A Very Fake Fiancée: The Fiancée Charade / My Fake Fiancée / A Very Exclusive Engagement

As long as her welfare caseworker knew she was engaged, there was no need for a media circus. She was determined that the move back home would be a complete fresh start, in all ways.

Tears welled as she walked along the pristine beauty of the shore, waves curling into foam at her feet. Dashing the moisture away, she kept her gaze on the distinctive shape of the Atraeus Resort, midway along the misted curve of the beach, and resisted the urge to look back.

She’d had a wonderful night and had said her own private emotional goodbyes to the relationship, such as it was. The small kernel of hurt that not once had Gabriel mentioned any degree of emotional involvement was the most difficult thing to acknowledge. Maybe he felt he hadn’t needed to because it wasn’t as if it was the first time they had made love, but the lack mattered to Gemma.

It underlined the need to enforce her own rules on the situation, and one of those was that if they were going to be engaged for a week, then during that time Gabriel would have to play his part. He would have to value her as if he did love her.

It was a small point, but it was important to Gemma. A man valuing his fiancée meant a ring, flowers, dinner— all of the important elements of a courtship that he had happily bypassed both times because she had slept with him so quickly.

* * *

Gabriel woke with the sun on his face and the space beside him in bed empty.

The second his lids flipped open he knew that Gemma wasn’t just missing from his bed; she was gone.

He should have seen it coming, read it in the quiet way she had tried to distance herself from him in bed after making love. A distance he had obliterated by the simple expedient of wrapping an arm around her waist and drawing her close.

The first thing he saw as he climbed out of bed was her dress and shoes still on the floor. Padding through to the sitting room he noted that the canvas bag was gone, and the shirt he had tossed over the arm of a chair was missing.

He muttered something short and flat under his breath. After pulling on a pair of dark pants, he walked out onto the balcony. His jaw tightened as he noted the trail of footprints in the sand. Sliding his phone out of his pants pocket, he dialed the hotel and asked to be put through to security.

A brief conversation later, he hung up. He had thought Gemma might disappear for the day, but it was worse than that. She had just left for the airport.

Moving quickly, Gabriel walked through to the kitchen and found a note anchored to the counter. The message was simple, politely thanking him for the night together and stating the new terms of their relationship, which from now on, owing to Gemma’s status as his employee, would not include sex.

Gabriel’s fingers closed on the piece of paper, crumpling it. She had ditched him, close enough, and he hadn’t seen it coming.

Although, thinking back, it was not the first time. Technically, he had ended their last relationship, but Gemma had never at any point tried to cling to him or get him back. Six years ago she had seemed unruffled by the fact that he had no space for a relationship.

He smoothed out the crumpled note and reread it, frowning at the businesslike language, the small P.S. that stated that they would both have to play their roles as an engaged couple to the letter.

He frowned. What did that mean?

He was not exactly au fait with the whole process of getting engaged. As far as he was concerned this was just a sham that would facilitate his control of his company.

And keep Gemma in his bed until he could figure out just where the relationship was heading.

He finished dressing, not bothering with a shower and shave. By the time he accelerated away from the house, only fifteen minutes had passed since he had first woken up. Even so, he was certain he was going to be too late to catch Gemma.

As he drove, he dialed the airport. Precious minutes ticked away while the call was shuffled to someone more senior and manifests were checked. He had thrown his weight around and used every bit of influence he had, but by the time it was ascertained which of the international flights Gemma was on, the plane had been cleared for takeoff.

Pulling over onto the side of the winding coast road with its stunning views, Gabriel climbed out of the Maserati. Gaze narrowed against the glare of the sun, he searched the blue arc of the sky and saw the jet in the air.

The sea breeze whipped his hair around his jaw and flattened his shirt against his torso as he watched the jet for long seconds.

Despite all of the unanswered questions he had about Gemma, his unwillingness to commit, it was an out he didn’t want.

Too late to realize he should have cossetted Gemma more, treated her like a date instead of rushing her into bed. His approach had lacked finesse; it had lacked even basic good manners.

