“All this is very real sometimes.”

“Yes.” His thumb moved to the edge of her mouth. “Very real.”

“But getting involved with each other probably wouldn’t be a good idea, would it?”

“Probably not.”

She moved her body a little closer. “Because when this is over we’ll probably never see each other again.”

“That’s more than likely.”

She didn’t answer him. Just stayed still beside him as his fingers caressed her skin and his thumb teased the edge of her mouth.

So without another word he forgot the sensible way to go and moved in to kiss her again. Her hand moved up to touch his jaw, then around to the nape of his neck to hold him closer. And for a while there was no TV show, no lies and pretence. There were just two people who wanted to be close.

The Wedding Surprise
Trish Wylie

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Trish Wylie tried various careers before eventually fulfilling the dream of writing. Years spent working in the music industry and in promotions, and teaching little kids about ponies gave her plenty of opportunity to study life and the people around her, which, in Trish’s opinion, is a pretty good study course for writing! Living in Ireland, Trish balances her time between writing and horses. If you get to spend your days doing things you love, then she thinks that’s not doing too badly. You can contact Trish at www.trishwylie.com.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER ONE

‘HOW bad is it, Dad, really? I need to know.’

‘There’s no point in both of us worrying about it.’

‘What happened to “A problem shared”?’

‘It still lives in the same region as “What you don’t know won’t hurt you”.’

Caitlin Rourke blinked at her father’s familiar face. He had gone grey in both complexion and hair colour over the last year, and it was worrying her.

She watched with suspicion as he smiled a smile that didn’t quite make it all the way to his dark eyes. And she sighed in frustration.

‘I know there’s something seriously wrong.’ She pulled up a chair in front of his ancient oak desk and sat down, leaning her elbows on the desk’s edge and leaning forward to stare him in the eye. ‘Maybe I can help.’

Echoing her sigh, Brendan Rourke leaned back in his leather chair and shook his head. ‘Not this time.’

‘You don’t know that.’ Her voice softened.

‘Yes, baby, I do.’

‘Well, maybe I’d like to know what’s wrong before I decide for myself. You’re the one who always told us to know all the facts and look at things from every angle before we made a decision.’

Brendan smiled softly as his words were used against him. ‘It makes me feel old when my children use my own philosophies to win an argument.’

‘You raised us all to question, to learn from all the things we do.’ She grinned. ‘You did a good job. You’re one hell of a dad.’

His smile faded and he turned his eyes from hers, looking around his office walls. ‘At least I can say I’ve done one thing right, then.’

Silence invaded the room as Caitlin searched his face again. She’d been noticing changes in him in the last few months when she’d visited. The normally confident manner in which he held himself had started to change first. There had been a slump to his broad shoulders. Then gradually he’d become more silent, introverted and brooding. And that just wasn’t the man she knew and loved.

There was something wrong, and it was big. ‘Tell me, Dad, or I’ll live in this office ’til you do.’ Her heart skipped a little as she asked the question that had been torturing her for weeks. ‘Are you sick?’

His eyes shot to meet hers with a look of surprise. ‘No, I’m not sick. Why would you think that?’

The fact that he’d lost so much weight. Something a man of his size just didn’t carry well. The whole grey complexion thing…

‘Is it Mum?’

Brendan frowned as he leaned forward, resting his elbows on the opposite side of the desk. ‘Sweetheart, nobody is sick.’

She let a breath out. It had been her biggest worry. As people got older they were only too aware of the fact that they wouldn’t have their parents for ever.

But if it wasn’t that then there was only one thing it could be. ‘It’s the business, isn’t it?’

He leaned back in his chair again. Studied her face for long seconds while she raised her eyebrows in question. Then eventually he nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘Well, then, we’ll find a way to fix it together, all of us. It’s what we do, remember?’

His eyes filled with sadness. ‘This can’t be fixed that easily. I’ve allowed this to happen through my own stupidity and there’s nothing more I can do now.’

Caitlin’s face transformed into a look of dogged determination her father knew only too well.

‘If it’s a money thing we’ll find the money.’

‘I already found the money. Three times now.’ He sighed with resignation. ‘And now it’s not just the business we’ll lose.’

‘What else?’

‘The house.’

Caitlin’s breath caught. Not home. Not the one place in the world that could be relied upon for security and unquestioning love. It was a haven for all of them. A place filled with a million memories. They couldn’t lose that after all this time. They just couldn’t.

