One Night Mistress...Convenient Wife

by Anne McAllister

  “I do not,” Natalie retorted. “I’m fine.”

  “You have big dark circles under your eyes.”

  “I’m not sleeping well. I’m…allergic.”

  “Sure you are,” Sophy said. “And I’m the tooth fairy. I told you Savas men can break your heart.”

  Natalie just looked at her.

  Sophy sighed. “I know. It doesn’t help being told. You can’t help yourself. But honestly, Nat, you should take a few days off. Go away. Get some perspective.”

  What good perspective would do, Natalie didn’t know.

  But she said, “I’ll think about it.” She even considered asking her mother about good places to go. Laura had taken some trips by herself and with friends after Clayton had walked out.

  She’d picked up the pieces of her life and made a new one.

  She was a perfect role model. Natalie knew she could do worse than emulate her mother.

  She would emulate her mother.

  She just needed a little more time.

  She was glad she’d invited her mother to dinner, though she hedged a bit when Laura suggested they do it again next week at her apartment.

  “You come over here,” Natalie said, not wanting to risk any chance of seeing Christo. “You almost never come here.”

  “I’m here now,” Laura pointed out. “And if you come to me we can walk on The Strand afterwards. I’m trying to walk at least two miles a day. Part of my keeping-fit regimen.”

  “Maybe,” Natalie said. “I’ll see.”

  But when her mother mentioned it again as she was leaving, Natalie didn’t commit herself. “We’ll talk about it next week,” she said as she walked her mother out to her car.

  It was a cool night for early August. It never got especially cool as far inland as Natalie lived. But at the beach it might even be sweater weather. Her mother pulled one on before she got into her car, then turned to give Natalie a kiss.

  “Thank you so much for dinner. And for taking care of Herbie—and Christo—while I was gone.”

  Natalie smiled. “Glad to do it.”

  “Hope they weren’t too much trouble.”

  Natalie shook her head. “No trouble at all.”

  Not the cat, anyway. Memories of the man were destroying her peace of mind. But Laura would never ever know that. She would simply believe that Christo had needed help and Natalie had stepped into the breach.

  When her mother left, Natalie went back inside and wished she had the table to clear and the dishes to do.

  But Laura had insisted on helping her with them. So the kitchen was now spic and span, and Natalie had yet another empty evening stretching in front of her.

  If she sat down to read, her mind wandered in directions she didn’t want. And if she watched television, it was even worse. She caught up on all her paperwork from Rent-a-Wife, but it took her no time at all to fill out the online schedule for the rest of the week. She made all the phone calls to confirm tomorrow’s assignments, and even rang Sophy to make sure she’d covered everything.

  “You need counseling,” Sophy told her severely. “Or a ticket to the far ends of the earth.”

  Natalie didn’t reply to that, though there were times the far ends of the earth seemed damned appealing. She just said good-night and hung up, then glanced at her watch, wishing it were later, wishing she were more tired, wishing she would stop having every other thought be about Christo Savas.

  The quick sharp rap on her front door came as a welcome surprise.

  She didn’t know many of her neighbors, but occasionally one appeared needing to borrow sugar or an apple or a blender.

  Now she opened the door, eager for the distraction—and stared.

  It was Christo.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  THE mere sight of him caused her heart to leap, proving that for all that she might have been telling herself that things were getting better and that she was getting over him, the truth was, she wasn’t over him in the least.

  “Christo?” She gripped the door so hard her fingers hurt.

  “I need to talk to you.” He didn’t smile. He looked, in fact, positively grim.

  She didn’t want to let him in. It would only be harder when he left again. But she was supposed not to care, she reminded herself. So she stepped back and opened the door wider. “Come in. Sit down.”

  He came in. He didn’t sit down. He cracked his knuckles, paced a bit.

  Natalie didn’t say anything. He’d sit down if he wanted. He jammed his hands in his pockets and faced her.

  “I have a favor to ask. A business proposition, I guess you’d say.”

  Whatever she’d been expecting, it wasn’t that. “Business?”

