Her Wedding Escort: A BWWM Alpha Male Romance (2 page)

She looked at several men, clicking on their profiles and reading through a litany of descriptions and bios, each of them making the men sound more and more like gods than men, but finally she happened on a nice looking man. Owen Jacobsen. He was well-built, not bad looking, and black. He was what Theo could be if Theo ever got his life together and quit chasing women.

Julia clicked on his link and read everything about him. He seemed perfect. She only needed him for the weekend, after all. She clicked on the reservation line and soon she had him booked for three days of paid work in Los Angeles.

Satisfied with her handiwork, she left her computer and finished putting clothes away. Ten minutes after she had sent the request to him, he accepted it and sealed their deal, making plans to meet her at a coffee shop around the corner from her house. She said she would be there in the morning and he said that would work well for him.

Her heart floated at the thought that she was going to keep her freedom a while longer, and while she felt bad for lying to her family, she knew that this was the best and right thing to do to avoid being stuck with Ronald or anyone else that happened to come to the wedding looking for a date.

She finished packing for her long weekend and took a hot bath, hoping to relax some before her drive down the coast and the time she was going to spend with her family. She loved them dearly, but she preferred to love them from a distance. She did wish that Samantha lived in San Francisco; she would really love to be able to see her sister more often and spend much more time with her, but Samantha was busy with college in Los Angeles, and then she met Kevin Daniels at school, and now Kevin and Samantha were getting married. There was no time for the two of them to be around each other as they had been when they were growing up.

Julia was working as the director of marketing at a major tech company that had been a startup and had grown into a multimillion dollar company. She worked hard for them and had plans to stay with them as long as possible. They were her career and she loved everything about it.

Climbing out of her bath, she dried off and slipped into her pajamas, heading to bed with her nerves already tingling about the weekend. She had a ball of nerves in the pit of her stomach that kept tugging at her about taking a fake boyfriend with her to her own sister’s wedding just to trick her parents and Ronald into thinking that she was happily involved so that they would leave her alone.

There was the tiniest bit of guilt on her conscious, but nothing that was big enough to make her change her mind about her plan and tell anyone anything to do with the real truth about what was going on in her life. She fell asleep wondering how it would all go, and it seemed like seconds later that her alarm went off and she looked at it with panic, knowing that her adventure was about to begin. She dressed quickly and tied her hair up in a pretty clip so that it spilled over the top, sending her red-brown curls down in an array around her long slender dark neck, and she slipped dangling earrings into her ears and put red lipstick on her full, luscious lips. She always felt that her lips and her eyes were some of her best features.

Julia rubbed lotion on her dark skin, giving it a healthy glow and slipped her sandals on, pairing them with cute shorts that showed off her long legs and a short sleeved shirt that would keep her cool on the long drive. She grabbed an iced coffee, packed her car, and climbed in to head to the coffee shop where she was picking up her pseudo-boyfriend.

She still couldn’t believe her audacity in hiring a man to pose as Theo for her, but she would much rather do that for a quick weekend than face the alternative of Ronald chasing her all over her sister’s wedding and her mother pushing her toward him. This was by far the best option. Plus, she thought to herself, she was aiding the San Francisco economy, giving work to someone who probably needed it, and offering them a free vacation weekend in Los Angeles. It was a good thing for everyone involved.

Julia pulled up to the coffee shop and went in to look for the man she had hired online the night before. There was no one in the coffee shop except for her, two older white ladies who were so deeply involved in their shocking gossip that they hadn’t even looked up when she walked in, and one other man who was standing near the door with a suitcase on the floor.

She looked around and frowned. She was in a hurry and in her request, she had made it very clear that time was of the absolute essence. She had to leave by eight in the morning. There was no wiggle room for lateness. Looking at her watch and then gazing around her again, she sighed and the man with the suitcase by the door walked up to her and smiled. He was easily over six feet tall with golden blonde hair and sea blue eyes. He had a strong jaw line and high cheek bones. He looked like Robert Redford. His body was lean and muscular, and his smile was warm and sunny, just like a California man’s smile should be.

“Julia Robinson?” he asked with a kind voice.