‘What’s gone wrong?’

‘Cashflow. That’s all. Downfall of many a business before this one, and I’m sure we won’t be the last. People don’t pay us, so I can’t pay the people we need to pay. I borrowed until I had to remortgage, and now I can’t borrow any more.’

His words circled around her head and took long moments to be absorbed into her brain. When eventually she’d grasped the severity of it all she blinked slowly as she asked the obvious. ‘How much would it take to get us out of the hole?’

Brendan smiled a small, sad smile. ‘More than you could get.’

‘How much, Dad?’

Leaning back in his chair made the leather creak beneath him. The sound filled the silent room as he considered not telling her. But the determination in her eyes was unwavering. ‘Seventy thousand.’

Caitlin’s eyes widened. It was way more than she had in her own savings. Probably more than her brothers and sister could manage from their own savings. Hell, probably more than they all had combined.

She studied her father’s face again. And she could see it. The defeat. The disappointment. The sense of failure. It broke her heart to see him that way. The strong bear of a man who had possessed enough love to solve a million smaller problems for his growing children. But not enough means to hold together the business he’d spent most of his life building.

Immediately her mind jumped to Aisling, the friend of a friend she’d spent most of yesterday evening on the phone with. Aisling had had a proposal to put to her. One that Caitlin had laughed about for hours.

Suddenly it didn’t seem so ridiculous.

Now it was an escape route.

Nodding at the decision she’d silently made, she pushed the chair back from the desk and walked around to wrap her arms around her father’s neck. ‘We’re going to get through this, Dad. You wait and see. You’re the one who taught us that we’re stronger together than apart.’

The breath he took was shaky. ‘There’s no way out of this one, sweetheart.’

‘Yes, there is. There’s always a way. Everything happens for a reason.’ She leaned back from him, her face barely inches from his, and smiled, ‘No more secrets, Dad. That’s what family is for. Someone wise told me that once.’

He nodded with a small smile at her words. ‘All right. No more secrets.’

She kissed his forehead, her eyes closing. No more secrets. Apart from the massive one she was going to have to carry to get them out of this.

‘God, I’m thrilled you’re doing this.’ Aisling hugged her tightly after she’d walked into the airy office. ‘You’re going to be just amazing.’

Pulling back from the embrace, Caitlin looked at her with narrow eyes. ‘I don’t know about the amazing part, but I’m glad one of us is thrilled.’

‘It’s an exciting project for all of us.’ Aisling moved back and sat down on the large sofa that took up half of one wall in her office. ‘It’s taken eighteen months to set it running, and I for one can’t wait to get started.’

‘Mmm.’ Caitlin moved across to join her. Taking a breath, she turned on the sofa, tucking one of her legs beneath the other. ‘Can we just go through it again?’

‘You’re not nervous?’

‘Me?’ She laughed. ‘Nah. Hell, I always lie to my family and friends for money from a TV show.’

‘You are nervous.’ Aisling smiled a smile that said Trust me. ‘That’s understandable. It’s nothing out of the ordinary. I’d be nervous too.’

‘You’re not the one who’ll be living a lie.’

‘Why do you think I was so keen on it being you?’

Caitlin raised an eyebrow at the question. ‘Because as someone you already know I’m less likely to sue you if it all goes pear-shaped?’

Aisling laughed at her reasoning. ‘Well, that’s one I hadn’t thought of, but I guess I can tick that box now too.’

‘I tick off boxes?’

‘Tons of the things.’ She started counting them out on her long fingers. ‘You’re single and unattached; you’ll be sensational on camera; you have this amazingly close family and you have good reason to want the pay-off at the end.’

Dark eyes widened ever so slightly at the last ‘tick’. ‘What good reason, exactly?’

Aisling looked surprised she’d even asked. ‘What a strange question.’ She frowned. ‘You do still want that restaurant of yours, don’t you?’

It was all she’d wanted ever since she’d trained as a chef. Her own place to be creative in. But her priorities had changed now. There were other things, much more important, that needed the money.

Another lie wouldn’t make much difference, though. ‘Sure I do.’

‘Well, then…’

‘What about the guy?’

‘Aiden?’ Her face lit up, ‘Oh, he’s a blinder. We all just adore him. Wait ’til you meet him…’

Caitlin cringed at the thought. She didn’t want to meet him. Ever. Given the choice.

