The Billionaire's Fake Girlfriend - Part 2 (The Billionaire Saga) Page 4

  As our heart rates slowly returned to normal, both Amanda and I glared accusingly at Marcus. A second later, Deevus hopped up on the couch to join us. In perhaps a greater testament to self-preservation than remorse, Marcus had the decency to flush and look away.

  “Well, she’s flying down to meet you,” I said, smiling. “I hope you’ll like your new fake mother-in-law.”

  Amanda sighed sympathetically. “You can’t lie to her like that.”

  “I have no choice. And I really feel bad about it.”

  She looked at Marcus. “You shouldn’t have involved Becca’s family. Now that’s crossing the line.”

  “I didn’t think it would come to all of this.”

  Amanda blew out a long breath. “Maybe being stuck with a future mother-in-law is punishment.”

  I leaned back against the cushions and closed my eyes with a tired sigh. “He’ll find a way to spin it to his advantage.”

  “Against Sharon?” she asked skeptically. “I don’t think so. Even he’s not that good.”

  “Uh…guys, I’m right here,” Marcus tried to interject.

  I ignored him. “Mark my words. First he’ll charm her with some extravagant gift—a diamond collar for Mugsy—”

  “Who’s Mugsy?” he tried again.

  “Then he’ll con her by saying all the right words. ‘Oh, isn’t it lovely, Mrs. Wood? Or should I call you…Mom?’”

  “I would never play with your mother’s emotions that way.”

  “Then, before she fully understands what she’s doing, he’ll whisk her off to some tropical island, butter her up in a little beach hut with perfect clothes, then lure her onto a stage so he can propose marriage in front of half the U.N.”

  “Okay, so I admit…that part was over the line.”

  Amanda shifted around on the couch. “There were delegates from the U.N. there? What about, like, ambassadors and governors and stuff?”

  I shook my head. “I already know where you’re going with this—no one there had the specific jurisdictional authority to expunge our parking tickets—I already checked.”

  “Damn,” Amanda said. “Is there any way I can get into this gig? I’m a good actress, and my family would love Marcus. Does he have a brother who needs a fake girlfriend?”

  I stifled a smirk.

  “I’d even be willing to do a pregnancy announcement on CNN. I’m a lot more flexible then Becca here.”

  I chuckled. “Yeah, right. You have Barry now.”

  He didn’t rise to take the bait. In fact, he didn’t do anything but stare steadily back at us, his eyes heavy with remorse. “I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. I’m truly, deeply sorry. I’ll say it as many times as you’d like to hear, and do anything I can to make it right.”

  There was a hitch in her breathing, and she glanced at me tentatively. I saw the telltale signs. The “isn’t that adorable” pursing of her lips, the softening of her eyes as she inwardly melted at the eloquent sincerity.

  I hit her with a pillow.

  Amanda blinked quickly like she was coming up for air. “Shit, you’re right. Sharon doesn’t stand a chance.” She let out another sigh and looked at Marcus. “I’m sure you have to get on the line with your publicist to figure out a way to capitalize on all this media attention.”

  “Just ignore her,” I said. “She’s a little overprotective of me. I’ll text you where to meet us tomorrow after we pick up my mom.” I then looked at Amanda. “I’m getting paid for all this publicity stuff. And it’s my job, so stop it.”

  “We can renegotiate the contract,” Marcus said. “Since things are far more complicated now.”

  “My best friend needs at least $50,000. I mean, now she has to fool her family and friends. And that’s not cool. Plus, she gets to keep the ring and any future jewelry or clothes you purchase for her. And I promise I won’t let her give the stuff away.”

  He grinned. “Done.”

  She held out her hand. “Then we got a deal.”

  “Wait. Isn’t this my deal?” I laughed.

  “I’m working on your behalf,” she said. “I should get a cut.”

  When she winked, I laughed.

  “Oh, wait,” Amanda said. “We have to iron out the kissing clause. Is that allowed?”

  I blew out a long breath. “No more kissing. It just gets in the way. We’ll keep it strictly professional. I will do what I was hired to do. Be one hell of a fake girlfriend without tongue.”

