Maybe that was part of the problem. Nothing about this made sense.
Most people would have hesitated before agreeing to fake-date a near stranger for an entire wedding weekend. They would have asked questions, wanted details.
Dane had just said yes, which brought me back to the same question I’d been asking myself for days.
Why? I leaned forward, resting my elbows on the table.
“What are you getting out of this?” I asked.
“Hm? Well.” The corner of his mouth twitched. “I get to spend more time with you, don’t I?”
His eyes looked almost impossibly blue in the afternoon light, steady and amused in a way that made them difficult to read.
“Right,” I said slowly.
He leaned forward as well, lowering his voice slightly. “Maybe I really do just want the free drinks. Times are hard.”
I kept staring, waiting. Dane held my gaze for all of three seconds before looking away.
Across the patio, a couple stepped out of the café carrying drinks. After a brief debate over where to sit, they settled near the flower beds.
Dane watched them for a moment, then sighed, dragging a hand down his face.
“All right. Fine. Remember how I said my family’s been on my case?”
I laughed so loud that those sitting nearby glanced over. For the first time since this conversation started, something finally made sense.
“So they’ve been trying to set you up?” I guessed.
“Constantly.”
The misery in his voice only made me laugh harder, and Dane endured it with the kind of patience that suggested he had no one to blame but himself for admitting it.
Eventually, I managed to get myself under control again.
“Were they really that bad?” I asked.
“You have no idea.”
“And?”
The question slipped out before I could stop it. I wasn’t even sure I needed to push though, because the look on Dane’s face already suggested he had nothing left hide.
He sighed. “And I might need you to come to a couple of things with me.”
I blinked. “What things?”
“Pack events. Family gatherings. That sort of thing.”
I stared at him for a moment longer than I probably needed to, and just like that, something in my chest loosened.
For days, I’d been carrying a low-grade sense of guilt I hadn’t quite named.
That I’d asked for too much. That I’d pulled someone into my problems simply because he’d been too polite to say no.
But this made sense. A favour for a favour. A grin spread across my face as I picked up my iced tea.
“Well.”