If he was as unsuitable for her as Aisling thought he would be then she was going to hate every moment of being around him.

But that was the whole premise of Aisling’s new show. Two completely different people pretending to be in love. All they had to do was persuade their families and friends that it was true. Then, to collect, they had to say their fake ‘I do’s with all of their family and friends present. Easy as pie, right?

Three months. Three months of living a lie with a camera crew following their every movement. But it would be worth every torturous moment of invasion of Caitlin’s precious privacy if it saved her father’s business and the magical place called home.

Caitlin’s chin raised a notch. She could do this. She had to. Even while her stomach churned and her hands were clammy. It was only three months.

And, after all, how bad could this Aiden guy really be?

CHAPTER TWO

AIDEN FLYNN turned as the door opened and then stared at the woman who was now his ‘fiancée’ for the next few months.

She was stunning. Not a bit of wonder they’d chosen her from all the candidates suggested. He’d bet she’d look great on screen. A hell of a lot better than he was looking anyway. But six months in front of a computer, within arm’s reach of billions of calories, hadn’t exactly helped any.

And he could tell she wasn’t impressed. When she’d opened the door she’d been smiling openly. But now, as her eyes moved over him, he could see that smile fading in her dark eyes.

Suddenly he wished he’d bothered to remove the abnormal amount of hair on his face. That he’d taken maybe ten minutes to visit a barber in the last week. But Aisling had been fairly adamant that he stayed the way he was. He was perfect the way he was, she’d said.

Shame that Caitlin Rourke didn’t think so. Because she really was stunning.

His eyes moved down from the urchin cut of her rich brown hair, over flawless creamy skin to the sensual bow of her mouth. Then they dared to move further, down over her long neck to the curve of her small breasts and the inward sweep of her slender waist. Oh, yeah. She was something. And way out of his usual league if the designer cut of her clothes and the swanky place she lived in were anything to go by.

His eyes moved back up as she smoothed her short hair behind one ear and smiled at him again before moving forward.

She then stunned him completely by throwing her arms around his neck and pressing her slender body tightly against his. Blinking in confusion, he wrapped his arms around her waist with jerky movements.

‘You’re here at last!’ She tilted her head back to look up at him. ‘I’ve missed you so much.’

Aiden’s eyes widened. ‘Well, I’ve missed you too.’

Her eyes jerked to her left and he followed the movement until his own found the camera pointing at him. Aha. Straight to business, then…

She leaned in to kiss his cheek above the line of his beard, leaving her cheek there and whispering, ‘My sister is here.’ Then she leaned back again to look at him.

Tightening his arms around her waist to signal he understood, he then did what any self-respecting fiancé would do and leaned down for a kiss. After all, her sister would expect it…

Caitlin’s eyes widened as the realisation of his intention hit her. She ducked her head further back and laughed slightly. ‘Oh, no, you don’t. Not with that beard.’

She thought he’d grown that beard overnight? If they’d only recently got engaged then she’d have been kissing him with that beard for some time now.

‘You didn’t complain about where this beard went last weekend, honey.’

A dark eyebrow quirked at his response and a spark entered her eyes. A challenge? he wondered.

Her voice came out like warm honey. ‘You have no idea the places I ended up with beard rash.’

A challenge indeed.

His eyes sparkled back at her. ‘Maybe you should show me later.’

‘We’ll have to see about that.’ And as quickly as that the spark was gone from her eyes and she pulled back from his embrace. She glanced towards the living room, then her eyes flickered back to meet his as her voice dropped. ‘That beard has to go.’

‘We’re not even married yet and already you’re trying to change me?’

She looked him over with a cursory glance, taking stock of the raw material the show had given her. Then with a small smile she nodded. ‘Hell, yes.’

The sister stared at him with a similar look of surprise as he entered the warm-coloured room. Aiden was sensing a pattern here. What was it? Had he two heads? All right, so right that second he might not look like a pin-up, but he wasn’t exactly serial killer material either. At least he didn’t think he was.

‘Hi.’

Caitlin watched her sister blink at him a couple of times before she stared back at her with wide eyes. The news of her ‘engagement’ not five minutes earlier hadn’t exactly gone too well. And the fact that she’d had to explain the presence of TV cameras in her life in an earlier phone call only added to the lack of reality. She was in the Twilight Zone. Something her sister had pointed out only seconds before Aiden’s arrival.

