pressed.
“I do,” Jocelyn said.
“And he doesn’t help with your books?”
“He does not,” she answered.
She was squeezing his hand again, but Grant thought it was more just general tension than sending any kind of annoyed message to him.
“So you could walk away tomorrow and be totally on your own?” Cristy said.
“Of course.”
But he saw how Jocelyn chewed her bottom lip.
She couldn’t totally be on her own. That was entirely the reason they were married right now. She needed his health insurance. She couldn’t have handled that by herself.
Yeah, the reality of the whole thing had just hit him too.
He’d just taught a seminar about how women should always be financially independent, even when they were married, and that money shouldn’t be a reason that anyone stayed in a relationship.
But he had a wife now because she needed money.
He’d gotten married to take care of Jocelyn.
Fuck.
It wasn’t like this was a brand-new revelation. They’d both gone into this with eyes wide open. But how had he let this happen? In his mind, marrying her to help her through her health crisis had been somehow different from marrying because she needed money.
But it wasn’t.
She was dependent on him right now. It wasn’t long term. He wasn’t going to use it to manipulate her.
Still… it was the opposite of what he taught women sixteen times a year.
Dammit.
“Um, Grant?” Jocelyn asked, leaning closer.
“Yeah?” He realized that things were tense at the table. The other women were concentrating on their food at the moment.
“I think… we need to go.”
It was uncomfortable. He might have just lost three fans, but he didn’t really know how to smooth this over. Leaving it alone might be the best plan. He nodded. “Okay.”
She was gripping his hand again. Yeah, well, he was a little annoyed too, but they could talk about everything later.
Actually, what they needed to talk about was how he was going to make her financially independent before their marriage ended. She didn’t like to worry about numbers and budgets and spreadsheets? Too bad. She was going to learn.
“I think maybe…”
He looked at her and noticed she was suddenly very pale.
“Jocelyn?” he asked, alarmed. “Are you okay?”
She sucked in a breath and shook her head. “I don’t think so.”
“What is—” But then he saw how she was pressing her hand against her side. Her gall bladder. Shit. He stood swiftly. “Come on.” He pulled her chair out and helped her to her feet, but she was having a hard time standing up straight.
“I shouldn’t have eaten those cakes,” she said. Her voice was tight.
“We’re going to the hospital,” he told her, bending and lifting her into his arms.
The fact that she didn’t protest told him everything he needed to know about how bad she was feeling.
At least she’d gotten hot sex, petit fours, and champagne before she’d had to have an internal organ cut out of her body.
Josie knew she was being dramatic and maudlin. But she felt yucky. Yucky being the perfect word to describe how she was woozy and a little sore and generally crabby.
Grant helped her through the lobby of his building. He was taking her to his apartment this time rather than back to the hotel. He’d decided that they should stay in Chicago for the first three days after her surgery so she could get past the worst of the recovery before returning to Appleby.
She was actually grateful about that. And that her gall bladder had decided that it needed to come out now while she was in Chicago. It wasn’t like she had a surgeon on stand-by back in Dubuque. The only time she’d even ever had anesthesia before this had been to get her wisdom teeth out. So she didn’t really care who operated on her. Chicago was, of course, full of fantastic doctors, and she’d had wonderful care at the hospital.
Now it was possible that she’d never have to tell her family or friends that she’d even had her gall bladder out. She might be a little sore for a few days after getting home—and she was going to have to avoid fatty foods for a while, including all the bakery stuff she loved so much—but she could cover all of that up.
According to Grant, as far as their friends knew, they were just having a fabulous time in Chicago, and he wanted to keep her here with him for a few more days. He’d left it to Cam to tell everyone.
Cam was the only one who knew the truth.