Body Double (13 page)

Get her a bracelet from Zale’s, please. Use my Diner’s Club card, top left desk drawer.

“How much can I spend?” Andrea asked aloud as she typed the question.

$1000 should get something nice,
came the reply.
She likes sapphires.

She closed the phone and set it on the counter. “Wow. A thousand bucks for a bracelet. Nice.”

“I got Joe a Rolex,” Blake said, spitting out the words as if they were nails.

“Aren’t those really expensive?”

“At the time, I thought it was going to be my only wedding. I wanted to get him something that would last as long as my marriage.” Blake shoved a pan, and it hit the tile splash guard on the wall with a clatter.

Andrea didn’t know whether to leave him alone or go to him, but her instinct was to offer comfort. She stepped up behind him, put one hand on his shoulder blade, and rubbed gently. “I’m sorry, Blake. I can’t imagine how hard this must be for you, going into a marriage you already know won’t last with a woman who doesn’t... I’m sorry.”

With hands on hips and head bowed, he acknowledged her sympathy with a nod. “You should go up and get dressed.”

Maybe he wanted a few minutes alone to calm down, but she couldn’t leave yet. She ran her free hand gently down his forearm and kissed his skin above the elbow, below the cuff of his polo shirt. “Sorry,” she whispered and kissed him again.

He looked down at her, his eyes shifting back and forth as he took her in. He slid the arm she’d kissed around her waist and pulled her close, his gaze moving to her mouth.

Uh oh,
she thought.
I’ve gone too far.

He lowered his head to kiss her. Rejecting him now would be cruel, and so she tilted her face up to his, but she didn’t part her lips. He gave her two short but tender kisses, each igniting a flame in her body, before pulling back. “In the two days I’ve known you, you’ve shown me more affection than Sarah did in four months.”

Though she was certain she wasn’t actually gasping for breath, she felt like she should be. Her tongue was frozen in her mouth. What should she say? That he looked like he needed some kindness, or that her years as a social worker had conditioned her to offer comfort? Or that she found him much more attractive than she cared to admit?

“You’d better put some clothes on before you find out just how much I appreciate your role in this whole messed-up wedding scheme.”

Judging from the stiffening form pressing against her, she already had a good idea. Her heart thundered and her palms sweated, and she was sure he could feel her tremble. She wouldn’t have minded if he kissed her again. Instead, he let her go and made an obvious effort to return his attention to fixing breakfast.

“All right. I’ll be down in a bit.” She bounded up the stairs, eager for some distance to clear her head.

After showering, she selected a strappy, yellow sundress and matching heels. With her hair tied into a careless ponytail and a few loose strands framing her face, she stood in front of the full-length mirror, turning this way and that, hoping Blake would find her appealing. She did look like Sarah with the green contacts in. A pang of guilt made her stop and stare hard at herself.
What are you doing, Andrea? He’s not yours. He’ll never be yours.

She twisted the engagement ring around on her finger.
Yeah? Well, he’s mine for the next two weeks, so shut up.
She smiled guiltily at her reflection and went downstairs.

When she returned to the kitchen, Blake was standing by the arcadia door in the family room, looking out. A bowl of beaten eggs sat on the counter, and smoke was billowing from the overheated pan on the stove. “Blake!” Andrea said, rushing to the stove. She removed the pan from the red-hot element. A circle of blackened butter bubbled around the outer edges of the pan’s cooking surface. The kitchen was smoky, and she punched the button above the stove to turn on the exhaust fan.

He hurried to help her. “Shit. Sorry, I didn’t even notice.” He turned off the stove with a flick of the dial and waved at the smoke-filled air.

“Sarah would never forgive you for burning her house down.”

“I got distracted.” He picked up her cell phone and handed it to her. “A text for you. It was from Sarah, so I read it.”

Andrea opened the phone and read the text still on the screen:
Forgot to buy Blake’s wedding band too. Pick him out something nice, please.

