He caught a glimpse of Liz chewing on her popcorn. "Am I meeting the parents?" He had the most adorable grin.
I could feel the girls melting. They'd all seen him in pictures and on TV. But pictures only partially captured his charisma. In his presence, you felt the full force of it.
Jas stepped up and introduced herself before I could, putting her hand on his arm. "I'm Jasmine, one of the roommates. Everyone calls me Jas. Haley's told us so little about you." She shot a quick, teasing glance at me. "The news says you're a duke. What should we commoners call you?"
"In the States, Riggins will do." He was amused. "In the UK, you'll have to call me Your Grace, I'm afraid."
Jas' hand lingered too long on his arm. "Are you planning to adopt a delightful British accent?"
I stepped between them. "Stop teasing him, Jas." I pulled Riggins away from her. "That's Liz on the couch."
Liz waved.
I grabbed Sid, put my arm around her shoulders, and pulled her forward to meet him. "This is my sister, Sidney."
I could feel Sid sizing him up, trying to decide whether I should sacrifice myself with him for her sake. I was losing. I could tell from her expression she thought I was crazy not to snap him up immediately, even knowing he didn't want me.
Liz and Jas had no clue. He charmed them and looked at me so adoringly that even I almost believed his act. I wondered for a brief moment if Milia had taught him how to act at her spy school.
I left him with the girls for a minute while I went into the kitchen and put the flowers in a vase of water. Laughter floated back to me. He was charming them, wrapping them in his spell.
Don't get too attached to the charming duke, I wanted to tell them. He may not be in our lives long.
The thought made me totally conflicted. Because, of course, I wanted a cure for Sid as soon as possible. If he could find it in the next few days, that would be a miracle. It would be perfect.
Except…I would lose out on the chance to be a duchess. I had promised Riggins. I wouldn't go back on my word. I didn't think. But what Milia had told me kept running through my mind.
When I returned to the living room, the girls were taking selfies with him. Jas was openly flirting.
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. I grabbed Riggins' hand and pulled him toward the door. "We should be going. We don't want to be late."
I got Riggins out of the house as quickly as I could. I practically had to pry him loose from the girls.
He drove a Ferrari, a beautiful, classic red one. One question answered. He opened my car door for me and handed me into my seat.
The girls were peeking through the curtains at us as we drove away.
As soon as we were out of the driveway, I let out a sigh of relief. "Gah! I'm so sorry about the girls. They've never met a billionaire before, let alone a duke. Did you feel like a specimen on display?"
He laughed. "I'm used to it."
"I shouldn't have let you come to the house."
"You couldn't have stopped me," he said, eyes on the road. "Your sister is gorgeous and charming. I wanted to meet her. She obviously loves and looks up to you."
I nodded, feeling a twinge of jealousy that he thought she was gorgeous. I would be lying if I said I'd never been envious of Sid's looks. But I'd never felt a deep, gut-burning jealousy like this before. "Yes, she is."
"So are you, Haley." He tossed the comment off too casually for me to take seriously.
It was an afterthought. Had to be.
What did I care about beauty? There were more important things than being admired for my looks. I twisted my hands in my lap. "So, you had an ulterior motive for picking me up at the house? You wanted to meet the girl whose life is at stake in our little game?" I phrased it dramatically on purpose.
He glanced at me. "The quality of her life is at stake."
"Her odds of living a full life decrease with every passing year."
"We'll help her, Haley. I promise."
He was so confident that I believed him. I'd never thought confidence was particularly sexy before. But now? Maybe it was. As long as it wasn't overconfidence. Arrogance was a turnoff.
Riggins
Our table was waiting for us when we arrived. The restaurant was on one of the piers downtown. It had a view of the dark night water sparkling beneath the lights. Of ferries crossing the sound on their regular runs. During the day, it had a view of the Olympic Mountains. At night, with the reflections in the water, it was magical.
"Does the paparazzi always follow you around?" Haley asked when we were seated.
