Grace's Fake Groom Read online

  “But … why?” Grace couldn’t fathom anything so … nasty. She settled her gaze on Chase Ryan. Despite his impeccable choice of suit wear and the hard set of his chin and brow, a glint of something softer reflected in his eyes. Sorrow, perhaps? He was trying to hide it, she felt sure of that, but he was keeping up the tough-guy charade with her.

  “I’m surprised you didn’t already know about it.”

  A sinking weight settled into her stomach. She wasn’t surprised, not at all. Grace had been trying to land a job in law for months, and with virtually no experience, she’d hit block wall after block wall. Then suddenly the clouds parted and Judith, the office manager, who had apparently gone with Kate, had given her a shot.

  And now she knew why. It was as if employing her and leaving her behind was a parting shot at Chase, as if to say, “Here’s some help for you—good luck.”

  She had no idea what Chase had done to tick off his lead attorney, but she hated being used. Hated it.

  Seething, Grace lifted her chin. “What are we going to do about all this?”

  One of Chase’s well-formed brows shot up, as if she’d startled him with her question. “I’m going to be speaking with my attorneys.” He paused. “And … I have to let you go.”

  Two

  Grace blinked, sure she had not heard Chase correctly. Perhaps this was some kind of initiation rite. That had to be it.

  He continued. “I have put in a call to my office manager … and, well, she hasn’t called me back yet.” He sighed, picked up the file and tossed it to the other side of his desk. “She’d know what kind of exit paperwork you’ll need.”

  “Exit paperwork?”

  “For unemployment.”

  She would not walk out of here unemployed. She couldn’t! The word wasn’t part of her vocabulary. She’d worked all through law school and even while studying for the bar.

  Before she could muster a response, he stood, lines etching his forehead. “I’m hungry. You?”

  She opened her mouth, but then shut it, confused. Food was far from her mind. Did he not just fire her? What the heck …

  He walked around to the front of the desk and leaned his strong frame against it. “I know your lunch is ruined. Let’s go have breakfast. I’ll explain further then.”

  “My lunch?”

  He creased his brow further, a distinct vertical line appearing between them. “That spill in your purse from earlier.”

  The puppy!

  She nodded quickly, wishing he had not remembered that—let alone her graceful entrance into the building. “Right. Yes. You’re right.”

  “So … brunch?”

  She eyed him. No light in his gaze. In a way, he reminded her of a puppy himself, one that had just been rapped with a rolled-up newspaper. “Let me go back to my office first and take care of some things.”

  He nodded. “I will meet you in five minutes.”

  She dashed out of there, half annoyed and the other half downright curious. What in the world had Chase done to drive out so much of his staff? Grace laughed aloud, though it was anything but merry.

  “What’re you laughing at?”

  Mick Smythe was squatting on the floor next to the credenza. Quickly, she shut the door behind her.

  “Oh my gosh, you’re here!”

  Mick blew a raspberry. “’Course I am. You didn’t think I wasn’t going to show up my second week on the job, did you?” He paused and pointed to the open drawer. “Who’s our friend?”

  Grace shook her head. “Not now.” She glanced at the closed office door while hitching her purse over her shoulder, thankful that the spot wasn’t too noticeable. And it didn’t smell. At least she thought it didn’t.

  “You okay?”

  “Kind of.” Was it her place to tell him what was going on? Especially since she hoped to change the boss’s mind? “Listen, Mr. Ryan has asked me to meet him for breakfast. Can you take care of the puppy until I get back?”

  Mick pushed up his glasses and shrugged, a comical smile on his face. “Sure. But can I just say something?”

  Grace let out an exaggerated sigh. “Of course.”

  “Be careful. That guy’s reputation with women isn’t sterling.” He paused. “I wouldn’t let my sisters date him.”

  Grace fought the urge to roll her eyes as it would be the second time today. “Got it. Thanks.” If he knew that she was out to save both of their jobs, he might have kept his thoughts to himself.

  At the scowl she undoubtedly gave him, Mick raised both palms. “Just sayin’.”

  Chase’s phone pinged. Judith, his office manager, had sent him a text. Finally.

  Judith: You rang?

  Him: I would expect this from the others, but you?

  Judith: What can I say? I’m weighing my options.

  He pressed his eyes shut. Weighing her options? Judith had been with him, well, she’d been with the firm since before Chase had gone to college. She’d worked for his father, had encouraged him to go to law school, to study hard, and she had stayed on after he’d passed the bar and added his name next to his father’s.

  She’d been his ear more recently as things with his father became more … precarious.

  His eyes opened and he blew out a harsh, pent-up breath, the taste of rejection like poison. Chase glanced at the door to Grace’s office as it opened and she stepped into the hall. He second-guessed his decision to invite the young woman to brunch, on today of all terrible days, but he knew he’d leveled a blow to her fledgling career. The invitation felt like a penance of sorts. For exactly what, he wasn’t sure. Or maybe the invitation was one very big avoidance tactic.

  All he really knew was that those perky eyes of hers dulled at his layoff announcement. And though he doubted she was different from every other ladder-climbing woman he’d met, that look she’d given him had prodded him into doing something he was not known to do: let her down easy.

