Chapter 15 #3
And she is the other line, the one I’m not allowed to name in this room, the one my wolf has been screaming at me to protect since the moment Sterling said her name out loud. I can’t choose between them. That’s the truth. And I can’t say that either.
The silence has her brows knitting together, and a strange emotion flits through her eyes before she turns her head away, pulling free from me. “Ethan needs you, and if I can help, I will. It’s not like I have anything else going on at the moment.”
I open my mouth, but Coach cuts me off. “She’s agreed to it. I don’t know why you’re so against it. If you have a problem with Miranda, you can just suck it up—”
“I don’t have a problem with her!” I snap. “But she should! Her entire life will be ripped open by the media. She’ll have no privacy. They’ll dig up everything, even things that are private, things she probably wants to stay buried.”
Miranda tightens her jaw. “I understand all that. I’m not an idiot, Grayson. But if you think I’m going to sit by while Ethan is taken from you, you don’t know me very well.”
My jaw moves, and she chooses that moment to turn to Sterling instead. “What do I need to do?”
Sterling slides his phone back into his jacket pocket.
“You move in here for the next couple of months, till this whole thing tides over. Cancel your lease if you have one. If anyone digs deep, you two started living together a while ago, and that’s why you’ve been spending time outside together.
Do all the things that a couple planning a life together would.
Living together is the first milestone people expect. ”
She nods slowly. “I can manage that.”
“You’ll be photographed with Grayson and Ethan in public,” Sterling continues.
“Restaurants, parks, team events, charity functions. Anywhere Vanessa’s people might be looking.
We announce the engagement in response to the articles that have already run, and we get ahead of the story before her side frames it for us. ”
“All right.” She glances at me. “That’s it? That doesn’t sound very hard.”
Sterling’s lips twitch slightly. “That’s just the basics.
You’ll go on dates with him. Be seen. Smile when you’re supposed to smile.
You’ll have to get physically close with him in public because Vanessa’s people will be watching, and a fiancée who flinches from her partner is a fiancée a private investigator will pull apart inside a week.
I don’t think I need to expand on what physical closeness should be, but in public, make sure you come off as a couple who is deeply in love. ”
Miranda’s hand tightens on the photographs. She doesn’t answer right away. I watch her work through it. The dating, the cameras, the touching, all of it laid out by a man in a suit who’s never met her before today.
“All right.” Her voice is quieter than before, but it doesn’t shake. “I can do that.” She doesn’t look at me when she says it.
“Miranda.” I’m standing two feet from her, hands in my pockets because I can’t trust them anywhere else.
I don’t like this. The fact that Sterling’s words are painting a tempting picture for my wolf is even worse.
I won’t be able to walk away from this. And if I can’t…
If I can’t stay away from Miranda, she will share the same fate as my sister-in-law.
“There has to be another way,” I say hoarsely.
“There isn’t.” Miranda frowns at me. “If there was, you wouldn’t need me here. Look, I don’t have a problem with this. Why do you?”
When I can’t find the right answer, she says quietly, “You paid off my debt for me. If nothing, then just consider this my way of paying you back.”
The breath leaves my body like I’ve been sucker punched. A debt. That’s what we are to her. A ledger she’s trying to zero out before she walks. My wolf whines low in my chest.
“I didn’t pay it off so you’d pay me back,” I say tightly. “This wasn’t what this was. Can you stop insulting me like this?”
Her expression blanches.
“You’re making me feel dirty when you say you want to repay me.
I’ve never once asked you to repay me anything.
And if that is why you want to do this, then no.
My answer is going to be no.” I turn around.
“This entire conversation is done. If need be, I’ll take Ethan out of the country. I’ll figure something out.”
“I’m not just doing this because of the debt, Grayson.” Her voice is small now. “I—Ethan is important to me too. I’m willing to help keep him with you. You are his whole world. You can’t ask me to watch him lose you when I can do something about it. Surely you don’t want that?”
I hesitate. “I don’t. But—”
She takes a step closer to me. “Then let me help. Let me do this.”
I look down at her.
Up close, she smells like sleep and my soap and the faint copper of the bruise on her collarbone, and my wolf goes quiet for the first time since Sterling walked up the drive. Quiet in a way that terrifies me more than any of the noise did.
“Fine.”
Her shoulders drop a fraction. Relief. She thinks she’s won an argument. A few feet behind her, Coach is watching me. I don’t look at him.