Billionaire Bad Boy's Fake Bride

He released her hand a moment later. A few moments after that, they arrived at the building housing his apartment, and he cursed. Connor slapped his fist against the st

eering wheel before glaring at the press of reporters crowding the entrance to the private parking garage. By the stir in the horde, it was clear they had been tipped off about which vehicle to look for, and they were all crowding around the sedan.

With a curse, he backed down the street, paying little attention to the reporters trying to block them. Angelina admired his skillful driving as he forced the media to scramble out of the way while driving in reverse and turning a sharp corner. The motion of the car sent her head throbbing again, but the rush of adrenaline tamped down the pain, at least for the moment.

Once they were back on the city streets, she watched him navigating with confidence and bit her lip. With a sigh, she asked, “Now what?”

“Plan C.”

“Um, okay.” She trailed off, waiting for more details that didn’t come. “What is Plan C?” Her stomach dipped as she braced herself for the suggestion that they stay with his father. She hoped that wouldn’t include Brenda’s irritating presence.

Instead, he completely shocked her by saying, “We’re going to Catalunya.”

Her mouth dropped open. “As in Barcelona?”

He nodded. “The Spanish Grand Prix. You made the arrangements for me, right?”

“Months ago,” she said with a wave of her hand. “Before your accident. You aren’t cleared to race again yet. You aren’t planning to race, are you?” Why did that send a surge of panic through her? It was what he did and had done successfully for the past seven years without any injuries—until his prototype crashed.

“Not this time, though I hope to be up for the Monaco Grand Prix. I’m attending to schmooze and make connections. I’m planning to retire from the circuit as a driver after this season, and I want to transition to construction.”

Relief swept through her, though it shouldn’t matter to her either way. “That sounds…safer.” Except when he tested his vehicles. “Still, there’s no reason for me to go with you to Barcelona, Connor. I can hole up in a hotel.”

“Not for forty-eight hours, you can’t. Knowing your penchant for planning, I no doubt have a ridiculously large suite awaiting me, so there will be plenty of room for you to have your own space. The jet’s always on standby, so we can be in the air in less than two hours. There’s a bedroom on board, so you can sleep during the flight. You can’t visit Kevin for two weeks, and I’m your employer, so you can’t feign work as an excuse. What other reasons do you have?”

“Just planning a wedding I’m supposed to skip out on at the last moment,” she said overly sweetly. “Put like that, Barcelona sounds like a joy.” Her face fell. “Oh, but I don’t have my passport. It’s back at the apartment.”

He smiled. “Leave that to me, my darling fiancée. I have it all under control.”

She snorted. “I’m the one who usually manages all the details of your life, Mr. Blackwell, so pardon my skepticism.”

He just laughed, looking arrogantly confident that he could arrange the world to suit his needs. She had to reluctantly concede he was right to be arrogant when they were on his private plane ninety minutes later, preparing for a final takeoff. Her passport was in her purse, and a suitcase of her clothes was also stowed in the plane’s bedroom. She didn’t know who he’d sent to accomplish the task, but he had made it happen. She wasn’t certain if she should be annoyed, impressed, or perhaps fearful for her job—which she already knew would be ending as soon as she jilted him at the altar, so that wasn’t really a concern.

In lieu of any response, she chose to hide out in the plane’s bedroom and sleep as they undertook the hours-long flight. She was probably making a mistake by going along on this trip, but as she lay down and drifted into a deep sleep, she realized she was looking forward to it all the same. Not because of her boss, of course. It had absolutely nothing to do with Connor.

If only she could make herself believe that completely…

Chapter Six

Barcelona was just the distraction she needed. Because Connor wasn’t racing in this Grand Prix, he didn’t have to participate in the pre-time trials or any of the myriad details leading up to the racing itself. Instead, they spent hours wandering the city, starting on foot before renting a scooter when Connor reluctantly admitted that his hip was bothering him.

It had taken her a couple of hours to coax him into admitting that as she watched with growing concern the way his gait became more uneven as time passed. After acquiring the scooter, they zipped around the city in a whirlwind tour. He showed her The Castle of the Three Dragons, a drive-by viewing of Camp Nou Stadium, and Palau Nacional before they made their way to the shopping district of La Rambla.