  He nodded. “I know this is messing up your life. And I know this is my fault, but I’m going to get us through it,” Marcus said, getting down on one knee. “You don’t have to worry—”

  “You might want to avoid getting down on one knee, buddy…” Amanda muttered, eyeing his submissive position and sensing the impending explosion.

  My eyes narrowed. “Don’t have to worry?”

  “I’m just saying, I’m going to take care of this,” he said earnestly. “It’s like you said, in a month or so, it will all be over, and we’ll get back to our happy lives.”

  “I’d also keep your face away from her shoes,” Amanda said.

  My gaze met his. “The entire world thinks the two of us are getting married because you had the nerve to propose. My mother is flying down from Washington to roast me alive for not mentioning that I’ve apparently fallen in love, and it’s only a matter of time before CNN, NBC, MSNBC, and whatever other news channels there are find me and lay siege to my apartment. We’ll have to build a moat! Deevus will starve because we won’t be able to leave to get him food! The roaches will get sealed in with us!” I sucked in a breath and jumped to my feet, pulling Amanda up too as Marcus went scrambling back. “So tell me again—how exactly do you expect me not to worry?”

  “Rebecca,” he said practically, holding up his hands for peace, “Enough with the theatrics. I seriously doubt we’ll have to build a moat—”

  “Well, maybe I should just move in with you in that fancy mansion.”

  Oh, yeah. He’d hate that! I loved putting him on the spot. Just like he did me with the marriage proposal. But at least I’d have peace and quiet from all the paparazzi that would soon be camped out below my apartment.

  He laughed as if I was joking.

  “I’m serious, baby doll.”

  “Well then, sweetie. I’ll get a room prepared for you ASAP.”

  “Okay, we’re moving way too fast. I was just kidding.”

  Amanda met his gaze. “If Becca doesn’t want to, I’d be more than welcome to move into the guest quarters.”

  I playfully slugged her.

  She laughed. “What girl wouldn’t want to stay in that mansion? You saw it at the party. It was mindblowing!”

  Marcus suddenly got a phone call and had to immediately leave. I waved goodbye as he rushed off.

  Chapter 5

  I sometimes wondered if Amanda and I were single-handedly keeping the tequila industry in business.

  The bottle lay on the floor between us, spinning empty as we took turns knocking it back and forth. Deevus had been crouched in a wedge between the wall and the television for the last forty minutes waiting for a mouse to make its move.

  “Okay, so you get what I mean now? About the eyes?”

  Amanda nodded, half-slumped atop a fallen cushion. “Yeah—those eyes are pretty intense. I would have fallen for the eyes too.” She gave the bottle another whirl. “Barry’s eyes are brown.”

  “I think brown eyes are the best.”

  She shrugged. “They’re pretty. But Marcus’s eyes…they’re dreamy.”

  I tilted my head drunkenly to the side. “Well, at least Barry would never take you to a tropical island and fake propose.”

  The bottle paused.

  “Yeah,” Amanda made a face, “good thing I never have to worry about that.”

  We laughed and rolled onto our backs, staring up the creaking ceiling fan is it spun in a long-suffering circle. After a minute, I shook my head.

  “No, yo
u’re going to have the perfect proposal. The perfect man. And the perfect wedding. And best of all…it will all be real.”

  “Maybe I’ll date Stan downstairs. He’s really quiet and boring. But he’s cute. And I wouldn’t have any drama in my life.”

  She shook her head, trying and failing to sit up. “Whoa, your standards have gotten low.”

  “Low standards?” I mocked, waving my ring in front of her face. “You call this low?”

  She giggled and snatched it off my hand, trying it on herself. “Oh my gosh,” she said in alarm, dropping her hand dramatically to the floor. “How do you even keep from knocking into things? This thing is insane.”

  “I know.” I shook my head self-righteously. “A veritable albatross.”

  “I bet it wouldn’t even fit into the bottle,” she mused, holding them both up and squinting appraisingly. I took them from her hands.