She turned on the spot and looked up at him. She blinked. “...Yes?” she asked in confusion. She knew she would have remembered meeting the Greek god standing before her. “Do I know you?” she asked, absolutely positive that she didn’t.

He shook his head and held out his hand. “Not yet you don’t. I’m Derek Carter. I’m from the escort service.” He smiled at her again and his blue eyes twinkled.

She blinked again and tilted her head. “Well, has something gone wrong? Where’s Owen? I’m supposed to be meeting Owen here and leaving... um... right now,” she said, glancing at her watch with another frown. She looked back up into his pleasant face.“Did you come to give me a message or something? Shouldn’t the site have emailed me if he’s going to be late or something? That’s not very good customer service.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “I agree, but I guess that your reservation was really short notice, so they didn’t have time to let you know that he wasn’t going to make it. They sent me as a replacement.” He looked as if it wasn’t a big deal.

Her jaw fell wide open and she stared at him in shock. “A replacement?! You can’t be a replacement! I specifically requested a black man! No offense or anything, but you’re about as white as a white man could be! I can’t take you with me this weekend! My family would never ever understand!”

Derek’s smile faltered and he slipped his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “I’m sorry about the mix up. No one mentioned anything about you having a black man, it was just that you needed a man for the weekend and I was the only one who didn’t already have anything going on.”

She gasped and covered her mouth and then slid her hands up over her eyes in disbelief. “This can’t be happening. It can’t. How in the world am I ever going to convince...” she began to mumble to herself as she sighed and rubbed her face in anguish.

Derek held his hand out and touched her shoulder. “Look, I’d like to help you. I’m free to come with you this weekend, and I’m packed and ready to go. There’s no one else who can do it. I’m sorry I’m not quite what you had in mind, but I can try to do whatever it is that you need done, and I can promise you that I will do my best, whatever it is.”

She turned and shot him a narrow look. “What it is this weekend,” she began with a little bit of an attitude, “is my baby sister’s wedding and my whole family is going to be there, and all of them have been waiting to meet my boyfriend for two years, but he’s busy screwing some barista in his apartment this weekend, so he can’t come and I needed a replacement so my family won’t try to set me up with someone else this weekend while I’m at the wedding! They’re never going to believe that you’re Theo!”

He paused a moment and a thoughtful look came over his face. “Wait a minute... did you say they’ve never met him?”

Julia sighed and nodded, rubbing her fingers over her forehead. “Yes,” she muttered.

Derek tilted his head and a small smile came over his face. “Have they ever seen a photo of him or anything like that?”

She shook her head and clamped her hands down on her hips, looking at the floor. “No. They’ve never seen him at all.”

He smiled slyly at her. “Then... maybe I’m missing something, but how do they know he hasn’t been white all this time?”

Her head shot up and she had an irritated look on her face as she jutted her chin out at him and began to snap at him. “Well of course they’d know... that he’s not...” and then she stopped and stared at Derek.

Her mind rolled slowly back over the last two years. Her family had never seen a photo of Theo. Her family had never met Theo. Theo could be a green alien from outer space and they’d have no way of knowing it. The man standing in front of her had an excellent point. Her mouth fell open again, but this time in thought as the wheels of her mind began to spin and her eyes opened wide.

She held both of her hands out to him and began to shake her head slowly. “I am so sorry that I was so... um... abrupt and...um...” she paused.

“Worried?” he offered kindly to her.

“Rude,” she corrected him shamefully. “I hadn’t even thought about it before because no one in my family would date or marry anyone that isn’t black, but it’s just for that reason that Theo’s race has never come up. It would make sense that if he was white I might have kept him from them all this time!”

She began to smile and laugh lightly as the lights came on over her head and the answer to her problem looked down at her with shining blue eyes. He held out his hands and took hers in them. They were soft and warm and gentle.

“So, will it work for you to bring me with you? Can I help you this weekend?” he asked with a lopsided grin.

She laughed out loud at him. “Yes! Yes... it’s going to blow everyone away and probably cause enough mayhem and gossip to last a decade, but yes. You’ll do fine for the weekend.”

