Page 48 of Just Not That Into Billionaires

She snorts.

“All the neighbors with dogs go to the waterside dog run,” I tell her. “That’s your audience.” Not that I really care. I guess I don’t know why I’m bringing her. Yet again I hear James’s voice in my head:What the hell?

The light changes and we walk. Spencer’s excitement ratchets up as we approach the green space. He knows what’s coming. We head down past the willows, past people sitting on the giant stones. The water sparkles brilliant blue beyond the rail.

It’s here I notice that she’s limping, trying to disguise it. She always was an expert in the art of disguising her limps during our time at Beau Cirque. The dancers worked injured all the time, and they’d constantly be talking about their injuries; some of them even seemed to wear braces and wraps as hard-ass badges of honor, but not Francine. She didn’t like to talk about her injuries, as if that might give them power and status.

Exactly how bad is her knee? Are there people in her life who know she dances injured? Would they confront her about choosing this tour over her long-term health?

Francine can get tenacious when she wants something, and not everybody has the spine to challenge her. She always fought to be taken seriously—I remember her talking about it on one of the interminable shuttle rides back and forth from the strip to the apartment complex where Beau Cirque put us all up. I don’t know why I remember so many inane little details about her; it wasn’t as if she was even talking to me when she said it. But Francine always had to be the center of attention, and like the loser I was back then, my antennas were permanently tuned in to her.

The point is, she doesn’t know how fiercely she can come off.

Do they know she’d do anything to be on that tour, push through any kind of pain, risk any kind of damage? Even move in with Billionaire Bluebeard? But then again, it’s not my problem, is it? Francine’s a grown adult, capable of making her own choices.

“Spencer!” A couple of kids walking a tiny dog kneel to pet Spencer and Spencer sniffs their dachshund.

“You on your way?” the oldest girl asks.

“Yes, is it busy?”

She shrugs. “A little.”

They head off.

“Spencer’s popular,” Francine says.

I grunt in agreement.

The dog park turns out to be not that crowded, luckily. We head in the double gates and let Spencer off his leash. There’s a cool springtime breeze coming off the river, and an explosion of tulips all around.

The husband of a financial whiz I work with waves and heads over. “Showtime,” I say under my breath.

“Friends of yours?” she asks.

“More or less,” I say. Which is true. This circle of friends came with James when we got into business together, and the group still includes me, James’s socially challenged business partner.

Aside from working with James and the team in the lab, I never fit anywhere. I never even fit in with my lively family, to the point where people would joke that maybe I was switched at birth, that maybe there was a family of somber, crushingly serious nerds who had a rambunctious, outgoing son they didn’t know what to do with.

So this circle; it’s not really that critical that they meet her, but it certainly cuts down on the questions. Best of all, once they meet her, she’ll be valuable as an excuse not to do things.

And Aaron thought she’d outlived her usefulness.

“Alan!” I say.

Alan smiles. “Hey!” He comes over and we move our little group to the side of the trail. I introduce Francine as my wife.

“Nice to meet you, Francine,” he says, trying to hide his shock. “So you exist after all,” he jokes. But it’s not really a joke.

“She has a busy ballet career, what are you gonna do?” I say. “Francine is one of the most dedicated dancers on the planet.”

She looks up at me questioningly. Does she think I don’t see it? You’d have to be an idiot not to see it.

“Not an exaggeration,” I add.

“A marriage of workaholics,” Alan says. “That’s a convenient thing to have in common. You can both be shitty at work–life balance together.”

“Yeah, right?” Francine says. “He doesn’t get after me about living, sleeping, and eating pirouettes and I don’t get after him for being single-mindedly obsessed with the microrobot takeover.” She lowers her voice here. “You do know that’s what he’s up to, don’t you?”

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