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My eyes widened, and my mouth popped open.

Did I hear him correctly? Did he just…?

“I’m sorry,” I shook my head, laughing without humor, “I think…did you just ask me to pretend to be your girlfriend?”

“Yes.”

Caleb’s serious expression triggered something inside me, and without preamble, I dissolved into a fit of loud giggles.

“You’re kidding right?” I snorted. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, or that Caleb was serious about it.

I expected both him and Macy to start laughing too, and tell me it was a joke, but when their faces remained earnest and humorless, the laughter died in my throat.

“Oh God,” I sucked in a breath, “You’re not kidding.”

“I wish I could say we had a better plan,” said Macy, “But we think this is the only way to convince the Board that Caleb’s personal life won’t negatively impact his job. They’re already unimpressed that Caleb kept Braelynn a secret, but more so because of the unwanted publicity it’s brought.”

“And you think that by us pretending to be a couple, they’ll think your personal life is…?”

“Stable,” replied Caleb. “They want to see that being a father won’t get in the way of being C.E.O.”

“That’s ridiculous. Of course you can do both, you’ve been doing both.”

“They don’t know that,” he replied. “Which is why I have to prove it to them.”

“We know it’s a lot to ask,” Macy’s expression was hopeful, and I blew it off as an overabundance of pregnancy hormones, “But just think about it.”

I felt like I was in the Twilight Zone, only instead of Caleb asking me out by choice, he was suggesting we ‘pretend’.

“This is madness.” I threw my hands up. “You’re crazy if you think I’d go along with this.”

The whole plan was ludicrous.

Absolutely absurd.

Not to mention that it would probably never work.

“I’m going home now,” I stated after a few moments of silence. “The two of you have lost your minds, and I’m hoping you’ll come to your senses.”

I turned around, disregarding that neither Caleb nor Macy were surprised by my outburst, and walked out of Caleb’s office. When I rode the elevator down to the lobby, and started walking down Park Avenue – I needed the air, and the walk to clear my head – I became aware that I was angrier than I had been when I first set foot in Caleb’s office. I was going to forgive him, of course I was, but then he blindsided me, knocked me completely on my ass, all because he wanted me to pretend to date him.

Unbelievable.

And I wasn’t even going to get started on Macy, or that she was actually on board with this stupid plan. I was however going to suggest that she go on maternity leave a little earlier because it was becoming obvious that her baby was eating her sanity.

When I’d walked at least half-way to Union Square, I decided to catch a cab, and head back to Caleb’s penthouse. I was in desperate need of some wine, and chocolate, and I knew Caleb had an abundance of both. The penthouse was quiet, but even if Caleb was home I wasn’t going to talk to him until I’d plied myself with enough alcohol to see the humor in what had to have been one of the crappiest days I’d had since moving in. I picked one of the most expensive bottles of wine I could find – Google might have played a part in that – and started stripping my clothes en route to my bedroom. I didn’t care that my shoes were somewhere in the living room, or that my skirt was in the hallway, and I certainly didn’t care that I was being obstinate.

With a tub filled with hot water, and copious amounts of bubbles, I lowered my naked body into my own slice of heaven, wine glass in hand. Turns out I didn’t want chocolate after all. Just wine. Lots and lots of it.

I sighed, allowing the tension to dissipate right alongside the steam rising from the tub, and three glasses of wine later, I had no idea why I was angry to begin with.

I’D JUST CLOSED MY EYES when I heard Caleb calling my name. His voice grew louder, and then he knocked on the bathroom door.

“Go away,” I mumbled, taking another sip of wine. I glowered at the glass when I saw it was empty, and reached over the edge of the tub to grab the bottle. “I’m naked, so you can’t come in.”

Silence.

And then, “Are you drunk?”