  “Let’s see.”

  With a wave of comedic brute strength, I shoved the ovesize ring against the mouth of the bottle. It fell inside with a loud clink.

  We both froze.

  “Oh shit!” Amanda cried.

  “Why did you make me do that?” I panicked as I started shaking the bottle wildly upside down. It became immediately apparent that the ring wasn’t going anywhere.

  She grabbed a pencil and handed it to me. “I didn’t make you do anything—you’re the one who shoved it down there!”

  “What am I supposed to do with this?” I waved the pencil around. “Write the mayor?”

  “You need to leverage it out,” she explained, miming the motion. “It’s basic physics.”

  “That’s…” I paused, “an interesting idea.”

  We fiddled around with it for about a minute before throwing the pencil down in despair.

  “That’s never going to work! I don’t even think it’s scientifically sound!”

  Her face fell as though she’d been let down. “I saw it once in a movie.”

  “A movie?! I thought you said—”

  “I thought I saw it in a movie,” she murmured, “but I might have made it up.”

  “Enough! We’ve got to get it out of there!” I shook my head as the obvious solution hit me hard. I only hoped it didn’t somehow backfire. “Okay…one thing left to do!”

  I took off down the hall to the bathroom, Amanda scampering along behind.

  “What are you going to do?” she asked with wide eyes as I prepped the tub. “Wait…why do you need to use my towel?”

  I finished spreading the towel out and took a giant step back. “In case it gets glass in it.”

  “Yeah, I got that,” she glared, “but why do you need to use mine—”

  With a fierce shriek, I hurled the bottle down into the tub.

  …nothing happened.

  I blinked. “Well, I thought—”

  “Give it here, you weakling.” She sneered, picking it up and winding back her arm.

  She cast it down with all her strength, but again, nothing.

  We both frowned.

  “They must use really thick glass to protect it during shipping—”

  “I’ve got an idea,” she said excitedly. She disappeared for a moment, then sailed back into the room clutching a hammer, a bat, and two pairs of ski glasses her parents had gotten us for Christmas. Her eyes sparkled as she handed one pair to me.

  I nodded my head, acknowledging the genius. “That’s brilliant.” We strapped them on like the athletes we’d always intended to be, and I took the hammer. “Awright, you ready?”

  Her eyes grew unnaturally focused. “I was born for this.”

  On the count of three, we both lunged for the bottle, hitting and swinging with all our hearts. Someone—we could never settle who—finally cracked the thing, but instead of stopping, we launched farther into the fray, giggling and screaming as we slowly demolished every sizable piece of glass.

  Beaming, I carefully extracted the ring, which I’d had the good sense to sweep to the side before the battle really heated up.

  “There,” I said with a wide smile. “No harm done.”

  There was a loud, belated snap! and a huge crack sprang up the center of the tub.

  Our faces fell as we stared at it, panting in the quiet aftermath.

  “You know,” Amanda said quietly, “this relationship situation may suck, but no matter how it might have spun off the rails, you did, in fact, sign up for it. What you need to do now is grow up, take the high road, and do the mature thing here.”

  My shoulders wilted. “I should suck it up?”

  She shook her head, looking startled that I’d even mentioned it.

  “You should get even.”

  So…confession. I may have deleted Marcus’ number from my phone, but in truth, I’d memorized it by the end of the first day. In hindsight, this was probably a bad thing, because I had no problem dialing him up—despite the absurd amount of alcohol I’d already imbibed.

  “Rebecca?” he asked curiously, answering on the first ring. “I didn’t think I’d be hearing from you until—”

  I laughed. “Well, you’re hearing from me now.”

  I hiccupped, and there was a pause on the other end.

  “You two got into the tequila again, didn’t you?”

  “That’s neither here nor there,” I slurred, watching as Amanda signed our names into the powdered glass with the tip of a razor. “Listen, we’re going out, and we’re inviting you to come.”

  There was another incredulous pause. But when Marcus finally spoke, he sounded noticeably brighter, even relieved. “Where are we going?”

