Five thousand a week just to wear a ring and pretend to be Angelo’s wife? And it means that Wyatt gets to fulfill his dreams of graduating with an impressive degree, and hopefully leave his druggie lifestyle behind?
Yep, I think I can handle that. I slip my shirt off and pick up the dress.
I sit in the back of the car wondering if this is all a dream. Not in an oh-my-gosh-this-is-so-fancy kinda way. More like: this is so different to my regular life, and the circumstances that brought me here are so bizarre, it can’t be real. But when we pull up to the restaurant and I climb out, the cold night air feels real enough. New York in winter can really be a bitch.
I walk into the skyscraper and follow the signs up to the restaurant, which is on the top floor and has breathtaking views of the city. It’s the sort of restaurant I could only fantasize about affording in my regular life, the kind of place where an appetizer can cost a month’s paycheck. It’s ludicrous and, as I walk to the hostess’ desk, I feel like she can see through my expensive dress to the ramen-noodle-eating poseur beneath.
Maybe the hostess is having a bad night. She’s a French lady—or maybe she just does a really good French accent—with a bun of dyed white hair and glasses perched on the end of her nose. She regards me the same way she would a pet that’s just dragged in a decaying rodent.
“Can I help you, miss?”
“Yes,” I say, a little caught off-guard by how brusque she is. “I have a reservation—I think.”
“You …” She pauses for dramatic effect. “Think that you have a reservation. Hmm, name?”
I’m so out of my element, I end up giving my name instead of Angelo’s. She looks up and down the list, and seems almost happy when my name obviously isn’t there. “Perhaps you are in the wrong restaurant?” she oh-so-helpfully suggests.
That pisses me off. Whether or not she’s right that I would never in a million years be able to afford even an appetizer here—she’s one hundred percent right, for the record—is not the point. “Are you saying I don’t belong here?”
“If you don’t have a restaurant…” she starts. My jaw nearly drops at the rudeness, and even she must see that that’s a little too much, because she changes course mid-sentence and says instead, “Are you here with somebody, miss? Or are you here alone? Is there somebody I can have my assistant call?”
Her assistant. How fancy is this place that the hostess has a fricking assistant?
“You can have your assistant—“
“Dani?” Angelo steps up beside her, looking handsome as Lucifer himself in a tight-fitting steel suit with a matching tie, his hair slicked back, his dark eyes flitting between us. “What’s going on?”
You can have your assistant assist you in pulling the stick out of your ass, is what I was going to say. Maybe it’s for the best that Angelo chose now to show up, though.
All the color drains from the hostess’ face at his arrival. “Mr. De Maggio!” she exclaims. “This is your guest?”
“Yes,” he answers coolly. “Why?”
“Oh, it’s nothing,” I say with saccharine sweetness. “We were just getting to know each other. Where’s our table?”
The hostess gives me a mortified look as Angelo gestures at me to follow him. As I walk forward, he wraps his arm around me like it’s second nature, like we do this all the time, like we’ve been married for decades, rather than—I check my watch—an hour. “You’re cold, Dani. Did you not see the coat I left for you?”
“Where was it?” I ask.
“In the wardrobe,” he says.
“There were about a hundred coats in there.”
He chuckles. “The idea was that you’d pick one.” He slips his jacket over my shoulders as we reach our table. “Here we are.”
We are at the fanciest booth in the fanciest restaurant I have ever been in. The walls of the booth are a felt material, patterned, and a sconce light flickers to imitate candlelight in the corner. Looking down, I have a view of the city, lost in fog and night except for the hundreds and thousands of lights.
“It’s like we’re looking down at the night sky,” I whisper, amazed.
He slides opposite me, and then pushes a ring box across the table. “Open it. You are to wear these at all times.”
I open the box to find two rings inside: a glittering engagement ring and a silver wedding band. He raises his left hand, showing me a matching band. “We had a quick wedding,” he tells me as I slip the rings on. I have to admit, they’re gorgeous, especially the engagement ring. “Levi was my witness and your brother was yours. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing, but we are very much in love.”
“Are we now, playboy?” I answer distractedly, head rushing with how fast this is all moving. “And how did you win my love?”
He shrugs. “How do they do it in the movies? You were going to catch a flight and I ran through the airport and stopped you, something like that.”
I arch my eyebrow at him. The waiter fills our glasses with champagne. It’s a little unsettling actually. It’s going to take some getting used to, how the staff in rich people’s worlds just appear and disappear.
“Is that really the best you can come up with?”
He raises his glass. We clink them together. We sip.
“If you have a better suggestion, I’m all ears.”
I lean back as the waiter silently slides the menu into place, and then retreats. “Hmm, let me think.” I take another sip of champagne. “I’m not an expert or anything, but I think to fall in love you’re supposed to know something about the other person. And I really don’t know much about you, Angelo.”
“We’ve met. We’ve talked. You know me.”
“So, what? When people ask about my husband, I’m just supposed to tell them he’s a pervert who cornered me in the hospital hallway and likes to dirty talk me at the scene of car accidents?”
“I’m sure they’ll take one look at you and completely understand my predicament. Shall I order for us?”
“As long as it’s good.”
He places his hand on his chest like I offended him. “I swear, signorina, you will not be disappointed.”
It’s actually nice to just sit back and let him take care of everything during dinner. Not the kind of thing I would’ve thought I’d enjoy, but then again, none of this was exactly in my five-year plan. I feel pampered and warm and sort of fuzzy with how beautiful this evening is.
Though I don’t let Angelo see any of that.
“So, husband,” I drawl, “tell me about yourself. What are your hobbies?”
“I workout,” he says rotely. “I box. I wrestle. I wrestled in high school.”
“Are we talking Olympics or WWE?”
He sips his champagne, and then says, “What do you think, dear wife?”
“Well, as much as I’m enjoying imagining you in a speedo with some war paint on, I’m guessing it’s more the serious headgear stuff.”
He nods. “Yes, though I don’t do it as much as I should anymore.”
“Too busy with business?” I ask.