THREE

It took a moment before I could speak again to ask. There was a burst of very loud laughter behind me and that saved me from my apparent incapability of speech because I was trying hard not to laugh.

He was shaking his head as he watched me fight it off. “Let up. You haven’t met her. You’ll understand when you do.”

“Why can’t you just tell your mother the truth?”

“I did and she wouldn’t. It was so stupid that she wouldn’t even lift a finger to help me. She’d say I made my bed so I should lie on it. But she’s incredibly romantic and this is the way. This is easier.”

“And you think I can help? How?”

“I like you.”

I blinked.

“And that hasn’t changed as I observed you for days now. So I know it will work.”

The man was a tease after all.

I almost shook my head.

“Yes… you did a background check on me. That’s an invasion of my privacy.”

“I had to make sure you’re a fit.”

I should be angry, but I was more curious than any desire to feel the right emotion for this. “Fit how?”

“Somebody intelligent, honest, hardworking, beautiful, too. And I need a clean background. Someone in need of money would work. That way, the business part will be very clear on both ends.”

I winced at the last description he’d used of me. “That is kind of… cold-blooded, don’t you think?”

“I know you need the money badly, Gia,” he says somberly, looking at me with those eyes as if he actually cared. “You already told the registrar at your college you’re not gonna make it the next year. Your mother needs to pay for her treatments and medicine. You’re going to be working all day and all night to keep up without telling her you’re not going to school because you know she’d rather not receive help from you if it means you don’t finish. You can’t go back to her house because she would find out you’re waitressing and not doing temp jobs.”

“How did you—”

“Lucy talked. Easy peachy. I can take care of all that for you.”

I gulped. How did he know too much about my mother’s condition? Has he talked to my mother’s doctor? Lucy couldn’t know all that. Was it the background check? It must be a professional background check.

Drat.

My face must be readable because of what he’d said next. “One of those guys I was with the other week owned a pharmaceutical company who has a contact at Memorial Sloan Kettering. You know cancer patients’ medical records are sometimes submitted to pharmaceutical and insurance companies for further studies? They pulled out her records with other patient candidates upon request for possible study. They told me your mother’s cancer has a high chance of remission but she sometimes missed her chemo appointments. She needed those, Gia. Do you know she skimps?”

I knew it. I knew I needed the money. That’s why I wouldn’t be registering for the next term.

I could do this. I didn’t need his money.

I can do this? Right?

You know that’s fifty-fifty.

“Do you know how scary you are?” I asked.

“Because I knew enough? Or am I scary as me? I am not. I’m harmless.” Then, he seemed to think more about it. “Do you really feel that way?” he said worriedly, his eyes on my face. “I wanted you for the job. I have to know why I feel that, and that it can be possible to make a proposition. I wanted to know the leverage I could use against you, not because I am your enemy, Gia. I know what you’re giving up if you accept this job, and I wanted to make sure it will be worth it for you in all the things that mattered.”

Jesus… he’s an amazing salesman.

He started to smile again when I didn’t speak.

Then his eyes softened into something almost… affectionate.

“I can be a bastard when I have to be brutally honest. I haven’t even started with you and you know why?”

He lowered his tone and continued on his litany softly.

“Because you’re a good daughter and you work so hard… and I admire you and respect you tremendously for it.”

His eyes lowered, looked at my barely touched plate while I worked at deconstructing the lump that got stuck on my throat.

“Eat. I’ll send you a dossier of everything about me. You will see that someone like you have nothing to worry about someone like me.”

“I’m not saying ‘yes’ nor do I even believe this is real,” I protested.

“You will… because your mother needs you to say ‘yes.’ I wouldn’t have even let you know about this if I had any doubt you’d say ‘no.’”

That night, sitting yoga-like in my bed with papers from his ‘dossier’ scattered around me, I couldn’t help but admit to myself—at least with everything that I had read so far—that he was legit.

His parents were living in Texas, Nevada, in a famous farmhouse. They virtually owned a whole town, building up and managing almost all commercial and residential properties in the past thirty years.

His mother was a beloved matriarch who loved rescuing families and houses.

His father was from old money who had enough to fund her ideas.

Two colleges were founded in two nearby towns to provide residents to the community. A mine was operating in another neighboring town that his father owned shares on. Bain and his brothers owned a high-end chain of boutiques and restaurants.

Bain himself dabbled in technology and was the CEO of a company that invented innovative machines that processed food, which he collaborated with his parents.

His fiancée was the daughter of a casino mogul and a socialite.

Brooke Lebowitz was known in her circle, a socialite like her mother, and a known jet setter.

Her I* alone generated millions of dollars a year, and she wasn’t even in Hollywood or in the fashion scene as a model.

I, frankly, didn’t know how she could hide her affair with the married man, but her fiancé’s beautiful physique was displayed on her posts so he could have provided a worthy distraction from any roving and speculative gossipmongers. 

I had heard about wealthy people like them. It was just something in the periphery, like people in I* I never bothered to follow because they did not influence her life.

I was only concerned about finishing school, my mother surviving cancer, and finding good work.

Meeting someone like Bain was surreal.

Him saying he liked me was plain laughable, like an unfinished fairy tale because it just jarred halfway.

The offer of money for payment to pose as his girlfriend—with the possibility of doing what girlfriends and boyfriends do behind a closed door and most of all, the possibility of a marriage contract should they had to—was like a splash of cold water to the face.

And that was the reason behind the exorbitant fee he was offering me.

That wasn’t even the end of it. The fees mentioned were just for the girlfriend job. There’s going to be a million US dollars for the marriage contact, subject to change depending on what difficulties we might find hard to work out if we do get married.

“You are not being paid to prostitute yourself, Gia,” he said last night in a somber tone, though it still had me feeling cold.

He looked like he wanted to reach out, and I was glad he didn’t. It was just too much. But he sighed.

“And that’s exactly why I want you. You make me feel anxious and guilty, but not like a bastard. It is because I like you that I know I’ll do good by you. That’s what my mother needs to see, and she’d face Lebowitz like a tiger for me. It’s what will work. “

In the next two nights, he answered all my questions about him as I sit at his table, with references of proof already sent to my e-mail that I could look into when I got home.

My co-workers thought something romantic was going on and displayed good-natured jealousy. He told me to let them think that way.

He stayed longer last night and remained until my shift was over to have a drink with me in a much quieter place.

“I’m going to leave New York in two days,” he dropped. “You have to make your decision official.” He was looking at me, his eyes all-knowing.

Shit, he was right. By continuing to ask him questions and receiving verified documents, continuing to talk with him, and remaining interested were all smack of an unofficial ‘yes.’

“I want to spend the last two days with you. I’m just staying here for you. Just two days. Let’s go around the city this weekend. You’re all done with your papers.”

“I’m not… sure what to do.”

“Sure, you do.” On a more serious note, he said, “I’m a businessman, Gia. I know the value of money more than anyone else. It’s freedom, security, and health. It is education. It’s used to take care of families. You’re accepting it doesn’t make you bad. Think about it while you spend the next two days with me. I’ll cover a whole term’s worth of school expenses and your mother’s treatment for the next six months just for that. Then decide if you’ll come with me for the whole offer after that.”

“This is all so ridiculous, Bain,” I said. “And surreal. I really don’t know what to do.”

“Think about it tonight,” he said. Then he smiled. “I feel almost insulted. Like I have body odor or something.”

I stared at him.

I couldn’t even laugh.