“My ring,” Blake said. “The symbol of her commitment to me is a fucking afterthought.” His eyes were bloodshot, and a pained line was pinched between his eyebrows.

Her heart ached for him. He was a nice guy, sweet and thoughtful. He deserved better than this. “There’s time to back out. You don’t have to go through with it.”

He shook his head vehemently. “No. Not going to happen.”

“You could postpone the wedding, then. Take more time to think about it. Have a talk with Sarah when she gets back from Colombia.”

Again, he shook his head, but this time, his head was hung like that of a dog kicked out of its heartless owner’s car on a lonely stretch of road far from home. “It wouldn’t accomplish anything.”

Andrea’s eyes stung and filled with tears. She stepped into his personal space and put a comforting hand on his cheek. “You deserve better treatment than that.” Without thinking, she kissed his lips gently, then his cheek, then the side of his jaw before putting her arms around his shoulders and pressing herself against his body.

He wrapped his arms tightly around her and held her close for a minute, nuzzling her neck and kissing her shoulder. His lips set her skin ablaze, sending sparks through her body. “I don’t know what’s worse: marrying a woman who doesn’t want me, or pretending to marry one I can’t have.”

Andrea pulled away just enough to look him in the eye. Sarah
had
said it was okay to become intimate with Blake. Andrea opened her mouth to tell him so, but stopped. She knew herself well enough to know that sleeping with him meant giving him a piece of her heart. She couldn’t do that knowing she would be saying good-bye to him in two weeks.

His gaze dropped to her mouth. “What is it? Tell me,” he said, his voice rumbling in her chest.

She studied his mouth, the curve of his lips, and the day-old beard that darkened his face. The room grew warm, but all she could think of was his lips and how delicious his mouth would be if he kissed her, really kissed her. What pleasures would she find in his bed? She couldn’t sleep with him and remain emotionally detached. Eventually, Sarah would return and want her husband back, if only for the few weeks it would take to finalize their business. It was best to keep her distance as much as possible. She was playing a role, nothing more. “We—” She cleared her throat. “We should probably go.”

Blake called the limousine company to pick them up at Sarah’s and take them to his house. He asked his butler, Sam, to see her to the theater room to watch TV while he showered and dressed.

When he came downstairs, clean and shaven, his housekeeper met him at the landing. “Benjie, forgive me for speaking out,” Isabelle said in a near whisper, “but something is... wrong with Dr. Gentry. One minute, she has an accent, and the next minute, she doesn’t. Dr. Gentry has been here before, but now she acts like this is a palace she’s visiting for the first time.”

“No need for concern. She’s under a lot of stress with the wedding. It’s made her a little jumpy and forgetful.”

Isabelle shook her head, as if denying his explanation. “That doesn’t seem like stress to me. She’s different, Benjie. What is going on?”

Though he’d known his housekeeper and cook for most of his life and thought of her as a second mother, he needed her to drop the matter for good. “My marriage is a personal matter, Isabelle. You don’t have to like her, but you do have to accept her.”

“Please don’t misunderstand. I like Dr. Gentry just fine and I accept your choice, but she’s not herself. I don’t even think that woman in there is Dr. Gentry. She might be an imposter.”

“Isabelle, stop. That’s ridiculous. Please keep your opinions and concerns about my bride to yourself.”

“But I—”

“I need your word, Isa. You don’t share these silly suspicions with anyone.”

Having swaddled him as a baby and watched him grow from a child to a man, she tended to balk when he gave her a command, but she accepted a paycheck for her work, which made him her employer, not her son. With a huff, she said, “Yes,
sir
. You have my word.” She thrust out her chin defiantly and shook her finger at him. “But I will keep an eye on her—and your valuables.”

He laughed disarmingly, put his arm around her shoulders, and guided her toward the kitchen. “I appreciate you looking out for me, but everything’s fine. Now, what do we have to eat around here? We’re in a hurry, and I burned breakfast at her place. Just something light.”