Moving down the pedestrian mall, they zig-zagged in and out of foot traffic on the scooter. She half-expected someone to stop them, but Connor seemed unconcerned by the possibility. She was still relieved when he parked the scooter, and they did more walking, this time at a slow and steady pace.

They shopped several kiosks and paused to admire the paving bricks that looked like water rippling. Ambling further on, she was surprised when he took her hand, and even more surprised by how right it felt. He tugged her over to a small fountain with a lamppost at the top, and she admired its interesting design.

“The Font de Canaletes,” he said.

She looked at the plaque on the ground. “The legend is you’ll come back to Barcelona if you drink the water of the fountain.”

He snorted. “Yeah, you’ll come back for antibiotics.”

She giggled, and they walked on, finally stopping at a tapas bar on Rambla Del Mar, where they stuffed themselves silly on olives, anchovies in vinegar, and prawns in peppercorn sauce, paired with a Cava wine from the Penedès region.

It was a relaxing day and made all the more relaxing by the fact no one was pointing at them or trying to take their picture for sensational news stories that had no substance. To be on the safe side, Angelina had applied heavier makeup than usual to hide the bruise Kevin had inadvertently left on her cheek, and she was confident it was unnoticeable other than some slight swelling.

They finished off the evening with a long dinner at the Forestier Restaurant in their hotel before retiring to their shared suite in Hotel Miramar. There was an awkward moment as they stood in the entertainment area, staring at each other as though waiting for the other to speak. For her part, she didn’t know what she expected Connor to say, or what she even wanted to say, if anything. She was drawing a blank too. The silence was growing, feeling even more awkward, so she cleared her throat and spoke at the same time he did.

“It was a lovely day.”

“I had a good time.”

They laughed together, and she was struck by how much it felt like a real date, complete with the awkward ending that she remembered well, especially from her early dates, back when she was young and inexperienced. That was how being with Connor left her feeling all over again, as though she had never been through the courtship dance before. Knowing this was all fake didn’t help remove the awkwardness from the illusion.

With a smile that hurt the corners of her mouth because she was projecting it so brightly, she gave a jaunty wave and rushed to the smaller of the two rooms of the suite. As soon as she closed the door behind her, Angelina leaned back against it and took several deep breaths to restore her calm.

When she flipped the lock on the door a second later, she wasn’t sure if it was a precaution to keep Connor out, or to remind her to stay in. It had been such a pleasant day, with Connor so charming and attentive. It had made it difficult to remember he was also a playboy racer who went through girlfriends frequently when he unleashed his charm on her and made her the focal point of his attention. It was even more difficult to remember that none of it was real when she wore his mother’s ring on her finger.

With a sigh, she moved away from the door and headed to the bathroom. Perhaps a warm shower—even better a cold shower to dissipate the ache of desire filling her core—would help restore her sense of reason and remind her that s

he and Connor could be friends, but nothing more, and not for long. When she played her part in their agreement, there would be nothing more to any fledging friendship, so it would be better to keep things on a professional level and not even flirt with the idea of friendship, let alone anything more serious.

Just because his father wanted him to get married didn’t mean Connor had changed his mind about settling down. She was well aware he was just playing along to preserve his father’s health, and that was her role in the situation as well. Giving in to the attraction flaring between her and Connor would be madness. She knew that, so all she had to do was remind her body of that whenever she was in his presence and tempted to ignore common sense in favor of explosive desire.

No problem at all. She deliberately avoided her own eyes in the mirror, not wishing to see confirmation of just how full of false confidence she was at the moment. Or full of something anyway.

***

There was one more day before the race began, and when he suggested they take a rental car to the old circuit used to host the Barcelona Grand Prix until 1975, she was agreeable. It wouldn’t have been her first choice, but she suspected it was an important landmark to the racing enthusiast inside Connor, though he had probably been there before.

Still, she was touched that he wanted to share the experience with her. That reaction should be setting off alarm bells ringing in the back of her mind. Instead of focusing on that, she decided to push aside all angst-filled thoughts for the day to just focus on having a good time and relaxing, freed from the pressures of her everyday life for the remainder of their impromptu vacation.

The drive to Montjuich Park didn’t take long, and she was pleasantly surprised to find there were no lapses in conversation today, with no awkward silences either. Either they had both made an effort to avoid the unspoken tension of the previous evening, or perhaps they were both just in a different mood today. Whatever the reason, the conversation flowed, and she was surprised to find they had a lot more in common than she would have expected.