But the problem was, he wasn’t certain how much more he wanted from this relationship. All he knew was that Gemma had fascinated him six years ago, and she fascinated him now. They hardly knew each other, and both times the passion had been too quick, the situations pressurized. What they needed was the one thing they had never had: time together.

Although he had ensured that they would have that now.

Relief filled him that he had tied her to an employment contract. He had time on his side. After last night he was certain that, despite the odds, Gemma was emotionally involved. No woman could respond as she had and not be.

The addition to the note about playing their roles as an engaged couple slid back into his mind and a small, salient fact registered.

When he had flipped through the magazine in Gemma’s holdall during the night, he had noticed a large section on women being valued in relationships, with passages underlined in blue ink as if Gemma had read and reread the article, committing it to memory.

He had made love to Gemma, and now she wanted to be courted.

Sliding behind the wheel of the Maserati, Gabriel put the car in gear and drove back toward Medinos.

Now that he had some facts to work with, he could form a strategy. He was a little rusty with dating, and it was a fact that he had never courted a woman, but he had a major advantage. Gemma had slept with him twice, despite his utter lack of courtship, which meant that she had a definite weakness he could, and would, exploit.

Sexually, she couldn’t resist him.

Ten (#ue314a0d7-f5ba-5014-8563-e9063c8a61c4)

Five days later, Gemma walked toward the plush ground-floor offices in Newmarket, Auckland, for her first day of work at the newest Ambrosi Pearl House.

Gleaming glass doors slid open, flashing back the conservative new image—she hesitated to call it an actual disguise—that she was still adjusting to.

Alarmed by the attention of the press when she had arrived in Sydney, and their interest in the fact that she was now, apparently, having a hot affair with Gabriel, she had made a beeline for her hairdresser and changed the color of her hair to a low-key sable brown.

Once she had made the initial breakthrough of changing her hair color, she had distilled the reinvention process down to rummaging through good quality secondhand shops for shoes and clothing in neutral shades. It had been a productive exercise because she had found a number of exquisitely cut, designer-label items for very cheap prices. Evidently, this season no one wanted to be seen dead in either oatmeal or beige.

Today, instead of her normal clear, bright colors and fun lace and ruffles, she was wearing a biscotti suit. She refused to call the color beige. Fake glasses and her hair smoothed into a prim French pleat added to the office look.

But as boring as the color of the suit was, it wasn’t as low-key as she would have liked. The jacket cinched in at the waist, emphasizing the fullness of her breasts and the curve of her hips. The skirt was also a little on the short side, making her legs look even longer. She had added high heels to the outfit, because she had made a judgment call and balanced the need to start her new job incognito against looking frumpy.

So far her new image had worked like a dream. No one had hounded her at the airport or tried to photograph her, and it was no wonder. When she had checked her appearance in the mirror that morning, she had barely recognized herself.

A workman wearing a faded gray tank, tanned, muscled biceps on show as he painted a wall, grinned at her and clutched at his heart as she strolled past.

Gemma found herself grinning back as she headed for the elevators and the second floor, where the offices were based. She just bet the guy was married with children—they all were—but the harmless bit of fun was soothing and exactly the lift she needed.

Boring in designer neutrals, but not dead in the water...yet.

Aware that she had almost veered into forbidden territory in thinking sexually about Gabriel, she refocused in a more positive direction.

Just that morning she had bought Sanchia a tiny hot-pink tutu and a pair of ballet slippers. She was going to give them to her once she had gotten the all-clear from the welfare caseworker and was able to move Sanchia back in with her. Now that she had a guaranteed income, she could afford the ballet lessons Sanchia wanted.

She pressed the call button on the elevator then stepped inside as the doors swished open. The sound of a firm tread behind her signaled that someone else had just entered the building.

She heard the low timbre of a masculine voice as the doors closed and froze, certain it was Gabriel.

On edge, she exited on the second floor and walked to the front desk. The receptionist, an elegant blonde called Bonny, was expecting her. Gemma glanced around as she followed Bonny through a smoothly carpeted corridor, amazed at the speed with which the new Ambrosi Pearls venture had been put together.