The Best Man's Plan

She gave him a quick, stiff smile in response. “That bag smells delicious,” she said, seizing on the first innocuous topic that came to her mind. “What did you bring us?”

He dropped his hands on her shoulders to hold her in place when she would have moved toward the table. “Grace, I know you’re a little nervous—that awkward morning-after thing, and all.”

“You’re right. It is a bit awkward. Maybe we should just have breakfast.”

“Fine. We can talk while we eat.”

“Talk?” She drew a deep breath. “Maybe we should wait a few days before we get into a serious discussion. You know, just to regain some perspective after the wedding and…and everything.”

He shook his head. “Has anyone ever told you that it’s very difficult to pin you down for a serious talk? One way or another, you’ve been putting me off for days.”

“We’ll have plenty of time to talk later.”

He didn’t release her shoulders. “When, Grace? Starting tomorrow, you’re going to use work for your excuse. Chloe will be away on her honeymoon for a couple of weeks and you’re going to have more responsibility at the shop. You’re going to tell me you’re much too busy and distracted then for a serious talk.”

Because she suspected she would have done exactly that for the next two weeks while Chloe was away on her honeymoon, Grace scowled. “I do have responsibilities at work, you know. I don’t have whole teams of people to handle details for me. Maybe our little shop isn’t as impressive as your business empire, but Chloe and I have bills to pay, and so do our few employees.”

That made him frown. “I never said your work wasn’t important. I know you’ll be very busy for the next couple of weeks, which is one reason I thought we should talk today, while we have the chance.”

She pulled away from him. “I really don’t see what we have to talk about, anyway. We’ve accomplished everything we set out to do. Your plan worked great. The wedding went off beautifully and with very little media attention since there was no juicy best-friend-betrayed angle to keep the tabloids interested. You and I had a nice little celebration of our success, and now it’s time to wind it down.”

She turned to pour herself a cup of coffee, speaking with her back to him. “Seems to me like the only thing left to talk about is how many more public appearances we need to make before we can quietly drift apart. Maybe if you start dating another cute little starlet in a few weeks, everyone will naturally assume you’ve lost interest in me and moved on to more interesting pursuits.”

Bryan had remained quiet while she made that extremely painful little speech. “Are you finished?” he asked when she paused to take a bracing sip of caffeine. He spoke very quietly, no expression at all in his voice.

She set her cup down and braced herself on the counter with both hands. “I’m finished.”

“Good. Because that was the biggest load of garbage I’ve heard in longer than I can remember.”

Stung, she swung around to glare at him. “What?”

“You’re right, the ‘plan’ worked great. I’m glad we were able to take some of the pressure off Chloe and Donovan. The wedding was beautiful, they’re married now, and I’m sure they will live happily ever after. But to be quite honest, I’m not really interested in discussing their future right now. I’m much more concerned with ours.”

She shrugged. “We already know our future. I just described it.”

“I’ve already told you what I thought of your description. Garbage.”

She opened her mouth to respond, but he surged on before she had a chance to speak. “Last night was not a casual celebration of the successful conclusion of a brilliant plan. It was a hell of a lot more than that, and it’s been building for a long time.”

“I…”

He didn’t give her a chance to finish—which was just as well, because she hadn’t a clue what she would have said.

Looming over her, he continued in clipped tones, “As for your clever suggestion that I take up with some ‘cute little starlet’—that’s not even worth the breath it would take me to respond. Concerning the rest of your comments, I see no need for us to have any more public outings just for the sake of the media. We’ve put that gossip to rest and everyone has moved on to more juicy speculation.”

“Oh. Well, then.” If he really thought there was no need for further outings, then they could just end it now. It would be a great relief, she assured herself, not to have to deal with any more high-society events—wondering what to wear, how to do her hair and makeup, what to say, or not to say. If she never heard another bored photographer call her name for a fake smile, she wouldn’t be at all disappointed. All in all, it would be best to just call it quits right now.

She could deal with the aching hollow left inside her later. She would certainly have plenty of free time to do so once her fake relationship with Bryan was over.

“From now on,” Bryan added, “you and I will be together for no other reason than that we want to be. The media will have nothing to do with it.”

A dull pounding began somewhere in the back of Grace’s skull. So it wasn’t going to be as easy as she had hoped to break this off between them. And this was exactly why she had kept putting this talk off. Now she realized she should have made her intentions clear several days ago, before she’d given in to temptation and made love with him last night.

It wasn’t going to be easy to convince him that she wasn’t interested in him when she had been all over him last night. And especially since she knew very well that she was head over heels in love with him—and probably had been from the first time he had walked into her shop. But that was something she could not allow him to see, since loving him did not make her right for him.

She chose her words carefully. “I’m sure we’ll see each other through Chloe and Donovan. Chloe enjoys entertaining, and we’ll be invited to dinner parties and that sort of thing.”

He was shaking his head long before she finished speaking. “I’m talking about us, Grace. You and me.”