BAD BOY ROMANCE: FAKE FIANCEE ROMANCE: Breaking Bad (Jealous Friend Alpha Male Temporary Counterfeit Romance Secret Love Thriller) (My Fake Fiancé Obsession Romance Bad Boy Love Collection Romance) (14 page)

              As she sat down she realized that she was going to be in his home the following evening. She wondered what his place would be like. She contemplated through to the next day and barely paid attention in the office at all. At 5:30, she got up and headed out to the address Jeremy had given her. She was indeed in front of the building in less than 20 minutes. She worried that he might not be there, but spotted his car out front. After debating whether to stay in the car for a while, she decided to just get out and buzz up. No sooner than she had rung, the door was opening before her. She took the lift up to Jeremy’s loft and was immediately shocked by the warmth and beauty of the place.

              True, the space was dim, but it had a great deal of character. It was well decorated, with muted dark aqua walls and varying shades of blue all around. There was artwork on the walls and it smelled as great as he did. There a beautiful painting of a blue girl hanging on the wall opposite his couch. While surveying the loft she barely realized that he was there. She finally spotted him in the kitchen standing behind the counter. It appeared that he was preparing food. She walked over, standing on the opposing side of the island. She said, “Hey. I didn’t interrupt your dinner did I?”

“I actually prepared this for us both. I tried to keep it general to make sure you’d like it”

“Oh wow! Thank you.”

“It’s cool.”

Paige was immediately impressed by what she saw. It was no rudimentary meal. There was stuffed chicken breast, twice baked potatoes, a very colorful salad, and some cheesy bread. It all smelled as good as it looked. She couldn’t believe he had made this. She slightly thought that he may have ordered out, but there were the dishes in the drain. If he were faking he was going through a lot of trouble to pull it off. He didn’t strike her as the type to do that. He went on, “You can help yourself. I figured we could eat and go over the app again.”

And so they did. Once again she told him what she wanted as he sketched it out on a sheet of paper. He then took out his laptop and began programming it right then and there. Meanwhile, Paige ate happily and sipped at the wine he had poured for her. She felt like a pig, but she just had to have seconds, it was so good. He worked on, having eaten his food already. When she was through, she began to look around his place. She started with the artwork, working her way over to his bookshelf. There were books and collectibles from all over the world. She looked through his DVD collection and was fascinated to see he had a record player complete with a grand collection of vinyl. She began asking him questions. She was surprised to find that he actually answered her.

Perhaps it was because he was at home, but somehow Jeremy seemed more relaxed and comfortable. She went through the vinyl and books asking about his preferences until he motioned her over to the computer screen. He pulled up a preview of the app and lo and behold there it was, just as she had imagined it. Even better than she had imagined it. She was so happy to see it laid out before her like that. He said that it could be up as soon as he uploaded it to the cloud. She encouraged him to get it up and running ASAP. As the app uploaded, perhaps out of the joy of the moment, she fumbled out, “So what is your name, really?”

She had not meant to ask him that, but the comfort and joy of the moment, along with their conversation had emboldened her. Before she got the chance to apologize he said, “It’s Jerimiah. I just prefer Jeremy. Not necessarily because it’s a simple name, just because I don’t enjoy it. It was my father’s name and that’s a whole other thing.”

Paige was very surprised he had answered her question. She felt somehow that that was not something he told to just anybody. It would seem that they had bonded and were on the way towards a friendship. Just as she began contemplating this, her phone beeped. It was a message from Leo. As soon as she read it, she realized that there was something wrong. First of all it was not the beginning of a conversation, it was in answer to another one. Yet it was something that she couldn’t understand him sending to anybody else. Or even her for that matter.

The text read, “We’re going to my sister’s on Thursday, relax.” This text was particularly odd because she was under the belief that Leo’ sister lived in St. Louis and Leo was supposed to be in New York. The second issue was who was he going to his sister’s with? She doubted a friend, so who else could it be? It had to be a woman. She was completely shocked. For a moment she forgot where she was. She was reawakened, by the sound of Jeremy’s voice asking her, “Are you okay?”

She didn’t know how to answer that. A few minutes ago she had thought that she was in love with the man of her dreams and yet now she didn’t know what she was. There were so many emotions tumbling through her at the moment. Before she could stop herself she blurted out, “What is wrong with men?” As soon as she said it she blushed and wished she could take it back. Yet once again, unbothered Jeremy came back, “Some people are just insatiable.”

Per usual, Jeremy had struck Paige with his answer. He always seemed to know the right thing to say. He continued, “I take it that’s bad news about your boyfriend. I didn’t like him.” Paige felt a rush of gratitude towards Jeremy for that statement. She also felt a rush of tears. In one motion she was putting her face in her hands, in the next she was falling forward into Jeremy. He immediately put his arms around her and held her as she cried. After allowing herself to let go for a short while, Paige collected herself and her things and headed for the lift. She said a clumsy thank you and goodbye before rushing out. On her way down and to her car, she realized that she had just broken down on an assumption. She did not know for sure that Leo was cheating on her. It was probably a misunderstanding. She would ask him about it when he got back.

She spent the rest of the week in a sort of troubled limbo. She experienced bittersweet emotions. She was happy for her site upgrade and new app, but troubled about Leo. He had texted and called her a few times and she had not mentioned anything. She was simply short and dry with him. Still he didn’t seem to detect a problem. She was waiting for the day he came back in town.