Then she looked up at him and her full lips curled into a big, sweet smile. “Thank you so much. I’m sorry about before, I was just...”

“Worried?” he offered again.

“Freaking out,” she counter-offered.

He nodded and smiled, picking up his suitcase and holding the door open for her. “I totally understand. Let’s see if we can make this work for you. I promise to do my best.”

“Thanks, Derek,” she said with a grin and led him to her car.

Chapter 2

She pulled the car onto the highway and headed out toward the ocean. He looked around and asked, “So, are you taking highway five down to L.A. or are we going down the coast?”

“We’re going down the coast. If I have to do this drive to go see my family, I want to make the most of it and have a beautiful scenic drive along the way, not hectic traffic in the hills.” She put the top down on her convertible car and the wind began to blow through her curls and over her face, making her smile and relax.

He leaned back in his seat and got comfortable for the long road ahead. “So, I picked up a little bit about what’s going on during our conversation at the coffee shop, but I’m still kind of confused, could you please explain to me what it is that we’re doing and why you needed me to come along for the weekend?”

She laughed a little. “Well... it’s not that complicated. See, I was dating this guy.”

“Theo... right?” he asked with a smile as he pushed his sunglasses on and leaned his arm on the window ledge of the door.

Julia nodded and continued. “Yes, Theo.” Then she turned her head slightly toward him and said, “You’ll have to go by Theo this weekend. That’s who everyone will need to believe you are.”

He nodded. “I’m Theo. Got it.”

“So anyway, I was dating Theo and we’ve been going out together on and off for a couple of years now. Things are good and then he screws up and things are bad, and then he talks me back into dating him again and like an idiot I go back to him every single time. Well, this last time I went over to his apartment and he wasn’t expecting me and I walked in on him and a girl from the coffee shop around the corner from his place. They were right in the middle of a wild fling and I walked in at the worst possible moment. It was horrible. I yelled at them both; mostly at him though, and then I told him I never wanted to see him again. That was three days ago. We had been planning on coming to my sister’s wedding for a few months, and I should have known better when he kept backing out of it and then committing to it again, and then backing out of it again... on and off, just like he is with me.” She shook her head and frowned.

“So I was going to go alone and just tell my family that he was working and couldn’t come, but then my mom called me and told me that she invited Ronald Williams to the wedding and I had to figure out a quick fix for myself.” She sighed and shook her head.

Derek frowned and looked at her sympathetically. “I’m really sorry that things didn’t work out for you and Theo. It sounds like maybe he didn’t know what he had with you. You don’t look too broken up about it though. Are you?” he asked curiously, looking sidelong at her.

She laughed ironically. “No, I’m not too broken up about it at all. Actually, it’s like a weight has been lifted from me. A heavy one. Like an anchor,” she said, waving her hand toward the Pacific Ocean rolling in to them on the passenger’s side of her car.

“I was heartbroken the first time it happened. I cried; I was devastated. Then each time we broke up for whatever reason, it hurt less and less, and after a while it didn’t affect me hardly at all. The most dominant emotion this time was anger and frustration. The bastard was screwing another girl. I’ll just say this: I’m glad I always made him wear a condom when—” she stopped suddenly and looked at him with an awkward smile. “Sorry,” she said with a little regret. “Too much information.”

Derek laughed and nodded. “It’s all right. It just means you’re a smart lady.” He looked out to sea for a minute and then looked back at her. “So who is this guy... did you say Ronald?” he asked, double checking the name.

She nodded. “Yes. Ronald Williams. Ronald isn’t a bad guy, actually, he’s about the furthest thing from a bad guy. Don’t you dare tell my mother this, but she’s right, he would be a great catch for me, but he’s been chasing me since puberty and I just have no interest in the man at all. I never have and I can guarantee you that I never will. It’s just not there for me.” She sighed and shook her head, shrugging her shoulders.

Derek looked over his sunglasses at her. “It’s there for him, though, right? He still wants you?”