‘This is Aiden.’

‘The internet guy?’

She smiled as she followed the story they’d been given. ‘Yes, this is him.’

‘The guy you’re getting married to?’

‘Yes.’

She opened her mouth to make a comment. Then her eyes moved to the camera at the end of the room and she pinned a smile on her mouth as she rose from the large sofa. ‘It’s nice to meet you, Aiden. I’m Cara.’

Aiden hadn’t missed the hesitation before she stood to offer her hand to him. There’d been a comment coming there, he’d just bet. ‘It’s nice to finally meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you.’

The smile stayed in place as she shook his hand. ‘More than I’ve heard about you, I’m sure. You’re quite a surprise.’

He laughed as he released her hand. ‘I’d say so.’

Cara continued to stare at him. It was like being a bug under a microscope. He stepped closer to Caitlin and grinned. ‘Well, honey, I’ll just throw my bag upstairs.’

‘Good plan.’ She reversed a few steps towards the door.

‘No, it’s all right. I know where I’m going.’ The lie flowed smoothly from his mouth. ‘You stay here and chat to Cara. I’ll be right back.’

Both women stood stock still, smiles in place, as he moved past Caitlin to leave the room. With a smile back at her sister he then reached out a hand and pinched Caitlin’s rear on his way out.

‘Are you out of your mind?’

He heard Cara’s whispered words as he walked upstairs. It had been a long time since he’d made such a lasting impression on two women.

Catching sight of himself in a large mirror as he reached the top of the flight of stairs, he smiled wryly. He guessed he couldn’t blame them. He looked like hell.

He stared at his own eyes in the reflection. They were the only part of himself he still recognised.

Everything else had pretty much gone to pot. His dark hair stuck out in varying curls where it reached the collar of his favourite old checked shirt. His hair was longer than he’d worn it since his university days. And as for the hair on his face. Well, Caitlin was right. It had to go. He looked as if he’d just walked off a desert island.

His dark eyebrows quirked up under his long fringe as he realised that technically he might as well have.

He’d spent the last six months in solitude, with only a ghost for company. And work. His own work and the ghost’s work. It had been fairly surreal.

Moving away from the mirror and along the softly lit hall, he found himself looking at frame upon frame of photographs. Caitlin Rourke’s life laid out before him. Pictures of her laughing, smiling at the people around her with love in her eyes. Close-ups of her curled up on a sofa, caught off guard as she looked up into the camera lens. Shots of an autumn day when she’d had longer hair tossed by an unseen wind. Every one showed scenes of a happy, contented woman, in love with life and living.

Caitlin Rourke was everything he wasn’t. And a familiar ache, so old it burned like a physical pain in the pit of his stomach, made him unexpectedly angry with her for that.

‘Are you out of your mind?’

Still reeling from the fact that her new fiancé had just pinched her behind, Caitlin blinked at her sister. ‘What?’

‘What are you doing?’ Cara glanced at the invasive camera beside them, turned her back on it and whispered, ‘You’re planning on marrying him?’

It didn’t take much searching to see the disapproval on her sister’s face. With a deep breath Caitlin prepared to take the steps to weave her lie. ‘You don’t know him like I do.’

A burst of sarcastic laughter hit the air. ‘Obviously not. Because whatever it is about him is hidden under about twenty feet of hair.’

Which would be gone by the morning if Caitlin had her way. She couldn’t abide men with facial hair. As a child they’d had an uncle with a beard who had made her cry every time she was asked to kiss him goodbye.

‘You just need time to get to know him, Cara.’

‘Like you have?’ Cara shook her head. ‘This is just too weird, Caitlin. How can you possibly know this man well enough to want to marry him?’

‘We’ve been talking for months.’

‘On the internet?’

‘Yes. On the internet.’

‘And you know him well enough from that to spend the rest of your life with him?’

‘Yes.’ The lies came almost too easily, ‘And you can’t know him well enough in two minutes to make a judgement on him.’

Cara stared at her for what felt like for ever but was probably only a minute. Then she shook her head. ‘This isn’t like you, Cait. He’s not like anyone you’ve ever dated, and all this camera stuff is mad.’