  Grace sat across from Chase, wiping her hands on a napkin repeatedly, unwilling to accept his explanation. He’d made mention of a falling out between him and Kate, but there had to be more than a lovers’ spat at the core of this sudden exodus from the Law Offices of Ryan & Ryan.

  But what?

  He turned his chin slightly, eyeing her. “I will email you a letter of recommendation.”

  Yes, well, that’ll pay the bills …

  Chase’s phone rang and he scowled. He snapped a look at her. “Sorry. Need to take this.” He lifted the phone to his ear. “Judith.”

  Grace sipped her coffee, her interest perked at the name of the firm’s office manager on the line. The woman spoke loud enough for the neighboring table to hear her—not that she was complaining.

  “I got your texts!”

  “I assume you have weighed your options, then,” Chase was saying in response.

  “For heaven’s sake, Chase, you didn’t think I was serious when I texted you that!?”

  Chase’s brows rose. “Then what did you mean?”

  “Honestly, I had no idea Kate had this planned. I had a dentist appointment this morning—didn’t you remember that?”

  His shoulders lowered visibly and he shut his eyes for a brief moment. He sucked in his top lip then said, “No. Your personal life had not occurred to me.”

  “Don’t get snippy with me, Chase! You need me right now, I must say. What are you going to do with the cruise this weekend? Have you thought about that?”

  Grace peered at him over her coffee mug and caught him sneaking a look at her. No doubt he was wondering how much she had heard. She had no thought of feigning ignorance.

  “Chase? Your father is expecting you—and you cannot NOT show up there. And you’d better not show up alone either.”

  Chase snapped another look at Grace and scowled. He turned back to the phone. “Listen, I’m speaking to Grace right now. Why don’t we continue this later.”

  “We definitely will. I will see you as soon as this novocaine wears off. I hate this stuff.”r />
  He slid his phone back into his pocket, a tiny smile emerging on his face.

  “Happy to learn that your office manager hasn’t jumped ship?”

  His eyebrows knit together. “Something like that.”

  She set her mug down. “So, speaking of ships, a cruise this weekend. Mexico?”

  He lowered his brows.“Yes.”

  “Hmm.”

  “What does that mean?”

  She shrugged. “Timing seems … rough.”

  He set his jaw, his look like a dagger. “It’s an obligation.”

  She laughed. “Really? Sounds like a vacation to me.”

  Those green eyes of his darkened to the color of a dense forest. “I’m not in the habit of discussing my plans with my employees.”

  “Perfect. Apparently I’m not an employee anymore.”

  “Do you always say what you’re thinking?”

  She paused, knowing this could be a trick. One of her law professors always said, “Know when to stop talking.” She did not want her boss—well, her potentially ex-boss—to think she could not follow this basic courtroom advice. “I like to think of it as saying what I believe, of not backing down from that.”

  “And you believe that I have no business taking a vacation at this crucial time.”

  She paused. “So what did Judith mean? She sounded almost shrill about, you know, your cruise and all.”

  He leveled a gaze on her. “She meant that I am obligated to attend.”

  “Bummer.”

  His mouth dropped open. “Are you … are you laughing at me?”

  “All I can say is I wish someone would obligate me to sail away on vacation.”

  “It’s not as simple as that.”

  “Three days of no phone, maid service, all the food you can eat and champagne you can drink …”

  “And all the clients I can schmooze with.”

  “Ah. I see. So that’s what she meant when she said you’d better not show up there alone.”

  “Not exactly.” He paused. “Your hearing is excellent, by the way.”

  “Then what exactly did she mean?”

  “You are exasperating.”

  Grace did not respond, but instead leveled her own gaze on Chase. She mentally swatted away all thoughts of wanting to kiss those frowning lips.

  Chase sat back. “She meant that I’d better show up with a fiancée—and that I have until Friday to find one.”

  She was good. He’d never known a freshly baptized lawyer to hold a poker face so well. Usually, that skill took time.

  Grace continued to stare at him, that impish look in her eye.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” he said.

  “How am I looking at you?”

  “Like you have it all figured out.”

  She rustled a bit then. It appeared that she was biting the inside of her cheek. “I wouldn’t say that, but some things are becoming more clear to me.”

  He sighed. “Like?”

  She shrugged. “Kate was more than your co-worker; she was obviously your fiancée. You and she had a falling out and now she’s trying to teach you a lesson.”

  “Is that right?”

  “Well, it’s a theory. Though …”

  “Yes?”

  She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t understand the part about having to find a fiancée by Friday. Seems rather draconian.”

  Chase crossed his arms. “Let me clear some things up for you: Kate was never actually my fiancée. She was pretending to be. For my father’s sake.”

  “What?”

  “Sorry if that doesn’t strike you as particularly kosher, but we had an arrangement, which, if she had not broken it so spectacularly, would have benefitted us both greatly.”

  “Because you were going to what? Extend that fake engagement into a fake wedding? And then break up with her?”

  “You’re onto me.”

  Grace exhaled. “Well, no wonder she’s peeved.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  She leaned her head to one side, as if assessing him. “Did you have it in writing?”

  He narrowed his eyes at her.

