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  “I’ll pay the driver extra to speed,” she says, and that pulls a laugh out of me.

  I end the call and walk the long length of our pool toward the villa as birds chirp in the trees overhead. Bentley told me he was going for a swim, but he’s nowhere to be found. As moisture pools on my arms, I step back into our air-conditioned villa and pad quietly across the tiled floor. I search for my fiancé to let him know the girls are on their way, but my steps slow when I hear whispered words coming from the den.

  I walk quietly as an uneasy sensation trickles through my blood. Why the heck is he whispering? Does he not want me to overhear something? Call it woman’s intuition, call it prewedding jitters. Call it whatever you want, but every instinct I have warns that something isn’t right.

  I press my back to the wall outside the door and listen. My gaze catches a photo bursting with the vibrant colors of Belize’s breathtaking foliage. With my breath stalled in my lungs, my heart beats a little faster, pounds against my ribs, as Bentley’s hushed side of the conversation reaches my ears. I listen for a moment longer, and as my rattled brain pieces the heard—and unheard—fragments of conversation together, a small sound catches in my throat. My knees weaken, and I flatten my palms against the wall for balance.

  “Wait, I think I hear something,” he says. “Gemma, is that you?”

  I move away from the door, hurry quietly down the hall and step into our bedroom. Unceremoniously, I plunk down on the bed, my world tilting on its axis as I sink into the soft mattress. I blink once, then twice, as Bentley’s cruel words circle my brain. It would be so easy to tell myself I misunderstood, so easy to just plaster on a smile and continue on, status quo, but the thing is, there is a part of me that knows this engagement—wedding—is nothing but a big, stupid mistake. That I might have said yes because it’s what any good daughter would do when a father was pushing her.

  Is that really how you want to live the rest of your life, Gemma?

  Don’t we get only one shot at this?

  My muscles tighten, a headache brewing in the back of my skull as that truth pierces like a hot poker. Honestly, I am so goddamn tired of being that yes girl, so tired of walking the line and suppressing a side of myself that is expanding, pushing against that impenetrable vault, demanding to be unleashed. I take a fast breath and then another to steady the pounding pulse at the base of my neck.

  “Hey, there you are.”

  I glance up to find Bentley standing in the doorway. He frowns and angles his head to the side, a familiar gesture when he’s puzzling something out. “Everything okay?”

  Oh, everything is fine, other than the fact that I just heard my fiancé talking to God-knows-who and telling her I was nothing more than a stepping-stone for his career and that he’d be there to see her as soon as he could. Oh, yeah, things are just peachy.

  But...

  Why am I not throwing things at him, screaming at the top of my lungs, accusing him of being a cheating asshole who uses others to further his own agenda?

  Why not indeed...?

  “Gemma?” he asks and crosses the room, and I spot the worry in his eyes. “Are you okay?” What? Is he worried I overheard him? He damn well should be, since he obviously has a lot riding on our marriage. I believe those were the exact words I just overheard. He glances at the phone beside me. “Are your friends coming?”

  As his gaze travels back to mine, a million thoughts go through my head, and I make the fast decision to pretend nothing is wrong—for now. My girlfriends are here to throw me a bachelorette party, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let the man with his own agenda, and a hot piece of ass on the side, rain on my parade. Yeah, I’ll party with my friends this weekend, they spent a lot of money to come here and I don’t want to put a damper on their weekend. I’ll break the news to them Sunday, before they all head back home. Then I’ll deal with the asshole staring at me like he hadn’t just ruined my life.

  Ruined my life?

  Maybe I have that all wrong. Maybe I should be thanking him.

  “Everything is fine,” I say, a strange calmness coming over me along with a new kind of relief. “They were just picked up by the driver and should be here shortly.”

  He nods and puts his hands into the pockets of his khaki pants. “I have some bad news.”

  This should be interesting. “Oh?”

  “I was just on a business meeting.” He jerks his thumb over his shoulder. “Not sure if you heard me or not.”

  He’s testing me, and since I’m not ready to drop the bomb yet, I say, “No, I was in the backyard. I thought you were going for a swim.”

  “Phone rang. I’ll be flying back to New York tonight. I have some business that needs my attention.”

  Business. Yeah, right. Then again, whatever girl needs his attention tonight, he could very well be using her for something other than sex. I almost snort. I kind of hope she is getting sex. As vanilla as that might be. But I guess one of us should at least be naked between the sheets. I honestly can’t remember the last time he touched me.

  “How long will you be gone?”

  “A week, maybe more. Depending.”

  “Okay.” I stand up, walk to my desk, and grab a pen and paper. That will give me time to gather my thoughts and figure out the best way to end this relationship. Maybe I’ll write him a letter—although that’s a cowardly way to end a relationship, and that’s really not my style, not even to a guy who is using me. But maybe tonight, after I’ve had too much tequila, I’ll be able to get my thoughts in order and put on paper what a slimeball he really is. If I had my paints, I’d put my brushes to canvas to express myself, but I don’t, so a letter will have to do.

  My father will be upset at this change of events—and not because he’s spent a fortune giving me the perfect wedding. No, he’ll be upset because my breakup will be a reflection on him, spotlighting our family in negative ways. If it’s a slow-news week, the media will sink their teeth into the broken engagement of the senator’s daughter. I shake my head. That’s what I’m worried about the most? Sad, but yeah, it is. My parents spent their lives conditioning me to think and act a certain way. To put career and appearance before everyone. I am so tired of it all.

  He clears his throat. “You’re sure everything is okay?”

  Honestly, I used to overlook the way he cleared his throat a million times a day, but right now, the mucus king is annoying the living hell out of me. In fact, everything about him is getting on my last nerve, from the way his beady eyes are narrowed, trying to figure me out, to the way he’s rocking on his feet. I fist my hand around the pen and resist the urge to stab him with it.

  I paste on a dazzling smile and catch my reflection in the mirror. The sadness beneath the upturned lips catches me off guard. What the hell is wrong with me? The guy I loved in college tossed me away like I was yesterday’s newspaper, and my fiancé was just insulting me on the phone to a girl he’s likely hooking up with. He has to marry me. Not because he loves me but because it’s good for his career.

  Am I that unlovable?

  I’ve been the good girl my whole life, done everything I was supposed to. Look where that’s gotten me. Maybe I ought to just say the hell with it, throw caution to the wind, and for once in my life, do something I want to do—regardless of the consequences.

  Yeah, maybe that’s exactly what I’ll do this weekend.

  Copyright © 2021 by Cathryn Fox

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  ISBN-13: 9780369702463

  The Pleasure Contract

  Copyright © 2021 by Caitlin Crews

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

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