  “Rent-a-Wife,” he said. “That’s what you do, right? Only I don’t need a wife. I need…a fiancée.” He met her gaze squarely. “You.”

  Natalie gaped at him. “I don’t think so,” she managed before he cut her off.

  “Hear me out. My father’s getting married.” He started to pace a bit again. “To make my grandmother happy.”

  “What?”

  “My grandmother is ill. Dying.” He seemed to force the word past his lips, and Natalie could see how shaken he looked as he said it. “She didn’t tell me. He did.” He sounded angry now. “Called me yesterday and dropped the whole thing on me. Her…illness. His wedding.” He raked fingers through his hair. “It’s to make her happy.”

  “His wedding? I’m not sure weddings are supposed to make other people happy,” she ventured. “Except coincidentally, perhaps.”

  “Well, it’ll make my grandmother happy. She thinks he needs to settle down. So he is.” Christo shook his head. “And I have to be there. I’m the ‘best man,’” he added, his tone twisting the words derisively.

  She could see how much the prospect thrilled him. It was a mockery of everything he professed to believe. But then so was his “business proposal.”

  “What’s the fiancée thing got to do with it?” Natalie asked.

  A muscle ticked in his jaw. “Because she wants the same thing for me. Settling down. Marriage.” He looked positively hunted. “And if I don’t show up with someone in line for exactly that, she’ll feel like she has to throw every damn eligible woman in Brazil at me!”

  “Let her,” Natalie suggested.

  “No. She’ll want it too much…” His words trailed off, but Natalie thought she understood the implications.

  “And you’re afraid you’ll marry someone to make her happy.”

  He didn’t answer, but she had an inkling of how devoted he was to his grandmother. And if his father was marrying to please her, it wasn’t impossible to imagine Christo doing the same.

  “If you come with me, I won’t have to,” he said now.

  As if it were up to her to prevent the disaster of matrimony.

  “No,” Natalie said. “It would be wrong.”

  “It isn’t wrong, damn it!” he countered, eyes blazing. “It’s not wrong to want her to have peace of mind.”

  “It would be a lie.”

  “We don’t have to lie.”

  “You said you wanted to hire me to be your fiancée! That’s a lie.”

  “Fine. I’ll propose. You say yes. And we can call it off when we get back!”

  She stared at him, dumbstruck.

  He raked a hand through his hair. “Look, it’s not a big deal. Just an…arrangement.” He took a breath. “We won’t lie, then. I’ll just bring you along. It will speak for itself.” His gaze entreated her.

  Natalie hesitated.

  “I won’t touch you again if that’s what you’re worried about.” His voice was harsh and he jammed his hands into the pockets of his jeans.

  Then she did stare. “What?”

  “I’m not expecting you to sleep with me. This is not that kind of trip.”

  “Don’t get any ideas, you mean?” Natalie raised a brow.

  He shrugged. “You don’t have any, do you? Of course you don’t. You pr
oved it. That’s why I can ask you.”

  Hoist on her own petard.

  “For a week, Nat. That’s all. I’ll pay you.”

  Her jaw snapped shut. “You will not pay me!”

  “Well, it’s business. But, fine. I won’t. I just…please. You’ll make an old—”

  “If you say, I’ll make an old woman happy, I’ll stuff a sock down your throat!”

  A corner of his mouth twitched. But he shrugged. “Okay, I won’t say it. How about, you’ll make me happy?”

  “Oh, and I desperately want to make you happy, don’t I?” she retorted sarcastically.

  He didn’t answer, just waited her out. And there wasn’t enough time in the world for her to muster enough common sense and self-preservation to say no.

  She drew a sharp breath, knowing herself to be a fool. Nothing had changed after all. “Fine,” she muttered. “I’ll do it. But only because Sophy keeps telling me to take a vacation.”

  “We leave on Tuesday.” Christo grinned, triumphant. But in his eyes Natalie could still see the haunted, worried look beneath it.

  He gave her a ring.

  They were standing at the airport, waiting to board the plane and all of a sudden he fished in his pocket and took out a small black velvet box.