  She laughed a little, as if she’d caught him. “So … your ex-girlfriend, the woman you worked with day in and day out, had promised to be your ‘fiancée’”—she made quote marks in the air as she said it—“but you didn’t have anything in writing mentioning that this was all make believe.” Grace shook her head. “Men.”

  “I’m confused.”

  “I’ll say.” She shifted in her chair, turning to face him dead on. “She didn’t want it to be fake.”

  Why was he discussing this with her? Chase shook his head. “No, you’ve got it all wrong.” He stuck two fingers into that space between the buttoned collar of his shirt and his neck, loosening his tie as he did. “She-she—of course she knew it was fake!”

  Grace stared back at him and Chase admitted to himself that he’d never met anyone quite like her. Any other office newbie would be sitting in silence across from him, perhaps nodding her head on occasion, definitely agreeing with him—at least outwardly. But she told him what she thought—exactly what she thought—and didn’t appear to be on her way to some kind of nervous breakdown as she did.

  Then again, he did just fire her.

  Tension crept up his back. “Fine. Look. I get that you are wondering about my predicament.”

  Grace picked up her mug of coffee and took a slow sip before saying, “Not really.”

  Chase’s brow rose. He could barely conceal a crack of a smile. “You really are teasing me now.”

  She shrugged. “Maybe.”

  “Well then, will you allow me to explain?”

  She set the mug down rather quickly, he thought, then flashed him a look. “Please do.”

  “My father, Timothy Ryan, started this firm, and though he has long-since retired, he has certain … requirements regarding its future.” Chase swallowed, thinking. “They are rather old fashioned, but he’s my father and I aim to honor his request.”

  “To have a fake fiancée?”

  He speared her with a look, ignoring the clench beginning to form in his jaw. “Bottom line is that Kate had agreed to do the honors, but now that she is gone, I’m in need of a replacement.”

  “That was some job requirement.”

  “It was never a job requirement. If it had been, I’d be in jail.” He shook his head. “No. She and I were close at one time and she knew my father, so she agreed to play along. That’s all.”

  “And then she changed her mind, spread the word that you were a cad, and almost nobody showed up for work. Well, other than Mick and me.”

  Chase sat back. “I was unaware that anyone else showed up. Guess not everyone fell for her story.”

  “Not all of us knew about it.” She batted the air once, as if to say she was moving on. “Have you tried calling her?”

  Was she serious? He narrowed his eyes. “Of course I did.” He shook his head. “Kate and I had a tumultuous relationship. She started at the firm as a paralegal. When she passed the bar, I kept her on and gave her a new title.”

  “Girlfriend?”

  He scowled. “Attorney-at-law.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “We were a good team, as colleagues. I think we both realized early on that anything more between us wouldn’t work. In the meantime, my father had become more insistent that my”—he cleared his throat—“reputation change. Do you understand?”

  She nodded, a somber expression overtaking her features. He hated the effect.

  “The stories aren’t true, you know,” Chase finally said.

  “None of them?”

  His gaze turned steely—he could feel the hard change of it, but couldn’t seem to control himself. Part of him wanted to throw cash on the table and end this now. The other part? He took a breath, steadying himself. The other part of him wanted to lunge across the table and kiss away that pout on her lovely face.
/>   He forced himself to pull his gaze away from her. He had to take back control of this conversation. “Like I noted earlier,” he said, benignly, “Judith will be in soon to talk to you about applying for benefits. I will have her speak with Mick as well.”

  “That won’t be necessary, at least not for me.”

  A knife-like pierce shot through his shoulder. She wasn’t going away easily. “Oh no?”

  “I have a proposal for you. A business proposal.”

  That one brow of his that tended to shoot up at moments when his interest was piqued just did its thing. “Really. And what exactly would that be?”

  “I need a job—and you need a fiancée. Consider the position filled.”

  So it wasn’t exactly the job she had envisioned? Without her quick thinking, Grace would be standing in line at the unemployment office. And she would also be sitting in front of her computer for hours each day, submitting her resume to cold and ruthless human resources bots. At least now she could pay her rent. And maybe eat.

  She may not be working as a lawyer at the moment, but she’d shown herself as resourceful. That was something, right?

  “Something’s not stacking up,” Mick had said while cleaning his glasses on the tail of his shirt. “You’re outta here, but I somehow kept my job.”

  She shrugged, not meeting his eyes. The puppy yelped for attention and Grace was happy to pick him up for a cuddle.

  Mick moved closer. “Why aren’t you ticked?”

  “Because, frankly, I have a lot going on in my family right now anyway.” By the time she talked Chase Ryan into giving her back her job—which is precisely what she planned to do after this little weekend was over—she’d make sure to negotiate a month off to fulfill the requirements of her parents’ will. Ha!

  Mick gawked at her. “You and the boss looked pretty cozy when you came back.”

  She frowned. “Really? I can’t imagine why you’d say that.”

  Mick stared at her a beat longer than was comfortable before breaking eye contact. He put his glasses back onto his nose and strode toward the door. “Guess I better go. Judith said she wanted to talk to me about some things.” He paused and turned to snare her with a look. “You going to be okay?”