Escorting the Groom (The Escort Collection 4)

Serena ordered the chef's tasting of sashimi and a $1,500 bottle of Veuve Clicquot champagne. "Glad you're buying." She motioned for the waiter to fill her glass.

"I'm only buying if this is actually beneficial. And I don't consider watching you day-drink in a jumpsuit particularly productive."

"Well then… let's get productive, shall we?" She took a healthy swallow and put her glass down then leaned toward me across the table. "I'll cut right to the chase. I found out about you. About Blake."

I grabbed the champagne and filled my glass to the brim. "Found out what?"

"About her… you know… questionable work history." Her voice was a whisper, and her cheeks were flushed.

Fuck. I wanted to reach across the table and throttle her, but something was off. Her tone was almost gentle. She wasn't flashing me an evil grin and going in for the kill.

That was not like my sister, not at all.

I decided to play straight with her. "What about it?"

Her throat worked as she swallowed more champagne. "I had her investigated before the wedding, right after that first dinner. I knew there was no way a woman that gorgeous had flown below my radar until you somehow plucked her from obscurity. Something was definitely off. So I looked into it."

I had to protect Blake. When my sister got a hold of something, she was like an Armani-collared dog with a bone. "What do you want, Serena?"

"You can't give me what I want, because I already screwed this up." She shook her head, her cheeks heating and her eyes glistening. "I should've come to you first. Instead, I got so drunk at your wedding that I blathered on and on about my plan to ruin you to Robert." She sat back and swiped at her face.

I was baffled. Is my sister crying? "And?"

Serena carefully wiped her face again, keeping her makeup intact, and drained her glass. "And he said that you looked happy."

"So?"

Serena sniffled. "He said he'd never seen you look happy before."

I wasn't sure where this was going. "So…"

"He said he'd out me if I went after you. For marrying him and staying married to him because I had to." Serena didn't wait for the waiter to come back; she just filled her glass and kept the bottle within reach. "Because our marriage wasn't real. It wasn't real, and I divorced him as soon as I felt like I could."

Well, well, well. I crossed my arms against my chest and calmly regarded my sister. "So you cheated the trust provisions."

"I cheated. Just like you did." She sniffled again. I couldn't ascertain why she was upset—if it was about the money or something else, like the fact that Robert had thwarted her plans.

"I thought your marriage to Robert was real."

"It got a little too real, to be honest. He wanted me to stay home, be boring and get pregnant. But I'm sorry, I just couldn't tolerate that! He was asking me to be normal, and I'm not made for that." She pushed her sashimi around on her plate without taking a bite. "On top of that, I was starting to like him more than I should. It was getting sort of gross."

I decided to keep my mouth shut about the fact that she'd been married to him, and that liking him was hardly a problem. This was Serena after all, who lived in the land of $1,500 bottles of champagne at lunch and no common sense. "But how could he out you? Where's the proof? You dated him; you married him."

She raised her eyes to look into mine. "I asked him to marry me in exchange for five million dollars."

I sat back. "And he said yes?" Robert was wealthy in his own right; he was a doctor because he loved it, but he had his own family money. And I'd never seen him act as though he loved money or the spotlight. He'd acted as if he loved Serena, though. Had he fooled me for all these years?

She shook her head. "He said no. But then he proposed because he said he loved me."

"And?"

"You were at the wedding. I think you know what happened."

"But you stayed married for more than a year," I said.

She nodded. "I stayed married for longer so it looked real, and so you and Mother couldn't give me a hard time. And so that Robert would think I gave it an actual shot."

"You played the poor bastard."