We'd had to fight our way through them after dropping off our car at valet parking. They'd snapped their usual zillions of pictures. And shouted questions. I'd given only glib, perfunctory answers.
I shrugged. "Not always."
I didn't want to scare her off so soon. "It's all this duke shit that has them in a frenzy right now. It will settle down again soon." I hoped. "I'm used to it."
I would have preferred anonymity and the ability to go out to dinner without being mobbed and asked ridiculous questions like, "A second date? Do you have your eye on her as your duchess? What about a British girl? A woman from the aristocracy?"
Haley is standing right here, I wanted to shout at them. She has feelings. Their questions made me irrationally angry. I didn't want to be that guy who was a major piece of shit and punched a reporter or decked a guy with a camera. I was supposed to be above all that. Stiff upper lip, now, man, I told myself. Get in touch with your British side.
Unfortunately, my particular British side would have taken a swing at those bastards on sight. The old man, from what I heard, never put up with shit of any kind. And the Dead Duke, he was an evil genius. I was doomed. One of these days, I was going to lose it.
"I'm not sure I could ever get used to people being in my face everywhere I went." She looked innocent, almost vulnerable.
For an instant, I wanted to punch the Dead Duke for putting her in this situation. "It's an acquired taste. It comes with the territory," I said with a grin. "I'm sorry."
Now I was apologizing over something that wasn't my fault. Things were messed up. I made a comical, contrite expression. Something about her brought out my protective side.
She laughed softly and smiled at me beneath her lashes, in an expression that mimicked the late Princess Diana. Coy and flirty at the same time. Teasing. "It's not your fault. A lifetime of having to leave the house in full makeup or be vilified is terrifying. You guys are so lucky."
I laughed. "Yeah. We just have to be sure not to develop a beer gut and go out on the beach with our shirt off."
We settled in to a pleasant meal and small talk. Surprisingly, she was easy to talk to, a good listener, and witty with her replies. She murmured sympathetic comments at all the right times. Laughed at my jokes when even I wasn't sure they were funny. And wasn't afraid to disagree with me. She told funny stories about the bakery. Her love and loyalty toward her sister were obvious. I envied Sid.
I was enjoying myself so much, I lost track of time. Looking at Haley was no hardship, either. I couldn't keep my eyes off her. Milia had transformed Haley into something exotic. She still looked young, but in a less vulnerable, childlike way. Her personality sparkled now, along with her laugh. There was a new confidence about her that was damningly sexy. I cursed Milia for doing too damned good a job on her.
I couldn't get over the difference in Haley's hair. Or stop staring at her eyes, trying to figure out what Milia had done to them. They could hold me in their depths forever, especially when they lit up when she laughed. When she talked, with her hands in full motion, her eyes were expressive and arresting. It was hard to reconcile this woman with the blushing, barefaced girl in the bakery. But they both had their own allure.
"Do I have something in my eyes?"
She'd caught me.
I shook my head. "Just admiring them. Your eyes are gorgeous."
Haley looked startled by my compliment. She opened her mouth and c
losed it just as quickly, breaking into a slow, soft, seductive smile. The kind that made a guy wonder what she was thinking. "Thank you."
"How are they now the same color? Colored contacts?"
She laughed again, not quite nervously. "They aren't. They're the same as they've always been. It's an optical illusion, a trick of the eye shadow and shading Milia used. Green tones on my blue eye. Blue on the green. And suddenly, I have two blue-green eyes."
"Let me see." I too her hands in mine and leaned forward across the table to look. Her hands were slender, cool, and delicate in mine. She wore cheap costume jewelry rings on each finger. Crystals, inexpensive ones. If she were my duchess, I would rectify that. No duchess of mine would wear anything cheap.
I pushed the thought away. She wasn't going to be my duchess.
She leaned into me and batted her eyes exaggeratedly.
I laughed. "You'll have to close your eyes so I can see the shadow."
