Bad Engagement (Billionaire's Club #10) - Elise Faber Page 0,50

excited and I . . . fuck, I couldn’t take it back in that moment,” she said. “I wanted her to be happy, and I know it’s ridiculous because I’m a grown woman, but I just didn’t want her to be disappointed in me.”

Like they had been when she’d upended her family’s lives.

“I don’t think your parents could ever be disappointed in you, Katie,” Heidi said, pulling her out of the memory. “They brag to my parents all the time, and I swear if I’ve heard it once, I’ve heard it a hundred times, ‘why can’t you be in a normal career like Kate?’” Her tone mimicked her mother’s. “‘She actually sees her family and doesn’t spend all her time in the lab—’”

“A lab from which you just quit working,” Kate pointed out.

Silence. Eyes going wide.

Then Cora blinked and said, “Nice try, Katie. But we’ll stay on the fake engagement topic for the moment.” She pointed at Heidi. “You, we’ll get to later.”

Kels lifted her fist for Cora to bump. “This is why we’ve been friends since elementary school.” Her gaze fixed onto Kate’s. “So, how long is this fake engagement going to go on?”

Kate winced. “Um . . .”

Kels groaned. “Oh no. Tell me he isn’t a jerk.”

“No!” She sat up. “No,” she repeated. “He’s actually really great. I like him so much. He’s sweet and good with my family.” A smile curved her lips. “He seems determined to take care of me and—”

“Are you paying him?” Kels asked, cold infiltrating her tone.

“She’s not,” Heidi said. “And I had a full background check run on him. His vet practice is successful, and his family is loaded—even more so than Kate’s after her mom’s magical aging serum.”

Cora tapped her forehead. “The reason I don’t have fine lines.”

“Background ch—” Kate began.

“Not the point,” Kels said to Cora, ignoring Kate. “So, nothing criminal in his background and he’s not looking for money. Why is he pretending to be engaged when most guys would run screaming the other direction?”

Three pairs of eyes turned her way, and Kate felt a rush of defensiveness. She wanted to snap out a response.

But, how could she?

She’d thought the same at first, wondered what possible motivation a man like that would want with a woman like her, especially when it came to something as intense and complicated as an engagement, fake or not.

Still, Kate couldn’t lie.

That her friends thought that too stung a bit.

“He”—Cora gasped, and then they all turned to see Jaime standing in the doorway—“was half in love with Kate from the moment he first saw her smiling in a picture on his friend’s feed. He spent the last months trying to build a slow communication with her so he wouldn’t be a fucking creep who slid into her DMs like he just wanted to get into her pants. He tumbled the rest of the way into love with her when he saw how much she loved her family, when he got to see how strongly she cared and took care of those around her. He plummeted deeper as he got to know her heart, her humor, her strength.” Jaime pushed off the frame, crossed over to her, cupped her cheek lightly. “But he fell deeply, irrevocably in love when she cracked the door enough that she let him take care of her in return.”

Her heart was pounding a million miles per hour.

Her lungs seemed to have stopped working.

Her skin prickled, her lips tingled, her fingers had gone numb.

Hell, her whole body had gone numb with the exception of where he held her face, the slight roughness of his calloused palm against her skin. “I know it’s too soon,” he said. “But it’s how I feel here.” He took her hand, placed it against his chest so she could feel his heart thundering beneath. “And it’s how I feel here.” He let go, tapped his temple, one half of his mouth curving. “Which is why we’re going to have a really long fake engagement. Long enough for you to decide that you want to be engaged to me for real. And then”—his voice dropped—“then I’ll get you that diamond Ann was talking about, okay?”

She was mute.

Stunned and warmed through. Pulse still thundering, but her heart open and full to the brim.

He slanted his lips over hers, not skimping on the tongue, not hesitating to tug her close and send her pulse skittering to even higher rates. Then he stepped back, nudged her onto the couch when