For her anyway.
“Angeline,” she heard him say. “Are you in some kind of danger?”
She took a moment to answer. Technically she wasn’t. But in every other sense she was. Without warning, a firm set of hands gripped her by the shoulders and turned her around.
“Answer me.”
“N-no, I’m not in any danger,” she managed to stutter while fighting the urge to lean into the strong, masculine chest that was so close.
He dropped his hands. Disappointment pummeled her. He clearly wasn’t as interested in touching her as he had been once.
Better to get this over with. “It’s the business, R.J. The TeaLC chain. I’m worried that if I don’t expand soon, we may not survive.”
He quirked an eyebrow. “But I thought your business was flaring.”
“It’s also very costly. The distribution end brings in a good amount, but the retail chains aren’t terribly profitable. Plus, I have some very expensive overhead. I need a sales spurt, soon.” She took a deep breath. “And I think I just may have come up with a way to achieve some growth.”
“But?”
“But it won’t be easy.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Go on.”
Here it was, the tough part. She braced herself for the certain embarrassment and decided to just blurt it out. “We never signed the papers to finalize our divorce.”
A dark shadow flashed in his eyes. “Is that what all this is about? You want to take care of the divorce finally?”
“No! No, that’s not it at all.” This was even harder than she would have imagined. “Actually, it’s kind of the exact opposite.”
Silence. He searched her face for clarification.
“I need to act like I’m happily married. Just for one night. I need you to pretend we’re still a fully married couple who never separated.” Oh, man, she was making a complete and utter mess of this whole proposal. But there was no way to back out now.
She lifted her palms in appeal. “It wouldn’t be for long. I realize what I’m asking and—”
He cut her off with a quick raise of his hand. “Let me get this straight. You have to act like you’re still happily married to grow your business.”
Before she could answer, he turned around and walked toward the center of the large room.
She stepped toward him, afraid he was going to leave without hearing her out. She’d gone too far to back out now. As difficult as this was, she had to see it through.
“R.J., wait. Can I just explain?”
He didn’t answer. Angeline rubbed her arms to calm herself. He was so angry he couldn’t even speak!
And then he turned around, looked into her eyes and broke into laughter.
* * *
She really was too much.
R.J. didn’t know if he was laughing more from amusement or the unsettling experience of seeing her again. This had to be some kind of joke.
He didn’t feel much like laughing, though, when she lifted those deep brown eyes up to his. She looked like a wounded doe.
His breath caught in his throat. “Wait a minute. You’re serious.”
“I wouldn’t have asked you to come all the way out here if I wasn’t serious.”
“I think I’m missing something here.”
“This isn’t some attempt at a reconciliation. I know things are over between us.”
“You’re right about that.”
She flinched. “I just need you to do some convincing acting for a day or so.”
“You want me to pretend we’re still completely together? That I’m still your husband in every way.” He’d done everything he could for the past three years to try to forget what that was like. “What kind of game are you playing?”
“It’s not a game, it’s a business proposition,” she said in a firm, official voice.
A what? He had to try to calm down. No one else could ever get him so riled up. Taking a deep breath, he concentrated his gaze on her face.
He wouldn’t have believed she could have become more attractive. The girlish, soft qualities had been replaced with the maturity of a beautiful woman. Breeding and class were etched in every inch of her. It had thrown him off so many years ago, the passion that lay beneath her proper demeanor. Just thinking about it now was throwing him off again. Three years hadn’t made enough of a difference, apparently.
“Maybe we better start from the beginning.”
“It shouldn’t take more than a day or so of your time,” she began, becoming animated.
He lifted his hand to stop her. “Before we get too far with this scheme, suppose you fill me in on the details. What happened? Last I heard, you’d grown the business tremendously since you started it.” She’d done an impressive job, too. Angeline had moved quickly on the sudden popularity of tea and had become a leading distributor in no time. She was one of the youngest successful CEOs in the United States. Like him.
“It all stemmed from such a terrific idea.”
Her tongue darted to lick her lips, and he lost his concentration for a moment. Her dark features were drawn tight. Slight dark circles shadowed her eyes. Even so, her regal grace never left her. It was that quality that had knocked him senseless when they’d met freshman year at university. He’d fallen hard for the contradictory mix of private school breeding and wanton boldness. Not to mention the drop-dead body that had turned his gut to fire every time he’d laid eyes on her.
“What idea?” he asked, turning back to the conversation.
“I thought there would be some opportunity for growth given the big wave in the herbal tea market. Lots of people swear by the healing benefits of some of the herbs and plants found in tisanes. I thought we’d stress that to set us apart from the competition.”
“What has that got to do with being married?”
“Well, I started doing some research. It led me to a variety of plants. It’s mainly grown along the Black Sea, on a small island nation called Mondolavia.”
“I’ve heard of it.”
“I traveled there with Shanna to check it out, and true enough, the stuff is invigorating. They’ve been drinking it in that part of the world for years. Anyone who’s tried it insists it’s like a magical potion. And it tastes great. Like nothing we can compare to in this hemisphere. If TeaLC was the first chain to bring it here, it would put us in a whole other category. This could be the start of a whole new product assimilation. And we’d be the one to start it all.”
“So far, so good.”
She nodded with excitement, clearly taken with the idea. “We were all ready to arrange for the supplier to start shipping. Even drew up a contract for exclusive distribution rights for the next several years.”
“That’s fantastic. I still don’t see why you’d have to be married.”
She shut her eyes tightly and let out a deep breath. “That area is a completely different part of the world. The plants are all grown and processed by