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I freeze in the middle of the path. Luna tugs on her leash as if eager to find the next trash bin. Instead, I lead her over to a bench on the edge of a manicured field, grateful that I decided to take her out for a solo walk today.
I sink onto the wooden bench. I knew my mother would wonder why I didn’t call her right away. But I wasn’t sure how to explain our plan.
Hi, mom. Gavin and I are going to trick the world into believing we were engaged because Gavin’s past had come back to haunt him …. That don’t sound like something I should ever say to my mother. She isn’t a smoke and mirrors person. Mom lives for facts, even after retiring from her accounting firm.
“I know Gavin is excited,” my mom says.
“How?” My brow furrows. My mother golfs and volunteers as if the requirement to donate all her free afternoons to charitable causes arrived with her AARP card. “Mom, where did you learn about our engagement?”
“I spoke to Gavin just now. I’d called to ask him for a donation to my local animal shelter. They are in desperate need of supplies. The last hurricane flooded their supply room, and he was so generous when we needed to rebuild the library—”
“Mom, I know about the shelter,” I interrupt. “Gavin told you that we were engaged? He told you the entire story, with all of the facts?”
I place particular emphasis on that last question because we agreed to tell my mother the truth about our so-called engagement. Gavin wrote that rule. If she heard about our engagement from a friend who reads gossip magazines, I would understand why she believes her daughter plans to marry New York’s most eligible billionaire bachelor.
“Yes, Kayla. He explained about the person who shot at you while walking your dog. That’s another time when one of your first calls should have been your mother, when someone shoots a gun at you while you’re walking your dog.”
“You’re right. If it even happens again, I’ll call you after the vet.”
My mother snorts. “I trust Gavin will have me on speed dial. I had a few words with him this morning.”
“Did you also share your feelings about our engagement?” I ask, still waiting for my mother to reveal that she knows we’re pretending. Maybe Gavin decided to toss all of the rules out the window.
Are we abandoning all the rules?
“Of course not.” The golf cart buzzes in the background again. “For all of that boy’s success, he’s still fragile.”
There was nothing delicate about Gavin last night. I mentally picture Gavin above me, his powerful arms holding his torso over my body while he thrust into me. Powerful, erotic, orgasm-inducing … but not fragile.
“We’re thirty-five, Mom. We’re not kids anymore.”
“Sweetheart, Gavin’s in a different place in his life. I worry about him. In many ways, he’s still a child forced to face the world alone.”
“That’s not true,” I say. “He’s always had me.”
“There have been times you were more caught up in your own life, Kayla. When you were married to that awful doctor, Gavin called me every few days. He wanted to storm your house and drag you away.”
“I know. Gavin called me too, trying to convince me to pack my bags and make a run for it.”
“And you did leave. When you were ready,” my mother says.
No, I left when I could no longer recognize myself.
Gavin stepped in and took control. He pulled my life together for me, buying the property next to his in the country. He hired the lawyers to initiate my divorce. He made sure I had groceries. If I’d wanted to go back to teaching, he would have applied for the job and taken me to the interviews. He rebuilt the outer layers of my world, and then he handed it over like a Christmas present.
“I couldn’t have left without Gavin,” I say.
“Don’t say that. He might have driven the car, but you made the decision to leave. You’re stronger than you think, Kayla. You realized you needed to be free from that ass you married and you accepted help. You built a life for yourself. I don’t want to see all of your hard work slip away when Gavin heads back to New York City and his parade of women.”
“Mom, that won’t happen,” I insist.
“Yes, sweetheart, it will. I love Gavin like a son, but he’s emotionally walled off from the world. It’s the only reason he survived after living with that awful foster family. But it means he’ll be a terrible husband.”
“And you wonder why I didn’t call you to share the happy news of our engagement,” I say dryly.
“I want you to think this through before you set a date and dive into wedding planning. You wanted to open up an animal sanctuary—”
“He’s going to fund it,” I say.
