control to do.
He reached for his coffee and drained it. Real marriage wasn’t something he wanted, hadn’t been on his agenda since the day his first love had walked away from him as though what they’d had meant nothing. He could still feel the cool sting of betrayal as if it was yesterday. But if he could package a marriage of convenience into something that could work for both him and Saffron? Now that was something he’d be willing to do.
BLAKE CONTINUED TO sip his coffee, watching Saffron. She was beautiful. She was talented and accomplished. She was interesting. If he had to pick a wife on paper, she was it.
“So come on, spill,” she said, setting her knife and fork down, surprising him by the fact she’d actually finished her entire breakfast. “The more you tell me you don’t want to talk about yourself, the more I want to know.”
He shook his head. “No.”
Saffron’s laughter made him smile. “What do I have to do then? To make you tell me?”
Now it was Blake’s laughter filling the space between them. “Marry me.”
Her smile died faster than it had ignited, falling from her mouth. She stared back at him, eyebrows drawing slightly closer together. “I think I misheard you.”
Blake smiled, knew he had to tell her his plan carefully, to sell the idea to her instead of having her run for the door and get a restraining order against him. She was probably thinking he was a nut job, some kind of stalker who was obsessed with her after one night together.
“Look,” he said, spreading his hands wide as he watched her. “If you married someone like me, you would have access to the best medical treatments, and you could stay in New York without any worries.”
She did a slow nod. “Funnily enough, I’ve been joking about that with my friends for weeks—that I need to find a wealthy husband. But I’m used to having a successful career and standing on my own two feet.”
Blake shrugged. “What if we did it? If we got married so you could stay in New York and get back on your feet, so to speak? I could pay for any specialist treatment you need to get you dancing again.”
Her gaze was uncertain, maybe even cool. He couldn’t figure out exactly what she thought now that her smile had disappeared. “I know why it would be good for me, I just don’t get why you’d want to do it. What’s in it for you? Why would you want to help me?”
“Marriage to a beautiful ballerina?” he suggested.
“Blake, I’m serious. Why would you marry me unless there’s something in it for you? A hidden catch?”
“Look, plenty of people marry for convenience. Gay men marry women all the time to hide their sexuality if they think it’s going to help their career or please their family.”
She sighed. “Well, I know you’re not gay. Unless you put on the performance of your life last night, that is. And anyway, I know plenty of gay people, and it hasn’t hurt their careers at all, to be honest.”
“Well, you’re a dancer. Corporate America isn’t always so accepting, even if they pretend to be.”
“Back to you,” Saffron said, studying him intensely, her eyes roving over his face. “Tell me now, or I’m walking out that door.”
Blake wasn’t about to call her bluff. Just because she needed a boost in finances didn’t mean she was automatically going to say yes to marrying a stranger.
“Running my father’s company was never part of my plan,” he told her. “Now I’m CEO of a company that I’m proud of, but not a natural fit for. It’s not the role I want to be in, but there’s also no way I’m about to let that company fall into the wrong hands. I need to keep growing it, and I’m working on two of the biggest deals in the company’s history.”
“I hear you, and I’m sorry you don’t like what you do, but it doesn’t explain why you need a wife. Why you need to marry me?”
Blake didn’t want to tell her everything, didn’t like talking about his past and what he’d lost to anyone, why he didn’t want a real wife, to open himself up to someone again. Eventually he’d have to tell her, otherwise she’d end up blindsided and their marriage would be uncovered as a sham, but not right now. Not until he knew he could trust her.
“I’m sick of the whole tabloid thing, the paps following me because some stupid magazine announced that I was one of New York’s most eligible men.” They’d called him the Billion Dollar Bachelor, the headlines had screamed out that women should be fighting over the former soldier back in the city as a corporate CEO and he hated it. Hated the attention and being known for his family’s money after doing everything in his power to prove his own worth, make his own way in the world. But most of all he hated that people he most needed to impress right now read the rubbish being written, viewed him as a playboy, were unsettled by the fact that he wasn’t settled.
“My dad built up the company as a family business, and our clients like that, especially a large-scale investor I’ve been working on for months. I don’t want them to start thinking the company isn’t going to continue to succeed because some loser rich-kid playboy is at the helm, and if I can set the right image now, it won’t matter if I’m not married in a few years’ time because the deals will be done.”
Saffron didn’t say anything when he paused, just stared at him.
Blake laughed. “Plus I’d like to get my mother and two sisters off my back. They’re driving me crazy, trying to set me up all the time.” He stood, pushing his hands into his pockets, watching, waiting for a reaction. He probably shouldn’t have added the joke about getting them off his back. “So what do you think?”
“What do I think?” she muttered. “I think you’re crazy!”
“We can talk through the details later, but please just think about it.”
“Wow,” Saffron said, holding up her hand. “I need time to think, to process how absurd this is.”
“It’s not that absurd,” he disagreed.
“This is only-in-the-movies absurd,” she fired back. “I’m not saying no, but I can’t say yes right now, either.”
Blake nodded. “I need to head in to the office. Why don’t you stay here a bit, take your time and meet me back here tonight if you decide to say yes. I can get the paperwork and everything sorted out pretty quick, and we can go choose a ring together tomorrow.”
Saffron shook her head, smiling then bursting into laughter. “I can’t believe you’re actually serious, that I’m not just being punked right now.”
“Sweetheart, I’m deadly serious.”
Blake took a few steps forward, touched her chin gently and tipped her face up, his thumb against her smooth skin. He slowly lowered his head and dropped his lips over hers, plucking softly at her lips.
“So we’d actually be married?” she asked, breathless, when she pulled back, mouth
