“I imagine not.” She shifted, not quite sure what to do next. “Well, I’ve never met your father, but judging by some of the policies here, he’s a very good man.”
Dante nodded. “He is.”
Paige turned and headed toward her car. “Oh…purse,” she said, stopping her progress and turning to look at Dante. He started trying to extricate the glittery bag from the pile in his arms. Then she checked the door. “Never mind, I forgot to lock it.”
“You forgot to lock it?”
“It’s secure down here,” she said, pulling the back door open and depositing the sleeping Ana in her seat.
“Locking it would make it doubly secure,” he said, his tone stiff.
She straightened. “How long have you lived in this country?”
He frowned. “Since I was six. Why?”
“You just…you speak very formal English.”
“It’s my second language. And anyway, Don and Mary speak very formal English. They are quite upper-crust, you know.”
“And you call them by their first names?”
“I was fourteen when they adopted me, which I’m sure you know given your proclivity for tabloids.”
“Wow. Exaggerate much? Proclivity…”
“And,” he continued as if she hadn’t spoken, “it would have seemed strange to call them anything other than their first names. I was adopted to be the heir to the Colson empire, more than I was adopted to be a son.”
“Is that what they told you?”
His expression didn’t alter. “It’s the only reason I can think of.”
“Then why aren’t you a Colson?” She’d often wondered that, but she’d never asked, of course. Partly because until today she’d never had more than a moment to speak to him.
“Something Don and I agreed on from the start. I wished to keep my mother’s name.”
“Not your father’s?”
His face hardened, his dark eyes black, blank. “No.”
Paige blinked. “Oh.” She looked back down at Ana, who was sleeping soundly and was buckled tightly into her seat. She closed the door and leaned against the side of the car. “So…I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then.”
“You’ll see me tonight,” he said, turning away from her.
“What?”
“We’re not going into this without a plan. And if I’m going to help you, you will help me. It’s in both of our best interests that it look real, once we take one step into confirming this, there is no going back. You understand?”
She nodded slowly.
“And you need to remember this. It’s essential for you, much more than it is for me. If this blows up it would simply be another bruise on my reputation, and frankly, what’s one more beating in that area? You on the other hand…”
“I could lose everything,” she said, a sharp pang of regret hitting her in the stomach.
“So we’ll make sure we don’t misstep,” he said. “I’ll follow you to your apartment.”
The thought of him, so big and masculine and…orderly, in her tiny, cluttered space, made her feel edgy. Of having a man, any man really, but a man like him specifically, in her space, was so foreign. But really, there was no other option. And she couldn’t act like he made her nervous. He was supposed to be her fiancé.
And people were somehow supposed to believe that he had chosen her.
“I feel dizzy,” she said.
He frowned. “Should I drive?”
She shook her head. “I’ll be fine,” she said, opening the driver’s side door. “I’ll be fine,” she repeated again, for her own benefit more than his.
And she really hoped it was true.
CHAPTER THREE
PAIGE’S house was very like her. Bright, disordered and a bit manic. The living area was packed with things. Canvases, mannequins, bolts of fabric. There was a large bookshelf at the back wall filled with bins. Bins of beads, sequins and other things that sparkled. Her office had simply been the tip of the iceberg.
This was the glittery underbelly.
“Sorry about the mess,” she said. “You can just dump my stuff on the couch.” She set the baby’s car seat gently on the coffee table and bent, unbuckling the little girl from her seat, drawing her to her chest.