Friday afternoon Paige received confirmation from Leo that he would be back that night and would order out from their favorite restaurant. Paige had simply accepted and said she’d see him that night. She went blindly through her workday in anticipation. She told herself it was nothing, but she had a strong sense of foreboding. Part of her had wanted to contact Jeremy, but to say what? Following the night at his place they had exchanged very little contact. She had been embarrassed about her breakdown and he had said that he was busy. He had, however, checked on her, which was very nice.

After work Paige rushed home. Once she got there she realized that there was nothing for her to do, so she simply sat around for a while. Her place was clean so there was nothing to do there. She got in the shower and put on something comfortable. She was in no mood for vanity. She turned on the TV and flipped mindlessly through the channels.

She kept looking at the time. As always, Leo was late. He always had so little consideration for her time. With the sense of dread in her, it was especially torture tonight. After waiting nearly an hour, she heard his key turning in the lock. He walked in, put the food down, and kissed Paige as if nothing was wrong. Paige had been prepared to wait till after they had eaten, but her nerves were so bad, she decided just to get right to it.

She launched right in with, “So apparently you didn’t realize, but you sent me the wrong message the other day.”

“Yeah, so?”

“It was something about going to your sister’s house yesterday. Who did you go to your sister’s house with? Especially going from New York to St. Louis.”

“What are you accusing me of?”

“Are you cheating on me, Leo?”

“See this is what I be talkin’ about. You always comin’ at me with something dumb. I send you one message by mistake and all of a sudden I’m cheating’.”

“What did it mean, Leo?”

“You know what? I don’t have to take this. You wanna make me the bad guy, fine, I’m the bad guy. I’m cheating’ on you then, if that’s what you wanna believe. But I’m not going to stand here and listen to this.”

At that he turned towards the door and walked out. For a minute Paige stood rooted to the spot, completely paralyzed by what he had just done. Not only had he tried to flip the script, but he had followed it up by storming out. Here she was expecting him to quell her suspicions and instead he only made matters worse. She made the immediate decision to go out and follow him. She hurried and grabbed her keys and ran out before he could get too far.

              She jumped into her car and sped off down the road. She knew which way he usually took when leaving her place for home, so she took the left at the end of the block and began scanning the streets for his car. It did not take her long to spot the silver Maserati and she started tailing him, trying to stay a few cars behind. They weaved in and out of traffic, with her trying not to get caught. He got onto the freeway and she followed. After driving for 45 minutes, he took the off ramp and began meandering through a beautiful neighborhood. After taking a few twists and turns, he pulled into the driveway of a beautiful brick home with a perfectly manicured lawn and one car already in the driveway. She pulled over a few houses down and turned off her car.

              She watched as he got out and walked up to the house. He did not knock on the door or ring the bell. He pulled out his keys, stuck one in the lock and walked right in. Paige sat in a trance trying to figure out her next move. It was possible that it wasn’t what it looked like, but it could hardly be denied. After sitting there for 10 minutes she decided the longer she sat there the more her resolve would wither, so she got out of the car and made her way to the house. She walked up the driveway, across the walkway and came to a stop on the porch. After standing there a few minutes steadying herself, she stepped forward and rang the doorbell. One single ring. She considered turning and running away, but forced herself to stay planted in the spot. After a few short minutes the door opened and on the other side stood Leo.

              For a minute it looked as if he had seen a ghost, but then a short, pretty woman came up behind him asking, “Honey, who is that at the door?” Leo took a step into her viewpoint and threw over his shoulder, “Just a woman who is lost. I’m going to try to direct her back to where she is trying to go.” At that he stepped out onto the porch and closed the door behind him. For a moment Paige thought that he might begin to beg and plead, but those thoughts were interrupted by the enraged look on his face. Through gritted teeth he spat, “How dare you come here?”

              Paige was completely dumbfounded by his audacity. She could not believe that on top of everything he had the nerve to be upset with her for coming here and not at all apologetic about the situation. Before Paige could launch a verbal attack on him he went on, “Get out of here now and I will deal with you later.”

              At this Paige spoke up and said, “You don’t have to deal with me ever. Give me my keys and never speak to me again.” Leo looked for a moment as if he might rebut, but instead reached into his pocket, took out his keys, picked Paige’s out and slid them off of his ring. As he reached to place the keys in her hand she stared at the ring on his ring finger. She continued to be shocked as the information crashed over her once more. Without giving her an opportunity to say anything else, Leo stepped back, opening up the door to the house and speaking up for his wife to hear, “Yeah, just go on around the McDonalds and you should run right into it. Good luck.” He gave her one more look before closing the door.

              Paige stood there a moment more, still in total disbelief. Gathering her strength she unstuck her feet and turn to go to her car. As she walked away she felt eyes on her back and for a moment she thought it was Leo realizing what he had done. However, when she turned her head to look, she instead saw the face of his wife staring after her through the window. As she looked into this beautiful woman’s face she saw in her eyes a look of recognition that told Paige that she knew exactly who she was. Paige felt a compulsion to turn around and explain that she had no idea and that she would never knowingly have a relationship with another woman’s husband. Yet something in the look passing between them told her that the wife understood all too well, and there was a look of almost pity there as if she knew what Paige was feeling. Before Paige could be sure, the woman had replaced the blinds and receded back into the house. Paige carried on to her car, got in, put it in drive, and drove away.

              She was in la la land, completely unconscious of where she was going. Part of her wanted to call Deanna, but she was too ashamed. She had the same feelings towards her other friends and family. She did not want to have to tell them what a fool she had been. She kept replaying it over and over in her head. She had begun the week in love with a man she was sure she was going to marry, only to find out that would never happen because he was already married. She was too out of it to cry.