a calculation. He’s playing a game. And he’s always playing to win.
“I know what you’re doing,” I whisper. “You’re trying to fluster me. To make me nervous around you.”
“It’s working,” he replies simply.
“I think anyone would feel nervous if their president told them something like that,” I shoot back. “I just can’t work out why you’re trying to do it.”
He raises an eyebrow. “I need a reason?”
“I think you’re a man with a reason behind everything you do.”
“Oh? You have me all worked out?”
“Answer the question. Why are you trying to make me nervous?”
He laughs. It’s light and full-chested. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him laugh before.
“You’re quite the interrogator, Veronica Waters,” he muses. “Fine, I’ll level with you. The way you act around me is... well, it’s stiff. The press will be all over that. You need to look like my fiancée.” He glances towards the chauffeur, a Secret Service agent. As if to remind me not to discuss the truth. “You’re going to be my wife, Veronica. I don’t want anyone to question that.”
“I get what you’re trying to say, but surely being uncomfortable around you just makes us more distant-”
“I tend to make most women flustered.” He shrugs his broad shoulders. “It’s nothing new. I imagine the media will just presume I drive you wild, don’t you think?”
He’s arrogant. So ridiculously arrogant. But he’s also probably right. I doubt most women are able to speak in full sentences in front of this man.
The car stops after a twenty-minute drive. We’re parked in front of a restaurant… a high, upscale restaurant. Like, think of the kind of place you might go once a year for a ‘treat’. And then add a couple of hundred dollars onto the bill.
David gets out and opens my car door. “Hungry, Veronica?”
It has been a very long day. “Yes, actually.”
I thank every star under the sun that I’m wearing these fancy new clothes. Nothing in my old wardrobe would even begin to look appropriate for a place like this.
The waitress, a beautiful goddess with waist-length hair and a dazzling smile, escorts us to the table. The restaurant is pretty packed, full of hundreds of couples chatting animatedly. I doubt anyone else is here as part of a secret government cover-up.
“Is there anything else I can get you?” she asks after taking drink orders, looking at David and fluttering her eyelashes.
She wants him. Of course she does. I’d be surprised to find a woman on this entire planet that doesn’t.
For some reason, I find myself annoyed by the idea of her hitting on him. It’s not like I can forget that we’re just acting and this is part of a cover-up. But for all the world knows, we are engaged. So this woman hitting on my pretend fiancé is pretty damn disrespectful.
“No thank you,” he replies, barely looking up.
I pick up one of the menus. There are no prices on there. I shudder to think about how much anything costs.
“This place is so fancy,” I say, shaking my head. “We didn’t have to come somewhere like this. Anywhere would have done.”
“The media has to know that we’re serious.” He doesn’t even bother looking at the menu. How many times has he dined at this place? That kind of wealth is crazy. “And it’s the best restaurant for what I have planned.”
“What have you planned?”
He nods to the window. “Take a look out there, but be subtle. Try not to let them know that you’re looking.”
I follow his gaze. Sure enough, I catch sight of a small crowd. I’ve seen enough of their type to recognize them pretty quickly now. The media have followed us.
“You want the media to catch sight of us,” I deduct. “To photograph us doing normal couple things, like going on dates and eating dinner together.”
He nods. “Yes. Really, I’m killing two birds with one stone. I wanted a private place where we could talk.”
“This is private?” I exclaim, looking around. Maybe the Secret Service aren’t looming over our shoulders, but this is pretty much the opposite of private in my book. There are so many other people here.
“Hired extras, all with background checks and non-disclosure agreements.” David gestures to everyone at the other tables. “They’re here to talk loudly and mind their own business. Anything we discuss is between ourselves.”
“You don’t think it’ll look odd if the media discovers that this is all staged?”
“Veronica, this is politics,” he says, giving me a dark grin. “Everything is staged. Even if