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It’s not until I’m halfway through a video call that it hits me: I offended hersobadly.

Exactly how much does a woman have to apologize and explain herself? I’m not even excited when my recent test results are delivered to my desk early Friday morning when Alessa is still in class. Theoretically, she will receive hers when she arrives later. The only relief I feel is the immediate satisfaction that everything is exactly what I expected in the health department.

I should be ecstatic. This forced celibacy I suggested we follow could end tonight.

When I bring this up to her at the end of the day, Alessa implies that we should wait until tomorrow, after the mixer. “We have an early day tomorrow, madam,” she says with roboticdiction. “We should get to bed early. If you have your way, neither of us will get to bed early.”

That sounds flirtatious on paper, but with her body language so closed off and her tone clipped, I know it’s anything but. She’s treating this like a business deal, which normally I would be all for, but even the best business dealings have an element of humanity to them.

I’m starting to rethink this arrangement. As I settle into my penthouse for the night, I decide that tomorrow night is my chance to seduce her again. If it was that easy a week ago? It should be a piece of cake now.

I’ll have to step up my game, however. No more vanilla. I’ll show her a side of myself that will suck her in – and keep her here.

Chapter 15

Alessa

Ishouldn’t be this nervous about meeting Julianna’s family. It’s not that serious, right? I mean, the relationship between her and me. I’m not her real girlfriend. I’m arm candy that blends into the background and gives her someone to sit next to.

So why am I sitting in the back of her Audi, shaking from head to toe as we cruise down I5 to wine country?

Wish I could blame the weather, but it’s sunny and warm today. I’m wearing a sweater over my springtime baby-pink dress, so I can’t blame the AC making me shake. I don’t even pay attention to Julianna, who is likewise ignoring me in favor of her tablet. Stocks from around the world, her PR adviser wanting more information about our relationship, and emails that can’t wait until later. I’m sure I could rub her thigh and get her attention focused back on me, but do I want to?

We’ve reached an impasse again. Our push-and-pull is mostly push right now. Julianna Marcon is smoking hot and continuesto plague my nighttime fantasies, but the real-life woman gives me a bigger headache than she might be worth.

I’ll give her one more shot. I may have signed her stupid contract, but I made sure a clause was put in that I could exit the whole thing whenever I wanted. It should have bothered me that she didn’t put up more of a fight over that. For pretense, of course.

Come on, Julianna, show me that you give a flying fuck about me.Me. Not only the sex and “wonderful experiences” I might offer you. Me.

Whatever.

I can deal with Julianna, hilariously enough. What I might not be able to deal with is already meeting her parents.

But it’s one of those things that further proves we’re not a real couple, you know? No woman would take her real girlfriend to meet the family one week after hooking up. I’m as good as an escort. In fact, I’ve heard several murmurs around the office that it’s exactly what she did before. Escorts. Can you believe it? I can, now.

The Willamette Wine Club is one of the most exclusive wine venues in Oregon, despite the simple name. It’s nestled deep in the Willamette Valley, where even on the drizzliest day everything is lush, green, and rolling in agricultural prospects. The wine ain’t that bad, either.

This clubhouse is far away from the freeway, and even from a single highway cutting to the coast. Apple trees line the private road leading up to a Mediterranean mansion overlooking some of the most pristine parts of the Willamette Valley I’ve ever seen. Rows of expensive sports cars and safe, black vehicles like Julianna’s Audi have already beaten us to the party. Nevertheless, an elderly valet greets us. I give him a wave as we drive on. He nods toward me, and that’s the last I see of him.

“Did you read those dossiers I gave you?” Julianna asks.

I show her the bottom of my tote bag, which I’ll leave in the back of her car. I’ve got a change of clothing in there too because I know I’m staying the night at her place. Wish it made me even a little more excited. A part of me almost dreads it right now.

Not as much as I dread meeting her family, though.

The dossiers were full of information about her immediate relations. Her mother was the primary one Julianna wanted me to learn about since she makes most of the decisions about the clan behind the scenes. Her father is retired and doing whatever the hell he wants around the world. Her older brother Edwin (although I’m told “we” call him Ted) now runs the company.

But their mother. Wow.

Serena Marcon has her hand in almost every pot up and down the coast. While her husband does whatever he pleases with his retirement, Julianna’s mother co-runs a plethora of ladies’ organizations in the Pacific Northwest. The kind that has had to rebrand over the past few decades due to certain images no longer standing in society. I knew everything I needed to know about Serena Marcon when I read she was the main dissenter regarding Asian women joining one of her more “prestigious” housewife groups back in the ‘80s.

Julianna’s handwritten notes to me suggest that I don’t say anything to her mother other than my name. With any luck, she won’t acknowledge my existence while we are there.

I know what that means. She’ll see me as her daughter’s latest hussy who shouldn’t even exist. Well, at least I know it’s coming?

“Did I tell you I brought a gift for Ted and Jordan?” I ask Julianna as we ascend the front steps to the club. The gift is at the bottom of my handbag. “I read on an etiquette website that you’re supposed to give the engaged couple a gift when you first formally meet them. Since this is a wedding mixer…”

“I’m sure they’ll love it. They’re rather easy to please.”