  Natalie stared at it as if it were a rattler about to strike. “What’s that?” she demanded, sure it was exactly what she hoped it was not.

  Christo flipped open the box. It was. A perfect diamond solitaire. Very spare and elegant. Not a rock, but not minuscule either. Exactly the sort of ring Christo would give a woman he was going to marry—if Christo were going to marry anyone. Which he wasn’t.

  “You said we weren’t going to lie!”

  “It’s not a lie.”

  “What? It’s a prop?”

  He shrugged. “If you will, yes.” He looked exasperated. “Look. Just wear it, will you? Consider it part of the uniform.”

  He held it out to put on her finger, and she scowled, but finally stuck her hand out. “It probably won’t fit anyway,” she muttered. She had big hands, not the delicate ones men always seemed to expect.

  “It will,” Christo said confidently.

  And damn it, he was right. It slid on and fit perfectly. Natalie stared at the ring glittering on her finger and felt a sinking desperation somewhere deep inside. She started to tremble.

  “How did you—?” she began, but couldn’t even finish.

  “I asked your mother your ring size.”

  Her gaze jerked up and she stared at him, horrified. “You asked my mother? What size ring I wear? Are you crazy? What on earth will she think?” Oh, God. It didn’t even bear thinking about!

  “What will she think? The truth. She asked, and I told her the truth.”

  “That you were hiring me to be your…fiancée?”

  He shrugged. “She knows about my grandmother. She’s met her. She understood.”

  She did? And what had she thought about Natalie being his choice for fake fiancée? Had she wondered why? If so, she hadn’t asked.

  She hadn’t called her daughter, either, though Natalie couldn’t quite imagine her mother being as sanguine as Christo thought she was. But then, she had to have known since at least yesterday for him to have bought a ring. And Laura hadn’t called and tried to talk her out of it.

  Was her mother expecting something to come of it? Dear God, what a mess.

  “This is going to be a disaster,” Natalie said with quiet certainty.

  “No, it won’t,” Christo said. “It will be fine. It has to be fine,” he added fiercely.

  The line was moving now. They were edging toward the plane, and as they moved, Natalie twisted the ring on her finger and was excruciatingly aware of Christo’s hand lightly touching her back.

  It was easy to spot Lucia Azevedo when they’d reached the baggage-claim area. She was the small, birdlike woman whose pale face simply lit up at the sight of Christo. She crossed the space that separated them in seconds and wrapped Christo in a fierce hug, then stepped back to regard Natalie with an intent gaze.

  “So you are my Christo’s lady?” Her voice was a bit reserved as she offered her hand, which Natalie took. Her fingers were thin and bony, but warm, and Natalie felt determined strength in them as they pressed hers.

  “I’m so happy to meet you, Senhora Azevedo,” Natalie said, and though she felt a twinge of guilt at the way she was doing it, she meant every word. Ever since she’d heard the stories Christo had told Jamii, she had wanted to meet this woman who meant so much to him.

  “Call me Lucia,” his grandmother said.

  “Lucia,” Natalie repeated dutifully. “Thank you for inviting me. And thank you, Senhor Azevedo,” she said to the man who stood fidgeting in the background.

  He had stayed back until his mother had finished greeting Christo and Natalie, as if he knew who really mattered to Christo. But now he embraced his son and clapped him on the back, then kissed Natalie on both cheeks.

  “Xanti,” he corrected her. “Senhor Azevedo makes me sound like my father. Dead.”

  “Beloved,” his mother corrected firmly, slapping his arm lightly. “And deeply missed.”

  “Sim. And not replaceable. So I am Xanti,” her son said just as firmly, taking her hand in his.

  Xantiago Azevedo was in his mid fifties now, but unlike many men his age he had retained the lithe, lean, soccer player’s build he must have had in his prime. He wasn’t as broad-shouldered as Christo, nor as handsome in Natalie’s estimation, but she could see instantly that Xanti’s quicksilver grin would always have appealed to the ladies. And there was a twinkle in his green eyes, which were much more devilish than his serious son’s.

