Marrying My Ex's Boss novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Sunday Dinner

At Honoria's table with Colin across from them, the fake couple's invented love story collapses and then locks in, until Colin catches Claire alone at the cars and promises she will be gone by Thanksgiving.

"Mother," Truman said. "This is my fiancee."

Honoria Shaw looked at me for a very long time, from my sneakers to my pixie cut.

"Sunday," she said. "Seven o'clock, Sewickley. Wear shoes."

Then she went back up the stairs, and the cane went tap, tap, tap.

Two days later I wore shoes.

They were the only heels I owned, black, from my cousin's wedding, and they pinched at the toe.

Honoria's house sat at the top of a long drive behind a wall of old maples, all gray stone and lit windows.

A woman in a black dress took my coat.

"Breathe," Truman said, at my shoulder.

"I am breathing."

"You're counting the chandeliers."

"There are nine," I said. "Eleven if you count the ones in the mirrors."

His mouth twitched.

The dining table was long enough to land a plane.

Honoria sat at the head, with her white bob smooth as a helmet.

On her right sat Colin, in his good navy suit, wearing a smile.

I stopped in the doorway.

"Oh, you know Colin," Honoria said, not looking up from her napkin.

"He's been a great friend to this family since March. I thought he should wish you well."

"How kind," I said.

Colin raised his glass to me.

We sat.

Soup came, something with leeks, and I used the right spoon because I'd looked it up in the car.

"Now," said Honoria. "How did you two meet?"

"Rotterdam," Truman said.

At the same moment I said, "Pitt."

We looked at each other.

The leeks were very quiet.

I had a choice, and I'd made a lot of bad ones that week, so I made a fast one.

"Both," I said brightly. "The first time was in May, at the Cathedral of Learning."

"I spilled a latte on a tall man, and he didn't say a word."

"I was jet-lagged," Truman said, blank.

"He kept the napkin."

"I still have it," he said, and picked up his water.

"Rotterdam is where he lives," I said. "We've talked on video every night since."

Colin set down his spoon.

"Every night," he said. "That's funny. I was in her bed until last week."

Honoria's eyebrows rose a quarter inch.

"You were in the bed," I said. "Not in the conversation. I talked to him after you fell asleep."

"Our first call was a Tuesday," Truman said. "She hates Tuesdays."

I did, actually, and I stared at him.

He did not look at me, and I could see he was enjoying himself.

Honoria laid her spoon down very precisely.

"What does your family do, Claire?"

"My mother runs a school cafeteria in Altoona."

"How wholesome."

"Four hundred lunches a day," I said. "On a budget of two dollars and sixteen cents each. She'd get you through a recession."

Colin laughed into his glass, a short ugly sound.

"And your father?"

"Left when I was eight."

"And you work at Ironbridge as a?"

"Junior analyst. Forecasting, on fourteen."

"And when do you intend to stop?"

I blinked. "Stop what?"

"Working," Honoria said, as if explaining a coat check. "A Shaw wife has obligations. Charity boards. The hospital. Entertaining."

"I'll be at my desk Monday at nine," I said. "I can do the hospital after six."

A pause.

"How very Bloomfield," Honoria said.

"Altoona, actually."

"Of course."

Truman put down his fork.

"Mother," he said, in a voice so level it frightened me. "You'll find she's the best-informed person at that table."

"I'm sure she's very informed about a great many things."

"She told you the cafeteria's cost per plate to the cent. Without a note."

Honoria considered her son, and then me again, with the same flat stare.

"We'll see," she said.

The main course was lamb.

Colin talked about the Kickoff and the Rising Star award and the importance of loyalty, and every time he said loyalty he looked at me.

Truman said nothing.

Under the tablecloth, his knee pressed against mine, once, hard, and stayed.

I did not move my leg.

We left at nine, because Honoria said she tired early, and nobody argued.

In the drive, under the maples, Truman stopped to take a call from his lawyer, and I walked ahead to the cars.

Footsteps behind me, quick and light.

"That was impressive," Colin said.

He was smiling the real one now, the one I'd seen at two in the morning when he was getting what he wanted.

"Go home, Colin."

"Tell me, babe. What is he paying you?"

My stomach dropped through the gravel.

"Excuse me?"

"Nobody falls in love in five minutes. Nobody marries in a week."

He tilted his head.

"Honoria wants me as her Vice President, and a CEO with a fake wife is a gift."

"All I need is the paper."

"There is no paper."

"There's always paper," he said softly.

He leaned in so close I smelled the cologne I'd bought him for his birthday.

"Enjoy the house," he said. "I'll have you out by Thanksgiving."

Then he walked to his car, whistling.

I stood in the cold with my pinched toes and thought about a napkin in my bag.

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