Blake and Andrea moved to the table in the breakfast nook, and Isabelle set out a light breakfast of fruit, yogurt, and muffins with coffee, tea, and apple juice. She was nothing but warm and welcoming to Andrea, though she occasionally shot Blake a surreptitious warning glance.

“Your home is lovely,” Andrea said in her best Southern accent. “What I saw of it, anyway. I’m sure the upstairs is just as splendid.”

He cast a glance at Isabelle, who glowered as she put items into the dishwasher. “I can’t wait to show you my—our bedroom,” Blake said with a wink.

“After we’re married,” she said with a self-satisfied grin.

Once they finished eating, they had the driver take them to a jewelry store on the way to the restaurant so that Andrea could buy a gift for Charlotte. And a ring. People stopped and stared when the limo pulled up to the curb, no doubt waiting to see if a celebrity got out. Blake was used to disappointing the gawkers and would-be paparazzi. He was nobody they would recognize, though he sometimes noticed women in their twenties stared a little longer, twirling their hair with a flirtatious smile. “Stay put, Steven. I’ll get her door.” He went around and opened Andrea’s door and offered her a hand as she got out.

“I can open a car door,” she murmured.

“Of course you can,” Blake said, putting his hand on the small of her back as he ushered her through the store’s glass door. “I’d like to show you how a gentleman treats his lady, if you don’t mind.”

Her smile told him she didn’t.

A pair of salespeople looked up eagerly when they entered, but it was the woman who greeted them first.

“Welcome to DeMarco and Son. What can I help you find?” She was an immaculately dressed woman with perfect posture and sculpted red hair. Her eyebrows looked to have been plucked completely away and redrawn with a matching red pencil.

He browsed the men’s rings in the display case at Andrea’s request while she looked at bracelets for Charlotte. She needed a ring to put on his finger at the wedding, but he didn’t have to like it. She might as well buy him some fifty-dollar piece of junk, for all it meant to Sarah. In fact, no matter what ring she bought, wearing it would only remind him of his impending divorce. He might as well find something suitably cheap to use in the ceremony and stash in a drawer until the divorce.

A ring caught his eye, a gaudy yellow-gold thing shaped like a lion’s head with emeralds set into the eyes and a ruby in the mouth. It was hideous, with a price tag about ten times higher than its worth in materials. He hated it.

“Let me see that one,” he told the salesman.

The salesman shadowing his movements, whose name tag read
R. Reynolds,
looked confused by his request. “Which one?”

“The ugly lion’s head.”

“Certainly, sir,” he said, sliding the rear cabinet door open. It wasn’t even locked. “Although judging by the Rolex Oyster on your wrist, I’d say your tastes run significantly more distinguished than this. Perhaps I can show you—”

“No. The lion.”

“Of course, sir.” Reynolds lifted the tray of rings out and pulled the ugly ring from its velvety socket. “I believe this ring is actually silver with ten karat gold plating and synthetic gemstones.”

Blake took the ring and slid it onto his left ring finger. It was horrific, but it fit.

Andrea walked up, smiling victoriously. “I found the most beautiful white-gold-and-sapphire bracelet for Charlotte. Did you pick—” She gasped when her gaze settled on his left hand.

“We’ll take it,” Blake said, pulling the ring off. He handed it to the salesman. “It’s only a hundred fifty bucks, so she won’t even have to spend much money on it.”

“Blake,” Andrea said with a horrified expression, “that’s not the one you’ve chosen, is it?”

He put one arm around her and followed the salesman to the counter where the cash register sat. “It’s perfect,” he said quietly. “That’s the ring that best symbolizes my dear bride’s love and commitment, don’t you think?”

She blanched, blinking up at him. “I don’t think that’s the one she would’ve chosen for you. Maybe one of those over there? Platinum is nice, right?”

“No, I choose this one.”

“Please? Just take a look.”