Caitlin sighed. ‘I told you—it’s just a programme about people who’ve found love over the internet.’

‘And you’re telling me that every time any of us talk with you it’s all going to be filmed?’

‘It’s just a few months and then they’ll be gone.’

‘Well…’ She glanced over her shoulder at the camera again. ‘With any luck it won’t be the only thing that’s gone.’

Caitlin reached a hand out and squeezed her sister’s arm. ‘Give him a chance, Cara. He can’t be that bad.’ She frowned at her mistake. Surely she would know herself that he wasn’t that bad if she was marrying him? ‘He’s a great guy. At least I think he is. Just give it some time.’

Eyes as dark as her own stared at her before Cara sighed. ‘I think I’m more hurt that you didn’t tell me before now. We always talk about everything. This is the first time we haven’t.’

Caitlin’s throat threatened to close at the words that were only too true.

‘It just feels like something has changed with you and me.’ Cara’s voice broke slightly, betraying her emotions. ‘And I hate that.’

Caitlin blinked back tears as Cara pulled her into a hug before turning to leave, with an ‘I’ll talk to you tomorrow’ thrown over her shoulder.

‘This sucks already.’ She glanced into the camera, ‘You have no idea.’

She frowned down at the carpet, then glanced up at the ceiling. It was time to go and meet her fiancé. With a silent plea to the overhead light that a book really couldn’t be judged by its cover, she turned on her heel to go upstairs.

CHAPTER THREE

BY THE time Caitlin reached the hallway he was halfway down the stairs. She tilted her head back and looked up at him, her eyes meeting his. They were the one feature she could see that she liked. So blue they belonged on a movie screen, and they seemed to spark back at her. Surely someone with eyes as blue as a summer’s sky couldn’t be all that bad?

‘Hey.’

She blinked up at him. ‘Hey.’

‘So you’re my fiancée, then?’

She smiled at the statement. ‘So it would appear.’

He nodded and his eyes sparkled with amusement. ‘Big hit with your sister, wasn’t I?’

Caitlin quirked a dark brow beneath the annoying fringe that kept on falling in her eye. ‘Mmm, well, she’s a bit protective. You’re in for a lot of that, I’m afraid.’

Shoving large hands into the pockets of his faded jeans, Aiden studied her before asking, ‘Your family is close?’

Caitlin nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘Then this can’t be an easy thing for you to do.’

She suddenly felt vulnerable as he studied her, her head beginning to pound at the temples. She’d never been with someone who could make the very air around them feel oppressive to her. It wasn’t a nice sensation. Particularly not in her own home.

‘And lying comes naturally to you, I suppose?’

Aiden merely shrugged at the question. ‘I’ve done it from time to time, growing up. When it was called for.’

Her fringe fell back out of her eye as she tilted her head and studied him. This stranger. How could anyone with eyes so warm be so cold? And how would she ever know a word he said to her was true if he was so open about lying?

A sudden burst of male laughter caught her off guard.

‘That shocks you, does it?’

‘I don’t know if shock is the word I would have used. It surprises me that you’re so open about it, I guess.’ She smiled a small smile. ‘But maybe that’s what they had in mind when they chose you. An experienced liar might be able to teach me the ropes.’

He continued smiling. ‘Could be. But they certainly got the opposites thing right.’

Her eyes moved over him again as she nodded in agreement. ‘Yes, so it would appear.’

He removed his hands and started slowly down towards her. Each step seemed measured, controlled. And when he stood on the step above her he leaned his face closer to hers to ask in a low voice, ‘So, how do we make them all believe we’re in love, Caitlin Rourke?’

She swallowed hard as she looked into his eyes close up. They were really stunning. And another sense awoke to discover he actually smelled extremely good. She took a deep breath and found the scent almost calming. Reassuring in its maleness. He was just some guy, after all.

She tilted her chin slightly upwards. ‘I guess it might be an idea to try getting to know each other better.’

Aiden quirked a brow at her. ‘And how do you suggest we do that?’

‘Talking would be the traditional route. And we’re supposed to have been doing months of that on the internet.’ She thought for a moment, trying to get her brain around the problem. ‘Or we could make out a set of questions for each other and write it all out.’

‘Like a study guide?’

‘Exactly!’ She smiled at his understanding. ‘That makes perfect sense.’