  “Where’s Katia?” Christo asked his father now.

  Katia was the bride. But more than that Natalie hadn’t discovered.

  “I’ve met her once or twice,” Christo had said. “She’s young. Beautiful. The sort Xanti always goes for. Not much older than me.” There was a mixture of doubt and censure in his tone. He looked around now, but apparently didn’t see her. He looked quizzically at his father.

  Xanti laughed and shrugged. “Running around like a chicken,” he said, shaking his head as he hoisted one of the suitcases Christo had taken off the luggage turntable and led the way out the door. “She has so much to do before the wedding. Me, I don’t know what is so important.”

  “I know,” his mother said imperiously. “The wedding is important. She wants it to be perfect.”

  Christo rolled his eyes at that comment, but fortunately his grandmother didn’t see him. She was focused on walking as they went out of the terminal. Her gait was slow and not terribly steady. Natalie slowed her pace to match and offered Christo’s grandmother her arm for support.

  “Maybe your father could bring the car and meet your grandmother and me here?” she called to Christo who, laden with two more suitcases, had been going after his father.

  He glanced back, realized at once what she meant, and called something to his father in Portuguese. Then he immediately turned back and helped Natalie usher his grandmother to a bench.

  “You shouldn’t have come,” he scolded her. “You should have stayed home to rest.”

  She looked indignant as she sank onto the seat. “For what do I rest? For you. You are here at last. Who knows how many days I have to see you?”

  “Don’t say things like that,” Christo chastised her roughly.

  His grandmother shrugged. “It is true.” And she looked up at him with such love that it was almost painful to watch—especially since Natalie had a very good idea how she felt.

  It took over an hour to get to the house that Xanti had built for his mother after he’d become an international soccer star. It was in the same rural area he had grown up in, with a mixture of working farms and large estates. And when they arrived, Natalie realized that it wasn’t simply a house, but a small compound of two good-sized houses and several smaller cottages.

  “Be
cause Xanti wanted home-cooked meals, but he didn’t want Avó telling him not to bring his women home,” Christo explained wryly after they’d taken his grandmother to her house and she’d been persuaded to take a short rest. “She has her place here and he has his over there—” a wave of the hand toward a sprawling modern place near a freeform landscaped swimming pool. “And there are others for family and visitors,” he added as he walked her through the beautiful grounds along a winding flagstone path that ended at the door of a small cottage. “This one is for you.”

  The one he’d brought her to was older than the others, a rough ivory-colored stucco house with deep-set windows and a broad flagstone veranda all across the front. It was quite the most lovely welcoming little house Natalie had ever seen.

  On a trellis on one side of the porch a deep burgundy bougainvillea grew all the way up to the roof and draped along it, providing privacy and welcome shade from the sun.

  Though it was winter in Brazil, the day was still warm, and Natalie was glad to step into the shade while Christo took out a key and opened the door, then held it for her to precede him.

  The inside of the house was cool and as welcoming at the exterior. A rattan sofa and chairs with colorful jungle print cushions were grouped at one end of the main room, and there was a small kitchen and dining area at the other. French doors opened onto another veranda beyond the dining table.

  There was a small hallway with a bath and a bedroom where Christo carried her suitcase. Natalie followed him in and stopped as she stared at the one wide bed.

  Instantly her gaze flew to Christo at the same moment he turned and looked at her.

  “I’m staying at Avó’s,” he said. “Don’t worry. You can, too, of course. I just thought, under the circumstances, you might prefer it here where you could have a little privacy and some space. Where you won’t be under the microscope all the time.”

  “I would,” Natalie said quickly. “Thank you.”

  She smiled at him then, and for the first time since she’d agreed to come, it felt almost right. Almost as if she might not have made the biggest mistake of her life.

  Walking back out into the main room, she turned in a circle, trying to absorb the peace and the beauty of the place. “It’s gorgeous here, all of it,” she told Christo. “Your dad’s place looks amazing and your grandmother’s is really lovely. But I really like it here best. It’s homey.”