‘I can certainly let the hotel know to cater for six,’ she said, sounding like she meant to go on before there the line went quiet again and he sensed a ‘but’ coming.
‘Well?’ he prompted, running out of time and patience.
‘I can see what you’re trying to do.’ Her words spilled out in a rush. ‘But is taking along a pretend fiancée really wise? I mean, what if Culshaw finds out? How will that look?’
Her words grated on both his senses and his gut. Of course it was a risk, but right now, with Culshaw feeling so vulnerable, so too was turning up alone. ‘Choose the right woman,’ he said, ‘and that won’t be an issue. It’s only for a night after all. Are you anywhere near your email? I sent you an idea of what I’m looking for.’
‘Look, Mr Zamos—’
‘Leo.’
‘Okay, so, Leo, I appreciate that I got the wrong end of the stick before, but finding you someone to play fiancée, that’s not exactly part of the service I offer.’
‘No? Then let’s make it part of them.’
‘It’s not actually that simple.’
‘Sure it is. Find an acting school or something. Tell whoever you find that I’m willing to pay over the odds. Have you got that email yet?’
‘I’m opening it now,’ she said with an air of resignation, her Australian accent softened with a hint of husky sweetness. He decided he liked it. Idly he wondered what kind of mouth it was attached to. ‘Charming,’ she read from the list of characteristics he’d provided, and he wondered. Surprisingly argumentative would be a better way to describe his virtual PA right now.
‘Intelligent. Classy.’ Again he mused. She was definitely intelligent, given the calibre of work she did for him. Classy? Maybe so if she’d worked as a corporate PA for several years. It wasn’t a profession where you could get away with anything less than being impeccably groomed.
‘And I’ve thought of something else.’
‘Oh, goodie.’
Okay, so maybe charm wasn’t her strong point, but so long as she got him the perfect pretend fiancée, he would overlook it for now. ‘You might want to brief her on both Culshaw and Alvarez. Only the broad-brush stuff, no details. But it would be good if she wasn’t completely ignorant of the players involved and what they do and can at least hold a conversation. And, of course, she’ll need to know something about me as well. You know the kind of stuff…’
And then it suddenly occurred to him what had been bothering him. She said stuff like ‘Are you serious?’ and ‘goodie’ in a voice threaded with honey, and that put her age years younger than he’d expected. A glimmer of inspiration told him that if she was, maybe his search for the perfect pretend fiancée was already over…
‘How old are you, Evelyn?’
‘Excuse me?’
‘I had you pegged for middle-aged, but you don’t sound it. In fact, you sound much younger. So how old are you?’
‘Is that entirely relevant right now?’
‘It could be.’ Though by the way she was hedging, he was pretty certain his question was unnecessary. At a guess he’d say she wasn’t a day over thirty-five. It was perfect really. So perfect he was convinced it might have occurred to him earlier if he hadn’t assumed his virtual PA was a good ten years older.
‘And dare I ask…?’ Her voice was barely a whispered breath he had to search for over the sounds of the city traffic. ‘Why would that be?’
And he smiled. ‘Because it would be weird if my fiancée looked old enough to be my mother.’
There was silence on the end of the line, a silence so fat with suspicion that it almost oozed out of the handset. Then that husky, hesitant Aussie drawl. ‘I don’t follow you.’
‘It’s quite simple,’ he said, his blood once again fizzing with the heady buzz of a plan coming together beautifully. ‘Are you doing anything for dinner tonight?’
‘No. Leo—Mr Zamos. No!’ This could not be happening. There was no way she was going to dinner with Leo Zamos and pretending to be his fiancée. No way!
‘Excellent,’ she heard him say through the mists of her panic. ‘I’ll have my driver pick you up at seven.’
‘No! I meant yes, I’m busy. I meant no, I can’t come.’
‘Why? Is there a Mr Carmichael I need to smooth things over with? ‘
‘No, but—’
‘Then what’s the problem?’
She squeezed her eyes shut. Tried to find the words with which to give her denial, words he might understand, before realising she didn’t have to justify her position, didn’t have to explain she had an infant to consider or that she didn’t want to see him or that the idea simply sat uncomfortably with her. She simply had to say no. ‘I don’t have to do this. And neither do you, for that matter. Mr Culshaw knows you’ve only just flown in from overseas. Will he really be expecting you to brandish a fiancée at a business dinner?’
‘But this is why it’s so perfect, Evelyn. My fiancée happens to be Australian and she’s already here. What could be better?’
She shook her head. For her own benefit maybe, but it made her feel better. ‘It won’t work. It can’t. This is artifice and it will come unstuck and in grand style.’
‘Evelyn,’ he said measuredly, ‘it can work and it will. If you let it.’
‘Mr Zamos—’
‘One evening, Evelyn. Just one dinner.’
‘But it’s not honest. We’d both be lying.’
‘I prefer to think of it as offering reassurance where reassurance is needed. And if Culshaw needs reassurance before finalising this deal, who am I to deny him that?’
But making out we’re engaged? ‘I don’t know.’
‘Look, I haven’t got time for this now. Let’s cut to the chase. I said I was willing to pay someone above the odds and that goes for you too. This dinner is important to me, Evelyn, I don’t have to tell you how much. What do you think it’s worth for a few hours’ work?’
‘It’s not about the money!’
‘In my experience, it’s always about the money. Shall we say ten thousand of your Australian dollars?’
Eve gasped, thinking of new clothesdryers and new hot water services and the cost of plumbers and the possibility of not dipping into her savings and still having change left over. And last but by no means least, whether Mrs Willis next door might be able to babysit tonight…
‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘Let’s make it twenty. Would that be enough?’
Eve’s stomach roiled, even as she felt her eyes widening in response to the temptation. ‘Twenty thousand dollars,’ she repeated mechanically, ‘For one evening.’
‘I told you it was important to me. Is it enough, do you think, to entice you to have dinner with me?’
Twenty thousand dollars enough? It didn’t matter that his tone told her he was laughing at her. But for someone who had been willing to spend the night with him for nothing, the concept that he would pay so much blew her away. Did tonight really mean so much to him? Was there really that much at stake?
Really, the idea was so bizarre and ridiculous and impossible that it just might work. And, honestly, what were the chances he would recognise her? It had been almost three years ago and in a different city, and beyond heated looks they’d