From Fake To Forever. Kat Cantrell

       Three

      Meredith spent Monday morning shopping at Barneys and cursed her meager credit limit. She’d packed a few days’ worth of outfits for her unexpected trip to New York, not nearly enough for the two or three weeks she now planned to stay. And nothing in her suitcase would fly as a wardrobe for an employee at a high-class place like Hurst.

      She still couldn’t quite believe she had landed a job in a real fashion house. It was a dream come true, but one of those usually unattainable childhood dreams like becoming an astronaut or ballerina. And part of the dream was getting to dress the part.

      Asking Jason for an advance on her salary would have invited too many questions, so she made do with the sale rack. Most of the clothes were out of season. She’d be outed as a fraud in a New York minute. No pun intended.

      But still, it was a morning shopping at Barneys in Manhattan and life did not suck. Except for the part where she still didn’t have the divorce papers signed…and she’d have to take an extended vacation from her job with her sister.

      For the past two years, she’d assisted Cara as she designed and sold wedding dresses to Houston brides. Cara had recently begun selling her dresses in an upscale boutique and business was booming. Meredith wanted to make more of a contribution than simply as an assistant. What else could she do but buy in as a partner? Wedding dresses were Cara’s first love and she excelled at the design side. Meredith might as well help on the financial side. She had little else to offer.

      This was her chance to prove she had what it took. To prove everyone wrong who thought there wasn’t anything more to Meredith than the stuff they saw on the outside.

      Cara was in Barbados. Or was it Saint Martin? Meredith could never keep track of which resort her brother-in-law had dragged her sister to. Keith, her sister’s husband, ran around the Caribbean fixing up resorts in his consultant job and Cara traveled with him. Hopefully she’d understand Meredith’s need for time off without asking too many questions.

      Meredith made a mental note to call her sister later.

      Her phone buzzed and she keyed up the text message from Jason: Where are you? I’m at the hotel.

      She texted him back: Shopping. Be back soon.

      What was that all about? Was she supposed to sit around and wait for His Highness to appear? He might have his precious leverage—and she was still a little miffed about it, make no mistake—but that didn’t mean Meredith planned to jump when he said jump.

      When she got to the hotel after dallying an extra ten minutes just because, Jason was waiting for her in the lobby. He didn’t notice her right away. Unashamedly, she watched him as he talked on the phone.

      The man was unparalleled in the looks department. Clean-cut, gorgeous cheekbones, equally comfortable in a suit, jeans or nothing at all. It was enough to make a girl salivate.

      And then he saw her. A smile spread across his face and sent a shiver down her spine.

      Platonic was not going to happen. She was in New York for a couple of weeks, they were married, for God’s sake, and they’d certainly had plenty of sex in the past. Why would he even say something so ridiculous?

      They’d walked away from each other once and it hadn’t worked out so well. It was time to try not walking away.

      He pocketed his phone and stood.

      “You should give me a key,” he suggested when she met up with him as he strode toward the elevator.

      “In case you want to make a middle-of-the-night visit to your wife? Because I’m totally okay with that.”

      He chuckled and stuck his palm against the open elevator door so Meredith could enter ahead of him. “Because I’m paying for the room. I might as well use it to make private phone calls instead of letting everyone in the lobby hear about Lyn’s strategic plans.”

      Why was he so against resuming their relationship? It wasn’t as if she was asking him to stay married—that wasn’t what she wanted, either. Once she got herself established in a career, then she could think about whether she actually wanted to get married. Some women—like Cara—dreamed of nothing but white dresses and bouquets, but Meredith had never thought marriage was all that great of a goal.

      Figuring out how to be a grown-up was the scary, frustrating can’t-see-the-light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel quandary Meredith couldn’t dig her way out of. That goal felt as out of reach as it had two years ago.

      She stuck her tongue out at him and fished the extra card key out of her purse, then handed it over. “Seems like a waste of a good hotel room to me. Sorry you had to hang out in the lobby, sugar, but perhaps you should have told me to expect you and I would have been here,” she said without a trace of irony.

      She hadn’t heard from him all weekend. Not that she’d expected to.

      He waved it off and followed her to her room. “I was in the neighborhood, so I came by to go over all the arrangements I’ve made for you at Hurst House.”

      “Already?” Her throat got a little tight as this Machiavellian deal of Jason’s got real.

      What did she know about being a spy, in a fashion house or otherwise? The people at Jason’s father’s company would see through her instantly. If she failed at helping Jason get his plans back on track, would he refuse to sign the papers to spite her?

      She should have gotten more of this established before she agreed. Actually, she should have told him no and demanded the divorce. But she well remembered how destroyed he’d been over the company splitting up, and she did have a little bit of fault in the marriage becoming legal in the first place, though how the paperwork had gotten submitted still baffled her. Her father’s lawyer guessed that someone filed it on their behalf, probably a well-meaning hotel maid, but they’d never know for sure. Too much time had passed for anyone to remember.

      She felt horrible about her part in it, and if she wished to prove she wasn’t actually a scatterbrain, this was her opportunity. She couldn’t abandon Jason. Adults took responsibility for mistakes and accepted consequences. Period.

      “Yeah, already.” His eyebrows went up. “You think I have time to waste? Avery doesn’t rest, and she’s too smart to underestimate. She’ll have alternate plans in place in hopes of upstaging me. I can feel it.”

      “So what am I going to be doing?”

      “You mentioned the other night at dinner that you’d been working as a designer’s assistant. So it was a no-brainer to put you in that same role at Hurst House.”

      “Just like that?”

      She would be working for a God-honest designer. If it was that easy to get a job working in the fashion industry in New York, could she have been doing it all along?

      Her throat opened a little. At least she didn’t have to learn a whole new job to be Jason’s spy.

      Except working with Cara was miles and miles away from working with an established clothing label. Cara loved her and if Meredith occasionally messed up, it didn’t feel like the end of the world. That’s why buying into Cara’s business was so important. It wasn’t like Meredith could work with just anyone. It was the only opportunity available to her.

      “Just like that. After I called my mother and asked her to recommend you, she called Hurst House Human Resources and informed them you’d be arriving tomorrow morning. The vice president of HR still has a guilt complex over defecting to Hurst House, so he’d pretty much do whatever my mom says.”

      “I see.” How crazy was that? If only the rest of Meredith’s appointed task went so easily. “And that’s it? I show up, help one of the designers and wait around for Avery to stroll by? What if I never even see her?”