Shopping for a CEO's Fiancee by Julia Kent

ridiculous that would be?”
    I go cold. I am a wall at my company’s ice bar. I am an iceberg. I become liquid nitrogen.
    Ridiculous.
    Right.
    I can’t breathe. My throat closes, mind a whirl of all the business work Gina has texted and emailed to me, a helicopter cutting through the perfect familiarity of two seconds ago and shredding it with blades that become claws.
    “Andrew?” she asks, snuggling against my shoulder, the angle awkward, her ear over my heart.
    Can she hear it break?
    “Right,” I choke out, plastering on a smile. I force a low rumble of a laugh. “Ridiculous.”
    She lifts the window cover and a shaft of sunlight streams in, catching her ring, the wave bouncing right into my eye, blinding me with pain. I have to look away, the afterimage etched in my sight.
    I close my eyes, the distance between her warm skin and mine widening with each breath, even as we stay in place. She is pressed against me, still snuggled in, yet I’m a football field away within ten minutes.
    That day I said I wouldn’t let her love me, I lied. I told myself one hell of a whopper, and then I crafted it, an artisanal masterpiece of fakery, in order to get her to leave me with my pain and fear. Having a witness to my weakness was worse than bearing it alone.
    It’s crazy. I know. Wanting to be married to her is illogical. Impetuous. Silly and immature, a flouting of convention and societal understanding of what marriage is supposed to be and represent. We made a spectacle of ourselves in Vegas, and in the midst of drug-induced spontaneity, we committed an act of utter synchronicity.
    For one of us, at least.
    By the time we arrive in Boston, we’re still sitting next to each other, and she’s sleeping, her cheek against my shoulder, but we might as well have the Berlin Wall between us.
    And one of us has to defect.

Chapter Nine
    The realities of learning to run a Fortune 500 company come crashing down the second we land in Boston. Gerald’s there to greet me with the limo. Amanda and I exchange strangely distant kisses. Lance takes her home at her insistence.
    She claims she has a doctor’s appointment she forgot about, but it seems contrived.
    I invent a meeting with investors from Vilnius. She doesn’t question it. Her weekend is “full” with vague events with her mother, and mine is nothing but work catch-up. 
    We both clearly need some space.
    Our parting lingers in my troubled mind as Gerald pulls away from the airport, the other limo disappearing with a finality that makes me sick. We’re not on bad terms. Not even a bit.
    Ridiculous.
    That comment, though. Might as well tell me I’m bad in bed. Both are about as true, and both are distinctly impossible.
    “Sir?” Gerald asks. “How was Vegas?” 
    “Don’t ask.”
    “Pretend I didn’t, sir.” He smirks. The guy has worked for us for years. I don’t know much about him, other than the fact that he was a Navy SEAL and he teaches art on the side. Dad likes to hire chauffeurs with military or law enforcement backgrounds. We haven’t had a safety issue since I started working for Anterdec, so this is one of my father’s policies I plan to continue.
    “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas,” I add, voice dripping with sarcasm. “Anything new here?”
    “No, sir.”
    “How goes the art project at the community center?” Declan’s closer to Gerald, and helped secure a grant from our company’s foundation for a proposal initiated by Gerald.
    The guy shaves his head and has a face that shows a violent life. Crooked nose, deep scar below his right ear into the jaw, and a hardness in the lines of his face. He’s built like a nuclear bunker. 
    But when he smiles, he becomes a marshmallow. 
    “The kids love it. The pottery wheels and kiln make a huge difference. Some of the kids are preparing to sell their works at a juried art show. Another one got accepted into a full-tuition summer program for art camp.”
    “That’s great.”
    “And your