She groaned and shook her head. “Yeah, he still wants me. I don’t know why. He’s stubborn too, one of those people who set their mind on something and then never let it go. I guess that’s good for some things, but not for me because I just don’t want him back, and I’m never going to. I wish he had given up on me a decade ago when I told him to. Now my mother has gone and invited him to the wedding in hopes of setting me up with him.”

She looked over at Derek for a moment. “So, you see why I couldn’t go alone. My mother and Ronald would both be coming after me all weekend, and it would wreck my experience there. This is my baby sister’s wedding! I’m the maid of honor! I should be happy all weekend and focusing on her and on helping her do whatever she needs me to do. Now I can do that because you’ll be there to deflect both my mother and Ronald!” she grinned at him.

He nodded and stuck his chin out a little bit. “Like a shield! I guess that’s sort of like being a knight in shining armor. I’d be a shield in a suit. I can work with that!”

Julia raised her eyebrows. “You brought a suit?”

Derek nodded and grinned. “It’s a wedding, right? I brought a suit.” He looked at the ocean again and then looked back at her and raised one eyebrow as he leaned over to her a bit and said in a conspiratorial manner, “I’ll have you know, too, I look really good in it.”

Julia laughed. “I just bet you do.”  She sighed happily and smiled at him. “Thank you so much for coming with me. You’re really saving me. I’m sorry I was so awful at the beginning. I was just so stressed out over it.”

Derek waved his hands dismissively in the air. “No big deal at all. I totally understand. We’re going to have a great weekend and make the most of a weird situation.”

She laughed at him again.

“So, if we’ve been dating for two years and you plan on selling that to your family, I probably need to know all about you.” He looked over the top of his sunglasses at her again, his blue eyes dancing with light and matching the sparkling ocean behind him. “So tell me everything.”

Julia laughed a little and then realized that he was right. They had a lot to cover in a short amount of time. “Wow... everything. I don’t know where to begin.” She lifted both of her eyebrows in confusion. It was an intimidating thing to try to come up with it all at once. “Well, I grew up in Los Angles and my family stayed there and I moved to San Francisco about thirty seconds after I got out of high school. I wanted to go to college there and get away from my family.” She started out with what she thought would be most helpful. Profile information. Simple things. Facts and basics.

He frowned slightly. “You keep saying that you wanted to get away and be away from your family. Are they that bad?” he asked with a quieter voice.

She pursed her lips and shook her head slowly. “No, not really bad, they just see things really differently than I do. It’s hard to be around them and get along, so I just keep my distance so thing stay smooth between all of us. I’m more liberal and they’re more conservative.” She waved her hand in the air between them. “It’s like the dating thing; see, they would never ever date or marry anyone who wasn’t black like us, and that’s why the first thing I thought when I saw you was ‘no way,’ I can’t go down there with a white boyfriend. They’d never understand, but then when I thought about it for a moment, I realized that I’m totally fine with interracial relationships for other people, and I’m supportive of that for others, so there’s no reason in the world why it shouldn’t be fine for me, too.

“My family is going to lose it when they meet you, but that’s just like all of the other differences between them and me, and this is actually really indicative of who I am and who they are, and that’s why I keep my distance. I love them so much that I accept who they are but I don’t want to be around it because it’s important to me to keep the peace. Does that make sense?” she asked, tilting her head and looking at him.

He nodded shortly. “Yeah, I guess that makes some sense. So, what are the basics? Favorite everything?” he asked with a smile, turning to watch her.

She laughed. “This is the fastest speed dating ever, isn’t it?”

Derek laughed with her and pointed his finger toward the sky, “But we already know that it’s going to work! We just have to get through the information age!”

Julia’s belly laugh made him smile and grin at her. He looked at her thoughtfully and saw what a good and genuine person she was. Even though the premise he was working for her on this weekend was an untruth, he knew that deep down she was a good woman, and he understood her reasoning. He was glad that he had decided to see it through and go with her. She was beautiful and good, with just a bit of anxiety mixed in, but on her sister’s wedding weekend, that was to be expected.

“Well, my favorites... let’s see. I love cream in my coffee, dark chocolate and green tea. I love to laugh – comedies and romantic comedies are my favorite kind of movies, but a good drama now and then is always a good idea. I love San Francisco. I wouldn’t choose to live anywhere else,” she began.

