I pulled it off.
I proved to them—proved to all of them—that I’m not completely defective. I do have a girlfriend, and she is normal.
Hell, forget normal.
Even though her clothes are poor quality—and thanks to Spencer I now have more knowledge about fabric grades than I ever needed to—she’s not some down-on-her-luck girl struggling to make it in the big city.
She doesn’t just have money from Svensson Investments. She comes from money.
The way she knows she can order caviar off-menu. The fact that she even knows how to eat it. The way she uses a knife and fork, continental style, like the French. How comfortable she seems in the opulent brunch spot.
Who is she?
Doesn’t matter. Clearly someone who people are going to be very upset about when they find out Stuart Richmond’s son kidnapped her off the street.
But it’s not enough for my parents.
I can’t read their expressions as they stare hard at her while she regales them with stories of her recent family Christmas trip to some château that her father’s friend owns in the Swiss Alps.
They don’t laugh when she tells them how her granny tried to crawl into bed with the elderly earl.
I drape my arm around the back of Dani’s chair.
They know it’s fake. Right? They have to.
I lean in toward her, try to make it look real, like we’re in love.
I’m not ready to go to prison yet. Will they put me with Dad? He’s going to be pissed when he finds out the girl I kidnapped looks like Dani.
Dani’s chair scoots back abruptly.
“Excuse me, please, for a moment. I need to run to the powder room.”
“Wait—” It’s too loud.
My family gives me odd looks.
“Don’t girls usually all go together?”
“Stop being weird—you’ll scare her off,” Hannah hisses at me. “God, what is wrong with this family.”
Before I can stop her, Dani is up and gone. I watch her disappear into the back of the restaurant.
Dani’s going to run. She’s going to call the police. There’s going to be a scene in the restaurant. My mom is going tohate-mehate-me, for real this time.
Should I go after her? Threaten her?
“You’re really obsessed with her, huh?” Ryan says to me, cocking his head. “I’ve never seen you like this.”
I rub my hands down the front of my pants.
The skin around Mom’s eyes is tense. Her lips with their dark lipstick are a thin line.
“Yes,” Frank says slowly. “Obsessed does seem to describe it, doesn’t it?”
7
DANI