Aiden watched as her face was transformed with enthusiasm. Her dark eyes sparkled and she smiled more openly at him. Hell, what was she? Alice in Wonderland, or something? She had the same enthusiasm levels as a ten-year-old. ‘Keep your panties on, honey, it’s only a handful of questions. It’s not an unbreakable guide to cashing the big cheque.’

The smile disappeared. ‘You really are very rude, aren’t you?’

‘Because I mentioned your underwear or because I just rained on your parade?’

Her hands planted themselves firmly on her hips as she glared up at him. ‘Just because I happen to get enthusiastic about the fact that we might actually manage to do something pro-active about this it means you should shoot me down, does it? Why are you even doing this show if you have no intention of us winning at the end?’

‘Oh, I have every intention of winning at the end. And I’m all for anything that achieves that.’

‘So the idea of doing some work towards that would be a bad idea because…?’

‘I didn’t say it was a bad idea.’

She was flabbergasted. ‘But you just said—’

Aiden smiled calmly below his beard. ‘I just said you shouldn’t get so thrilled at the prospect of having to swot up on each other. It’s not exactly riveting stuff, learning what toothpaste we each use.’

Caitlin rocked back on her heels. She had never met anyone like Aiden before. How on earth were they supposed to get on well enough to fool everyone if they couldn’t even hold a simple conversation?

He watched the varying emotions play across her face and continued smiling his secret smile. She didn’t get him at all. And he quite liked that. It made him feel he was in control. Something to knock her neat little world out of joint. That would be one way of punishing her for having such a damned perfect life.

‘You really are something out of a 1950s TV show, aren’t you?’

Caitlin blinked up in the dim light at the voice that sounded from across her hall. It made sense that they should spend some time in her house playing the ‘getting to know each other’ game. But when she’d agreed she hadn’t realised she was going to be stuck under the same roof with someone so damned annoying.

They’d made out a set of questions for each other, swapped them to fill in the answers, and had then retreated to different parts of the house to ‘study up’. After four hours of learning how many sugars he took in his coffee and what side of the bed he slept on her head had gone numb, so she’d opted for fleecy pyjamas and the security of her huge bed.

But with the door to her room slightly ajar she could still see the light shining from where Aiden lay in bed across the hall from her. She was only too aware of where he was in the house at any given time. Aware of the sounds of another human being sharing her space. But there wasn’t the same comfort associated with those noises as there would have been if it were a friend or a family member staying.

She sighed into the air. ‘What does that mean, exactly?’

‘Everything in your life is just so bloody neat and pretty.’

‘I happen to like a tidy house.’ And she wasn’t normally in it much, which helped. But she didn’t mention that.

‘I don’t mean just your house.’

She rolled over to face the door, moving the pillow to fit underneath her neck better. ‘So what do you mean?’

‘I mean your whole life. Neat little family, neat crowd of friends, neat career direction. Your life is all wrapped up with ribbons and bows.’

Caitlin wished.

‘You have no idea what my life is like.’

‘That’s what I’m in here studying.’

‘You don’t get a picture of someone’s life from a set of questions dealing with what size feet they have or their favourite colour.’

There was silence for a few moments, and then Caitlin heard his bed creak slightly as he moved. ‘So tell me something that’s not on the questionnaire.’

‘Like what?’

‘Something that only someone you love would know.’

She pursed her lips and frowned at his words. He was looking for personal information. Something that meant she would have to give something of herself to him. And she really didn’t want to do that. Didn’t want this person she didn’t like much knowing things he would still know when he walked away in three months.

Aiden strained to hear any movement when she didn’t reply, holding his breath to keep silent.

‘Caitlin?’

‘I’m still here.’

He smiled at her small voice. She didn’t want to tell him anything, did she?

‘What’s wrong? Skeletons in your closet?’

‘Only ones wrapped neatly in ribbons and bows.’

Her sarcastic answer brought a larger smile to his face. ‘Come on. One thing. I promise to forget it when the show ends.’

She turned her face into her pillow to call him a name, then came out to take a deep breath. ‘We’ll swap. You get one subject; I get to ask about one in return.’

He considered the proposal for a moment and then quirked a brow at the doorway. What harm could it do?

‘Okay.’

Caitlin waited. Then waited some more. ‘So?’

‘I’m thinking.’

‘Don’t strain yourself.’