As she smiled and closed her eyes, tilting her head back slightly, I caught another whiff of her perfume. It had been tantalizing me, and teasing my senses, since I'd first picked her up. If someone had picked it specifically to turn me on and give me warm memories of this evening with her, they couldn't have done a better job. Whatever perfume it was, she hadn't worn it before at the bakery or at our meeting with Thorne. I would have remembered a scent that made me think of sex.
As I stared into her closed eyes, a flash went off. Someone had snapped our picture.
"Well?" she said.
"Yes," I said. "I see it now." I saw other things, too. The gentle curve of her neck. Her soft, smooth complexion. Her delicate fingers clutched in mine.
She opened her eyes and kept smiling at me. "Someone took our picture, didn't they?"
I nodded.
"Will we end up on the nightly news? Or the Saturday evening entertainment shows? Or just a social media post?
"What will the commentators speculate about why you're staring into my closed eyes? Lovers typically stare deeply into open eyes, right? What was I imagining?" She lowered her voice comically. "What were we thinking?"
Yes, what?
"Did I look rapturous? Or dreamy? Like I'm falling in love and angling to be your duchess before the other girls get a chance at you?" She leaned across the table and whispered in my ear, "Am I doing a good job of creating the kind of buzz we need? Or should I amp it up?"
If she amped it up, I was going to lose the precious thread of self-control I was hanging on to. When had she become so damn seductive?
I should have let go of her hands. I didn't. "Keep it up. I think we're fooling them and stirring up just the right kind of gossip to keep other girls away and fool Thorne."
"Can I ask you something?" She cocked her head, studying me.
"Anything."
She sighed sweetly. "Sid thinks having money will ruin my chances of finding true love. That whether I end up with millions, or hundreds of millions, I'll wonder about every guy who comes my way. Is he in love with me? Or with my money?" Even her frown was pretty, almost a pout. "How do you handle love? Do you ever worry you'll never find someone who only loves you?"
"I don't." I let go of her hands and pulled mine back. I didn't want her getting the wrong idea. "Maybe that's why I'm still alone."
Her frown deepened. "No one's turned your heart over yet? Someday. What happens then? When your heart wants what it wants? And your head doubts?"
"I'll marry another billionaire." I winked.
She shook her head. "Too glib. How many single female billionaires are there to choose from, anyway? Half a dozen? It's a small circle. Wouldn't you have met her by now? What if your billionaire only wants your title? How many billionaire duchesses do you know?
"Mr. Thorne said it's highly unusual for a woman to inherit a dukedom and become a duchess on her own. If a woman wants to be a duchess, she has to marry a duke to do it. So, there it is, something a rich female billionaire with her eye on a title can't buy."
"I'll add 'only wants me for my title' to the list." I raised an eyebrow. "Are you trying to make me insecure?"
She licked her lips and shrugged. Her eyes sparkled in the candlelight, searching mine. "I can't make you anything. If you feel insecure, it's all on you. I'm only pointing out how small the odds are."
"You’re my bookmaker now?"
"Maybe."
I held her gaze, giving her a piercing look, the one I used on fierce business competitors. If she wilted under it, she wasn't who I hoped she was. "Is love the most important thing to you?"
She looked at me like it was a rhetorical question.
We sat in silence while I waited for her answer.
"Oh, I see. That's an actual question, not merely rhetorical." She sighed. "Yes. Of course it is. Love brings happiness." She held my gaze. "Is that the wrong answer?"
"There is no wrong answer. Only dangerous choices. Does love bring happiness?" I thought of the heartbreak she'd feel if her sister died. I could have held out the hope I'd found for her, but I held back, saving it for the end of the evening. "I'm not so sure. I could find a fair number of people who would disagree with you."
"You would know it does, I think, if you'd ever felt the real thing."
"Have you?" I was genuinely curious. Was I dealing with a woman whose heart had been broken before? Or a girl who was still a naïve romantic? "I'm talking about romantic love. Not friendship. Not love for your sister."
She shook her head. "No. Not yet."
She sounded incredibly sad.
