New York Billionaires Series

“That’s the least romantic proposal story I’ve ever heard.”

“It’s also the truth,” I say. “My business partners will expect it.”

She chews on her bottom lip again. “You’re right. It’ll work in our favor, actually. To play on that.”

I run a hand through my hair and consider the options before me. Going to this dinner won’t be easy. It won’t be fun. But it will help soften the image I know I have. An image I’ve cultivated and never minded before. It’s also an image that, at times, makes me somewhat unapproachable.

I know. I’m a paragon of self-awareness.

Cecilia is the opposite. She makes housekeepers laugh and brandishes champagne sabers like swords.

“We got married at City Hall because we couldn’t wait,” she murmurs, looking down at her phone.

“We didn’t want a big ceremony.”

“That’s right,” she says. “We’d worked so closely before, too, in the office. We already knew each other very well.”

“That was my argument, once,” I say. “But someone said that we were strangers.”

She looks up at me, a smile flashing across her lips. “Yes. Well, we were. Still are.”

“We’re not strangers, Cecilia.”

“I don’t know where you grew up,” she counters. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“I know enough,” I say, thinking of all the little things I’d noticed in the last couple of weeks. Her running habits, her sleeping patterns. The sweet chai tea she liked to drink in the evenings, the book she’d accidentally left on the kitchen counter when I came down one morning.

The curve of her waist. The silky sheath of her hair.

I know her better than probably anyone currently in my life.

The same emotion flashes through her eyes again. It looks like hurt, but that makes no sense. Odds are I’m misreading her.

Wouldn’t be the first time.

“Okay,” she murmurs. “All right. Well, in that case, I guess we don’t need my questions. Just one more thing… rings.”

“Rings,” I repeat. “Fuck, you’re right. I’d overlooked that.”

Her small, patient smile tells me she hadn’t. “Yes. Well, not having any was fine before, but if we’re to act married in public…”

“We need them,” I say. “I’ll fix it.”

“You will?”

Cecilia nods. “Perfect. Well then, I only have one final question.”

“What’s that?”

“What’s the dress code for tomorrow?”

I shrug. “I’ll be in a suit.”

“Shocker,” she says. “Well, I’ll go for a cocktail dress, then.”

I think of her curves in a tight dress. I think of the way she’d looked when we’d gone out to dinner, with her eyes smoked and a neckline that was… well. I wrest my mind away from that image.Property of Nô)(velDr(a)ma.Org.

“Sounds good.”

She nods again and pushes her phone away. “That’s a wrap on this meeting, then. What time will we-”

Her phone rings. The loud signal cuts through the kitchen, echoing off the walls. She reads the name on the screen and then declines, sliding her phone into her pocket.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “You were saying?”

“I wasn’t talking. You were.” My curiosity gets the better of me, mingling with the image of her in a tight outfit and loose hair. We’d agreed we didn’t need to be celibate. She’s as free to date as I am. “Who was that?”

“Just a friend.”

“The woman who was one of our witnesses?”

“Yes,” she says. “She’s an artist, actually.”

“So that’s why you want me to patronize an art gallery.”

She nods. “It’s her first big show. Her stuff is amazing, but the New York art world is cutthroat, and there are fees just to exhibit.”

Several things click into place at that. Cecilia didn’t just marry me to quit her job. Didn’t just want to fulfill her dream of starting her own business. She married me to make her friend’s dream come true too.

In anyone else, it would be a weakness to care that much, to make business decisions based on sentiment.

But I’m not sure I can call the woman in front of me weak any longer.

She clears her throat. “I was thinking we’d go to the opening together.”

“So I can buy some art, be seen, make some calls.”

It’s no different from what most people want. What every single one of the people who sent us wedding gifts wants. They wanted some of the St. Clair name associated with them, as if the sheen and the prestige of an old family could rub off. But it’s not cheap and platinum-coated. It’s gold through-and-through, and it doesn’t stain.

“I’ll do it.” I rise from the table and put my plate into the sink. Her voice reaches me as I make my way to the hall.

“What do we say to people in a year?” she asks. “When they ask why we divorced?”

I look back at her, still seated cross-legged at my kitchen table. Miss Myers, and not a pencil skirt in sight.

“We tell them the truth,” I say. “We wanted different things.”

“That’s not the truth. We’ll want the exact same thing. To be divorced.”