“Why do you love San Francisco?” he asked with a smile.

She raised one hand in the air. “Who knows? There’s so much to love about it! I love the sourdough bread, the salty air, the cold thick fog that creeps in. I love the painted lady houses, the huge hills, and Chinatown. I love Golden Gate Park and the music that is created here. I love the entrepreneurial spirit of the startup businesses that have made so much success here. I love the ocean and the Golden Gate Bridge. I love the boats that are always out on the bay. I love the redwood forest just over the hill. I love the diversity and the wildness, the vibe of acceptance for so many different varieties of people. I love the seafood. There are a million things to love about that city, and it’s why I can’t ever leave.”

She glanced at him and grinned for a moment, then looked back at the road.

“I like the trolley cars,” he told her. “And everything else you said.”

She laughed and nodded. “You’re a man of good taste then!”

He nodded. “I am indeed. So what else?”

She bit her lower lip in thought. “I love good books, especially ones that keep you up until the sunrise reading them because you can’t put them down. Those are the best! I love libraries and museums, and I love art, history, ballet, the symphony, the opera, and football. I like baseball too, once in a while.”

He laughed out loud at her. “You are a renaissance woman if I ever met one!”

She nodded. “I guess I must be.”

“Okay... how about your bucket list? What do you want to do while you have the chance to do it?” he asked curiously.

She threw one hand up in the air. “Everything!” she shouted, feeling free and happy and excited as she drove down the highway beside the ocean with a new friend in the car.

He rubbed his chin with his finger. “That’s a lot. How about the top things on the list?”

Her head tilted back as she laughed at him and his eyes followed her full red lips down her neck to her chest, and then he looked away from her, feeling a little guilty for the way he had let himself take her in. He had to remind himself that he was hired to be her date, and that he wasn’t there because it was a real date.

“Let’s see. I want to go climb Mt. Kilimanjaro. I want to go up in a hot air balloon. I want to tour the Napa Valley vineyards and taste all the good wine they make there. I want to go out on a whale watching cruise and see them out in the ocean where they belong. I’d love to go diving in the Caribbean. I want to go to Europe for a long trip. I would love to learn to fly an airplane. How’s that?” she asked with a grin.

“That’s a good list!” he told her. “I hope that you get to do all of those things.”

She nodded. “Me too!”

She glanced at him for a moment and then said, “Okay, my turn... why are you working at an escort service? You seem like a good man. You’re smart and handsome... why the escort service?”

He shrugged. “Well, I’ll be honest, I’m a starving artist, really. I paint and I sculpt, and so far my work has been as yet unloved by the masses of art lovers out there, so to keep the wolf from the door, I date women who pay me to date them, or escort them, as the case may be.”

Julia smiled in an understanding way. “I get it. You do what you have to do to make it all work!” She reached over and patted his shoulder. “I’m really grateful that you’re doing it for me, though, because you’re really saving me this weekend.”

He smiled back at her. “Well, I’m glad to be saving you. So, tell me what Theo is like, so I will know what they expect me to be.”

She pursed her lips in thought and shook her head slowly. “You know what, you have the part of a lifetime here, because they’ve never met him and I almost never talk about him. They know almost nothing about him. You can make Theo anything you want him to be. All that they know is that he and I get into arguments from time to time and we’ve broken up and gone back out again afterward. They don’t really know why, they just know that things have been bumpy for us from time to time.”

He raised his eyebrows in surprise. “So, really, I could be anyone at all! That’s fantastic! Do you want me to be someone that you would keep around or someone that you might break it off with sometime soon?”

Julia immediately shook her head. “We want to look like we are deeply in love and things are going beyond amazing for us, because if my mother thinks for one second that she can get me hooked up with Ronald, she’s going to do it. She already knows that things have been hard for us, so she’s not going to be on your side, and you’re white, so that’s not going to help our case at all, but we’ve got to show her and Ronald that we are solidly together and there is absolutely no possibility that either one of them could come between us. We have to show them that no one has ever loved each other as much as we love each other, or they’re going to try to make me go to the dark side and marry Ronald.”