I asked as I took a healthy gulp of my drink, enjoying the warming sensation it left in its wake as I swallowed.
Gage shook his head. “No. She was like a spoiled child when I first began guarding her. I don’t think we spoke our first words to one another for weeks after I was hired. Well, that’s not true. She snapped at me constantly in those weeks. When we finally began talking, I could see she wasn’t that diva I’d thought she was.”
“Sounds like that Whitney Houston movie, The Bodyguard.”
“Not exactly. She wasn’t that bad.”
I held up my glass to let the waiter know I needed a refill. “Well, it’s nice to know there was a happy ending,” I said as I looked around the restaurant for the missing waiter.
“Not really. She married someone else last March.”
Turning to look at him, for first time I saw emotion in his eyes. God, I was such a bitch! I placed my glass down on the table and rested my other hand on top of his. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be so flippant about everything. You obviously cared about her.”
“Yeah, well, that whole good things happening to good people thing doesn’t always happen to everyone. Sometimes things are bad and that’s all there is.”
The waiter brought Gage’s food and another martini for me, and we sat in silence as he ate and I attempted to drown both our troubles. The press milling about outside had taken lots of pictures when I touched his hand, so I hoped we’d done our job well enough for Daryl to be happy. I didn’t want to think Tristan would be happy. I wanted to believe he’d be as jealous as I’d be if I saw him holding hands with another woman.
By the time I’d drunk three martinis, Gage was finished with lunch. In addition to tasting great, my chocolate martinis had the wonderful effect of making me hate the facade we had to keep up a little less, at least for the moment. I was also feeling more talkative.
“It was love at first sight for me with Tristan,” I announced as Gage finished the last of his steak and wiped his mouth.
“That’s cool. I didn’t realize that even existed in real life.”
“Well, maybe not first sight, but the first time he kissed me, it was definitely something like love.”
“Those drinks sure have an effect on you,” Gage joked. “Even your body language has eased up. You look like you did that night at ETA.”
“You were there with us that night?” I asked, surprised to know he’d seen Tristan and me then.
Gage nodded. “West and I have been in the shadows with you since you returned home from the hospital, especially when you’re alone without Tristan.”
He knew that I’d gone to see Cal that time and probably knew I’d secretly met with him those other times. I didn’t know why, but I needed to explain that I hadn’t cheated on Tristan.