‘Funny.’ He propped himself up on an elbow and continued to stare at the door, as if by staring harder he would be able to see through it to read her face. ‘So how come there’s no neat boyfriend around to complete the picture?’

Damn. He just would ask that, wouldn’t he?

‘Maybe I like being single.’

‘You’re twenty-eight years old. In the fifties you’d be a spinster already. Don’t you want neat little kids so you can scrub their little faces and read them fairy stories at night?’

‘That’s a second question.’

‘Oops.’

She raised herself up on an elbow and thought about her answer. To tell or not to tell. That was the question, really.

‘I used to have a boyfriend. A fiancé.’

He wasn’t surprised at the first part of her answer, but the second part caught him off guard. ‘What happened?’

She took a breath. ‘He died.’

Aiden flumped onto his back and frowned at the ceiling. ‘How?’

‘He had this stupid motorcycle that he loved nearly as much as he said he loved me.’

‘Was it long ago?’

Yesterday, she wanted to answer. There were still odd moments when it felt as if it was. But the moments were further apart now than they had been at the start. The pain she’d felt back then was a bearable numbness now.

‘Nearly five years. We met in high school.’

Aiden heard the matter-of-fact tone of her voice as she recited facts that must have hurt like hell at the time. Her perfect life had hit a glitch. A big one. And that made him think. ‘I’m sorry.’

Caitlin was surprised by the softness in his voice. It was a completely different tone for the sarcastic edge he’d had with her for most of the evening. She sank back down into the haven of her duvet and lifted the bottom of it with her legs to tuck her feet in. Those two words spoken with that softness making her reach out for a simpler form of comfort, she supposed.

She blinked upwards for several long seconds, then replied with an equally softly spoken, ‘Thanks.’

The house fell silent again, until Caitlin’s voice sounded out with, ‘So, no neat little girlfriend for you, then?’

He laughed. ‘No, nothing neat in my life.’

‘You’re this charming to everyone, then?’

‘Careful, Caitlin. I’ll get the impression you don’t like me much.’

‘Oh, and that would hurt your feelings, would it?’

‘Well, if you still think I have feelings then I’m not a lost cause just yet, am I?’

She smiled. ‘Every human being has to have a feeling on something or another. I’ll allow you that much.’

‘Cheers.’ He turned his head to smile back at the door.

‘You’re welcome.’

Aiden was surprised when it went silent again. She was quitting that easily? He was almost disappointed that she was. Not that he was up for a deep psychoanalysis of his own life. But she had told him something very personal, had allowed something painful to be talked about, even briefly. And he felt he owed her something back for that.

‘Six months.’

‘What?’

‘Six months. It’s how long I can manage to stay in a relationship with a woman, apparently.’

Caitlin thought about the unexpectedly volunteered information. ‘How come?’

‘I wear them out.’

She laughed at his joke. ‘I’ll bet.’

He smiled. ‘I guess I’m just not neat little marriage material.’

‘No kids to scrub and read fairy stories to, huh?’

The ache in his stomach came back. ‘I don’t have any experience on either of those things.’

She turned her head towards the door at his answer. ‘Your mother didn’t scrub your face and read you fairy tales when you were little?’

None of them had. They’d had so many kids in their care that it had been miraculous enough if they all made it through each day fed and watered. Fairy tales hadn’t exactly been on the menu at any stage.

‘That’s a second question.’

She opened her mouth to push him on it, but he got there first. ‘That’s probably enough to add to the lists—for one night anyway.’ The bed creaked again as he turned away from the door and switched off the bedside light. ‘Goodnight, Caitlin Rourke.’

Caitlin blinked into the darkness, her eyes adjusting to make out the dark forms of her bedroom furniture while her mind worked overtime. Aiden had more facets than he first appeared to have. And that intrigued her.

The fact that it intrigued her bothered her.

She’d never met anyone like him before. But the simple fact was in three months’ time she’d probably never meet him again.

‘Goodnight, Aiden.’

CHAPTER FOUR

THE fixed cameras in her house were replaced by a camera guy and a sound man during the day. And by lunchtime Caitlin knew more about them both than she knew about her ‘fiancé’.

They just had an openness that she was more accustomed to. In conversation they shared information that might have been simple in its general topic but gave hints to their personalities and lives. Whereas Aiden just had a way of avoiding anything remotely like sharing. He could be an international spy for all she knew.

