‘You need a wife, right? Someone who will make you more...palatable to the public for some business deal you’re working on?’
‘Hold on.’ He took a deep breath. ‘You don’t get to make assumptions about things you overheard—out of context, I might add—in a private conversation.’
Her cheeks flushed, and the spirit that had had her looking him in the eye earlier faded as she averted her gaze. ‘I’m sorry that I eavesdropped, Jacques, but I... I can’t be your wife.’
‘I’m not asking you to marry me, Lily.’
‘Then what do you want from me?’
‘I just want you to pretend to be my girlfriend. You may have overheard that I’m not entirely willing to marry someone to get the public to like me.’ Not if I don’t have to. ‘But you gave me the idea tonight that I could pretend to have a nice, respectable girlfriend and that might have the same effect.’
‘And that’s the real reason you wanted coffee?
‘Yeah. It isn’t that much to ask, considering that I did the same for you tonight.’
He shouldn’t feel bad about this. He shouldn’t have to defend himself.
So why was he?
‘And maybe if you’d asked me straight I would have agreed. But instead you just told me to continue the charade for a bit longer—which now, of course, I realise is because you wanted to test whether it would actually have an effect, and not because you wanted to annoy Kyle—and then “coffee”.’ She lifted her hands in air quotes. ‘You manipulated me.’
‘And what you did wasn’t manipulation?’ he snapped back at her, guilt spurring his words. The picture she had painted reminded him too much of his father.
‘I didn’t manipulate you,’ she answered primly. ‘I told you why I did what I did. I was honest with you as soon as I had the chance to be.’
He shrugged, pretended her words didn’t affect him. ‘And I’m a businessman. I know how to capitalise on opportunities.’
‘This isn’t an opportunity,’ she said coldly. ‘I’m not an opportunity.’
‘Of course not.’ He said the words before he could think about how they might undermine the cool exterior he was aiming for.
‘Then stop treating me like one.’
She was right, he thought, and then remembered that she’d said if he’d been straight with her maybe she would have agreed.
‘You’re right—and I’m sorry for the way I went about this.’
She gave him a look that told him she didn’t entirely trust his words. That look combined with the wounded expression just behind the guard she was trying so desperately to keep up, made him feel a stab of guilt.
He had manipulated her. And he should know, since he’d witnessed his father manipulating his mother for his entire childhood. Somehow the man had made his wife believe that telling their children they were disappointments, failures, was normal. That raising them without the love and support parents were supposed to give was acceptable. And his mother, so desperately in love with a man who had only wanted her for her money, hadn’t believed she’d deserved more.
That her children had deserved better.
When Jacques had finally managed to convince his mother to kick his father out it had only taken his father a few minutes to change her mind. And now Jacques regretted it. The trying. The hope. The fact that he’d done it on the night of the championship.
It had been the reason he’d been so easily provoked into the fight that had got him suspended for three years. That had lost his team their chance to be a part of the international league they had fought so hard to play for.
It was why buying the Shadows now was so important. And why he needed to make amends with Lily.
‘Would you give me another chance to ask you to be my girlfriend? My pretend one, of course.’ He wasn’t sure why he clarified it, but it made him feel better.
‘If you tell me why you need a pretend girlfriend, yes.’
He nodded, and forced himself to say the words.
‘Seven years ago I was suspended from playing rugby.’ It took more strength than he’d thought it would to say the words. ‘I got into a fight that cost my team a championship game and the chance of playing in the highest league they could play in.’
She interlaced her fingers and rested her hands in her lap. ‘What was the fight about?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ he answered, because it was true.
‘The scar?’ she asked, tapping at her lip.
He wondered what intrigued her so much about it, but only nodded. There was a beat of silence before she spoke again.
‘It must have been important if it cost you something that clearly meant so much to you.’
Maybe it had been important to him once—the chance of a family without his father. Now Jacques thought he’d been fighting over something that hadn’t been worth nearly as much as it had cost him.
‘It doesn’t matter,” he said again. ‘It’s only the effect the entire thing had on my reputation that does.’ He paused. ‘I heard recently from a few business associates that my old rugby club is going to be sold soon, and I want to be the one to buy it. Except I’ve been told that some of the club’s biggest sponsors will pull out if it’s sold to me. The only way to prevent that, it seems, is to build a more...positive reputation.’
She stared at him. ‘You’re seriously telling me that people care that much about your reputation?’
‘Apparently.’
‘And the only thing you did to get this negative reputation was have a fight?’
‘One that lost my team the championship and an opportunity.’
‘Yes, of course—but that’s it?’
He hesitated. ‘Well...’
Jacques really wasn’t interested in rehashing the details of the year when he’d spiralled into the depression that had damaged his reputation even more.
‘Well...?’ Lily repeated, a single brow arching in a way that made him forget the tension of the conversation they were having.
‘The year after I was suspended I spent a lot of time... Well, I spent some time on a self-destructive path,’ he said once he had steadied himself.
‘What does that mean?’
‘I...’ He’d hoped his explanation would be enough. ‘I told myself that I didn’t care what people thought about me, and I did exactly what I wanted to.’
And yet, ironically, it had been caring about what people thought that had made him act that way in the first place.
When she didn’t speak after a few moments, he found himself asking, ‘Why aren’t you saying anything?’
‘What did that entail?’ she said in lieu of a reply.
He tried to formulate an answer, but nothing he could say would make him look good.
‘I can’t help you if I don’t know the truth, Jacques.’
‘Parties. A lot of swearing at journalists. Women.’ He ran a hand through his hair, wondering how telling her all this intimidated him more than tackling the largest of men on a rugby field. ‘What more do you want me to say?’
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