Chapter 1: The Ask

Nadia's coffee is lukewarm by the time James's assistant texts her. Conference room? No. His office. Different thing entirely.

She takes the stairs instead of the elevator, using the time to catalogue what she might have done wrong. The Connolly event was Friday. She'd caught a vendor switching out centerpieces at the last minute—wrong florist, wrong roses, she'd made them swap them back. No complaints. The corporate retreat last month was already generating inquiries for next year. Nothing burned down. No one got food poisoning. So what.

His office door is open. James is at his desk in his shirt sleeves, which is rare. The man moves through summers in blazers like it's his job. He doesn't look up when she enters, just nods to the chair across from him.

"Shut the door."

The temperature in the room drops. Nadia shuts the door and sits, keeping her spine straight, her hands visible on her lap. She's learned in six months of working for Whitmore & Associates that James doesn't waste words, and every gesture means something. The shirt sleeves mean he's been here since before the office got hot. The nod meant sit here specifically, not sit wherever you want. He's building toward something—a case or a conclusion—she can't tell which yet.

Finally he looks up.

James Whitmore is thirty-one and looks it the way other men have to pay for. Dark hair, sharp jaw, the kind of eyes that see you working through a problem. Right now those eyes are looking at her like she's a problem he's been thinking about for a while.

"I need you to do something for me," he says. "Outside of work."

Nadia's first instinct is to say no. Her second instinct is to ask what he's offering. She does neither. She waits.

"My family has a reunion," James continues. He leans back. The chair creaks. Nothing in his posture has changed, but something in his voice has softened by approximately one degree. "Three days. Lake house. Upstate."

"Okay," she says, because that's not actually a request yet.

"I need you to come as my fiancée."

Nadia blinks. Once. Then she almost laughs, then she realizes he's serious, then she thinks about how to say no without it being no.

"I'm going to need you to walk me through the context, because that's—that's a lot."

James doesn't smile. He rarely does. But there's something like approval in the way he nods. "My mother has decided I'm underperforming as an adult. She's been sending me setups. Blind dates arranged through her network. She doesn't hear no very well. A fiancée would solve that problem."

"For three days," Nadia says slowly.

"For three days."

"Which would require you to tell your family that you're engaged, and then three days later tell them you're not."

"Yes."

"That's insane."

"I know," James says. He's calm about it in a way that makes it worse. Like he's thought about how insane it is and decided insanity was better than the alternative. "I'll compensate you."

Nadia tilts her head. "I'm listening."

"Five thousand dollars for the weekend."

She doesn't react. She learned early in this job that reactions are currency, and she doesn't spend it on first offers. James watches her, and she watches him watching her, and there's a moment where neither of them moves.

"Plus," he says, "a letter of recommendation to the senior leadership team. They're looking to bring on an events director. New role. Significant salary increase from your current position."

Nadia sits with this. She thinks about rent. She thinks about the events director role, which would mean she could stop taking the freelance jobs on weekends, which would mean she could have Saturday mornings back. Five thousand dollars toward the design degree she's been putting off because it's not practical. She thinks about James, who rarely asks for anything and apparently knows the margins on her paycheck.

She's quiet long enough that he starts talking again.

"I know it's strange. I know it's an inconvenience. But you're good at reading rooms and you don't panic and you—" He stops. She watches him stop. He's said too much or close to it. "You're good at handling difficult situations."

"I'd need more details," Nadia says carefully. "Background for your family. How long we've been together. How you proposed. How much your mother likes to talk about feelings. And I'd need—" she pauses, finding the right frame—"a reason for why I'd say yes to you. She'd need to believe it. That I'd want you. So I need to know what story works."

James leans forward. Elbows on the desk, hands folded. She can see the calculation moving behind his eyes, checking boxes she can't see.

"Three months ago," he says. "We met at the Harrington gala. I spilled wine on your dress. You were furious. I bought you a new dress. We grabbed dinner to discuss how to prevent future wine incidents."

Nadia has a flash of memory. October. The Harrington gala. A man in a dark suit apologizing while she tried to sponge Cabernet out of black silk.

"That was you?"

"That was me."

"You were wearing glasses."

"Contacts now." He says it simply, undefensively. "And then slowly it became actual dinners. We've been seeing each other since. I proposed three weeks ago. Small thing. Nothing that would travel through the rumor mill—I wanted to tell my family in person."

He's thought about this. He's thought about this a lot.

"Your family is going to ask me personal things," she says. "About you. About us."

"I know."

"And I'm going to know things about you that I don't know now."

"I'll brief you," he says again. He stands and walks to a filing cabinet—the second drawer, organized like everything in this office. He pulls out a folder and hands it to her without ceremony.

Inside is a photograph. James and his parents at some charity event. His mother is small and sharp-looking in a way that suggests she's made enemies through sheer force of personality. A woman who shares James's jaw—a sister. His father, distinguished and vague.

Under the photo: notes in neat handwriting. Family Dynamics. His mother, Elizabeth, works in philanthropy. Remarried after the divorce when James was sixteen. One sister, Caroline, two years younger, married with two kids, Boston. His father in Seattle with his second wife. The reunion is his mother's side, but his stepfather's family will be there too.

Then: Topics to Avoid. Things She Likes to Talk About. Caroline's Weak Points, with a note: don't let her try to set up James with her "refined friends".

Nadia turns the page.

"There's more in there," James says. "Take it. We can meet again before Friday to go over everything."

She looks up at him. "Saturday."

"Saturday. Nine o'clock. The coffee shop on Wabash."

She doesn't ask how he knows which one she likes. She tucks the folder under her arm instead.

"When do we leave?" she asks.

"Next Friday morning."

"What's the weather going to be like?"

"It rains," James says. "It always rains the first night. She always complains about it. My stepfather always says it'll clear up by afternoon. It won't. But it will eventually stop."

Nadia meets his eyes. Sees the humor there, dark and private. "Then we should probably know things about each other."

"I have a list," he says.

"I assumed," she says.

She tucked the folder under her arm and crossed to the door. Her hand closed around the handle.

"Nadia."

She stopped.