Damn, I thought. A girl who doesn't know better. She was ripe for some douchebag to come along and hurt her. "But you want it?"
"Yes," she said slowly. "I do." She bit her lip. "But you never know if you'll be one of the lucky ones in life who finds that kind of passionate, loyal, undying love. Or if you'll limp along with heartbreak after heartbreak. Or end up a lonely cat lady."
I laughed. "Have you noticed all the heads you've been turning tonight? You won't end up alone. You'll only be a crazy cat lady if you want to be."
She smiled softly. "That doesn't mean I won't be lonely." She paused. "But any sacrifice is worth it to save Sid. Even forcibly getting a pile of money thrust on me."
She laughed suddenly and stroked my leg with her bare foot beneath the table, sending an unexpected surge of desire through me.
"One thing is for certain," she said. "We know exactly each other's motives for being together. That gives our 'relationship' an honesty about it that we aren't likely to find with anyone else."
She picked up her glass of wine. "To us. Cheers."
Chapter 11
Haley
The evening had me rattled. Being near Riggins had me rattled. I'd expected to like him less after getting to know him better, not more. I'd thought that when he became more of a real person to me, some of the fantasy would wear off. Instead, I found myself fantasizing about him falling for me. It was dangerous territory, falling for a man who was actively trying not to marry me. But I couldn't help myself.
A day ago, I wouldn't have believed it, but Riggins made me feel beautiful. The way he looked at me nearly took my breath away.
Milia had been spot on with her coaching. But I was finding I didn't need it as much as I'd feared. There was something natural and easy about being in Riggins' company. And even his cynical view of relationships didn't put me off him. Maybe, beneath it all, he was just vulnerable, like we all were on one level or another.
All I knew was that dinner flew by. I didn't want the evening to end.
After we finished our coffee and dessert, he leaned forward and took my hand. "Do you like to dance?"
And here was the conundrum—tell the truth, or follow Milia's instructions?
"I like the idea of dancing." I smiled back at him. "But I'm not like other girls who seem to know how to move instinctively and who've nurtured that talent through years of lessons. I never had lessons. Not one. I was never in any danger of being on my high school
dance squad." My voice was just a trace sad. "Mom was sick so much when I was young, and Dad just never…
"Dance lessons were too much for him." I shrugged like it didn't matter, and blinked back real tears of missing Dad.
At the same time, damn. I couldn't get Milia's voice out of my head. I heard her gentle Parisian purr coaching me on how to win Riggins' heart.
When Riggins smiled, the corners of his eyes creased slightly and the trace of a dimple appeared. It was adorable. My breath caught. He was genuinely pleased with himself. And I was…
What was I? A liar? It was true I'd never had a dance lesson before today, but…
"Good!" His face lit up. "I have the perfect surprise—something you've never done before. I've booked a private lesson with the top Latin dancer in the city."
I smiled just enough to look uncertain, but pleased. "What? Are you kidding?"
Milia had warned me to act surprised.
He shook his head. "Well?"
"What can I say?" I pressed a hand to my abdomen and forced the nervous flutters away. "Another dream come true."
The Millennium Ballroom was located on the third floor of a historic building that had been erected in 1890. Seattle burned to the ground in 1889, so there weren't many buildings much older than it.
I had never been to The Millennium Ballroom. Sid, who had had dance lessons, thanks to me, had been many times. Guys took her there to impress her. Sometimes she went with her friends, trolling for guys. Sid loved dancing and always found a slew of willing partners. I was certain, should I have ventured to the ballroom, I would have been your proverbial wallflower. And probably happily so.
The paparazzi seemed to be tailing us. Flashes went off in our faces as Riggins put his hand in the small of my back, sending a shiver of pleasure up my spine, and walked me into the building that housed the ballroom. He held the door open for me and we escaped into the relative sanctuary of the elevator.
"Ever heard of bachata?" His eyes danced.
"No," I lied. "Are we playing an improve your vocabulary game? If so, I'm guessing a kind of rum?"
He grinned at me, because I was clearly teasing.