  “Karaoke!” Amanda shouted happily, deviating from our secret plan. I shushed her with a furious look and her voice dropped down to an apologetic whisper, “Karaoke.”

  This time, the pause was even longer still.

  Marcus was not a man who really, how should I put it…feared things. There were things that made him uncomfortable, some things that he’d even actively avoid. But nothing that he actually downright feared.

  Except singing in public.

  It was his nightmare, confessed to me in a rare moment of open sharing that night on the beach. But you know my nightmare? Right after enraging my mother and public dancing, both of which he’d already made me do?

  Getting married.

  That’s right. A pound for a pound. An eye for an eye.

  He proposed to me on an international platform, so I was making him do this. He couldn’t control every part of this relationship, even if it was fake. Besides, he might just have fun! Sometimes, he would have to leave his comfort zone. Sometimes, he’d have to be the one to make some sacrifices. And I could think of no better way to make that happen.

  He cleared his throat, clearly trying to keep it together as he made up his mind. “And where are we going to do this?” His forced cheer wasn’t fooling anyone.

  “K-town.” I grinned mischievously. “That’s ‘K’ for karaoke. And Korea. It’s in Korea-town.”

  “I know what K-town is.”

  “Just making sure.”

  This time, the pause was all mine. Until—

  “Rebecca,” he accepted the challenge, “I’ll see you there.”

  Chapter 6

  Karaoke with Marcus Taylor…there really are not words.

  I lay in bed the next morning, staring up at the ceiling with an arm thrown across my forehead. Basking in the afterglow. Playing scenes over in my mind. Trying to decide if it had really happened, or if it was a cautionary side effect of drinking too much tequila.

  Marcus had met us at the club. And by club, I mean a little hole-in-the-wall dive bar in the middle of Korean-town reeking with the stench of soy sauce and yesterday’s saké still dripping down the wall. He wore a white collared shirt—pulled open a few buttons—and dark jeans. Nothing flashy. Nothing that would make him stand out.

  Nothing except the priceless look on his face.

  Handsome features aside, I think I could have picked him
out of a crowd based on nothing but his twitching, petrified expression. He looked like prey.

  “Hi guys,” he said robotically as his eyes drifted up to the stage.

  A black painted stool was perched in front of a microphone and a large speaker. Directly in front of the stage, ten or twelve tables of noisy, laughing collage kids were throwing back shots and shouting back and forth—daring each other to try.

  The more they drank, the more they yelled, the more Marcus’ eyes dilated in abject terror. A thin layer of sweat appeared on his forehead, and he started tugging nervously on the cuffs of his sleeves. With how much I’d already had to drink, I actually felt sorry for him.

  “How about we get some shots?” I asked helpfully as Amanda and I snagged a table in a corner near the back.

  Marcus mumbled something about that being a good idea and disappeared to find a bartender. The second he was gone, Amanda grabbed my wrist over the table.

  “Okay, mission abort. I feel bad.” Her eyes followed him sympathetically.

  He was standing awkwardly at one end of the bar, seemingly unaware of the proper etiquette if one’s server wasn’t wearing coattails. With a drunken grin, I crossed the room to help.

  “Hey!” I yelled loudly, hopping up onto the counter and leaning on my stomach. “Can we get some drinks down here?” The frazzled bartender flashed me the ‘one second’ sign, and I grinned, turning back to Marcus. “What’s it going to be?”

  “Whiskey,” he said without pause. There was a faint tremor in his hands as his eyes flickered back to the stage, and I felt myself suddenly soften as well.

  “Hey, listen.” I put my hands on his shoulders, and for the first time since arriving, he actually met my gaze.

  His eyes widened as they travelled down my body in one fell swoop. Amanda and I had dressed up for the occasion. And by dressed up, I mean, dressed down. I was wearing ink black jeans that hung low on my bony hips, and the shirt I was sporting wasn’t really a shirt at all. It was more of a halter-like scarf that stretched to cover anything important before falling in a stylish knot down my back. In short, he was probably seeing more of me now than he had when I was in the bikini.