Page 22 of Faking It with my Small Town Billionaire

The drive into the city is long, but it passes quickly, with my excited passenger asking a thousand and one questions about how this arrangement is going to work. If she carries on the way she’s going, we won’t need to go to the office. We’ll have figured the contract out in the car.

“But what about meals?” she continues, the words flying out of her mouth. “Will we have to eat together like married people do?”

I’ve lost count of what number this question is, but after being interrogated for nearly an hour, all I can do is smile and do my best to answer her neverending queries.

“Not if you don’t want to,” I say for the umpteenth time.

That’s been my go-to phrase. Partly because I’m not going to make Lily do anything she doesn’t want to, and partly because I have no darn clue. I’ve never been married before. I don’t really know what the rules are.

And yes, my parents were married, but the truth is, I hardly ever saw them. I was raised by the staff because Mom and Dad were always at functions, or dinners, or galas, or fundraisers. Sometimes, they went on vacation and didn’t come back for a month.

Not surprisingly, I’m not super close with my parents. In fact, for the amount of time they saw me when I was younger, I might as well have been in boarding school. Maybe that might have been a better idea. It couldn’t have been worse than Willow Creek High.

Lily quiets a little as we get into the city. Her eyes are as wide as saucers when she looks up at the high rises.

“Have you never been to the city before?” I ask, now curious at her wonderment.

“I have,” she says, straining her neck to see a particular building. “It’s just been a really long time. A lot has changed since I was last here.”

“When you say a really long time...”

“I was ten.”

“Really?” I blurt.

She turns to me and smiles. “Why does that surprise you?”

“I don’t know.” I shrug. “I suppose, I just thought…” But then I taper off, realizing the drastic differences in our lives.

“You just thought that everyone popped into the city whenever they had a spare few hours,” she teases.

I nod knowingly. “Okay. I get it.”

“We don’t all own helicopters, Mr. Donovan.” She grins.

I smirk at her. “Is that why you agreed to marry me? For the helicopter?”

“I’m afraid of heights,” she says, looking back out the window.

“Oh, well. You’re going to love my office then.” My tone conveys the exact opposite, and she spins her head to glare at me.

“Oh, no.”

I give an apologetic shrug and watch as the color drains from her face.

“It’s fine,” I scramble, trying to offer a solution. “We can go to another office.”

“No.” She shakes her head. “We’ll go to your office. I’ll be fine.”

I don’t believe it any more than she does, but I don’t argue.

Lily’s resolve seems to waver, however, when we arrive and travel in the glass elevator of the Donovan Enterprises building, which happens to be attached to the outside of the structure.

“Oh, Lord. Oh, Lord,” she cries, as the glass box flies up into the air.

Ordinarily, I love this part of arriving at the office. The view across the city is fantastic, and it starts my day with a buzz. But Lily is beginning to shake, and this is clearly not fun for her at all.

“Come here,” I say, taking her arms and pulling her into me.

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