Except for that brief time that they’d shared talking from separate rooms across the hallway.

She struggled her way through the lunchtime rush at Maguires, the employer of her choice in Dublin city centre. The dream of having a restaurant of her own was so far off that it made sense to work somewhere she at least liked to fill the time. But with Aiden Flynn, international man of mystery, sitting at home in her house it was hard to concentrate on dish presentation.

Faking a headache, she left the restaurant and piled into her car with Mick and Joe to make the drive home.

‘So you’re taking Aiden home to meet your parents tomorrow, then?’ Mick pointed the camera at her from the passenger seat.

‘Mmm.’ She grimaced slightly at the thought. ‘That’s the plan.’

‘You worried about it?’

‘Oh, no. We tell massive porkies to each other all the time. It’s a sort of family hobby of ours.’

Mick laughed. ‘Mine too.’

She risked a massive insurance claim by glancing into the lens for a second, ‘I was kidding, Mick.’

‘Oh, me too.’

She laughed. ‘Seriously. My family is close. Really close.’ Her expression changed. ‘After Liam died they were there to hold me together. On the days when I couldn’t get up they brought me food in bed. When I couldn’t stay still my father even took up jogging to keep me company.’

Glancing back at the camera, she smiled sadly. ‘Where one of us ends the other begins. It’s just the way we are.’

‘That’s a rare thing, all right.’

‘Yes, it is.’

She wove her way through the traffic, her mind focussing on the task of not hitting another vehicle. But as they got out of the city and headed towards the suburbs her mind went back to a darker time than the sunny autumn day they were currently in.

‘Do you still miss him, Caitlin?’

The softly voiced question caught her off guard. It had been a long time since anyone had asked. She thought about it a while, played snapshots of memories across her mind, and smiled wistfully as she answered. ‘I miss the sound of his voice sometimes.’

The sound of the camera filled the silence.

‘You tend to think that someone the same age as you will just always be around. Especially when it’s someone you love.’ She continued smiling, eyes on the road ahead but her mind reliving he past. ‘Liam was always the one who lived for the moment. He used to say life was too short to just stand still.’

She glanced at the camera again. ‘Maybe he knew.’

She made the turn into her street and parked in front of her house. Switching off the engine, she glanced up at the windows. Was he looking out at her, Aiden Flynn man of mystery?

‘Aiden’s different from Liam?’

The question raised a small laugh. ‘Like night and day.’

‘Aiden?’

‘In the kitchen—and aren’t you supposed to yell “Hi, honey, I’m home”?’

She smiled as she walked through the living room to the open kitchen/dining room. ‘I’ll remember next time.’ Her eyes roved over the mess on her normally immaculate kitchen surfaces. ‘What are you doing?’

He quirked an eyebrow at the question. ‘I was hungry.’

‘So you thought it would be an idea to massacre my kitchen?’

‘It would have been perfect when you got home.’ He pointed an accusatory finger at her. ‘You’re early.’

She watched as he nodded at her crew.

‘I told them I had a headache.’

Concern crossed his eyes. ‘You’re sick?’

Caitlin’s eyes focussed on the spoon suspended in mid-air as he stared at her. In slow motion drips of red something dripped onto her cooker. ‘No.’

‘Getting quite good at this lying thing, aren’t we?’

‘I don’t think that actually counts as a lie.’ She continued watching the dripping. A small pool formed on the surface. Whatever it was, it had better wash off.

‘I guess it’s all about degrees of lying.’ He watched her face as he thought out loud. ‘What constitutes a big lie and what’s a fib.’

‘A fib, in theory, doesn’t hurt people. It may even save their feelings, depending on the situation.’ Her eyes searched for the nearest cloth. ‘What is that stuff you’re dripping all over the place?’

Aiden waved the spoon as he looked at it. ‘I’m making cheese on beans on toast.’

Her eyes moved up to lock with his. ‘You’re making what?’

‘Cheese on beans on toast.’ He grinned, white teeth peeking out from the shroud of his beard. ‘C’mon—you haven’t heard of it? And you call yourself a chef?’

‘I cook food that tastes good.’

‘This tastes good—’ He waved the spoon again and small splatters of red appeared on his white T-shirt. ‘Believe me.’

Frowning at the modern art piece her cooker was rapidly becoming, she retorted with, ‘I’m quite sure the air in my mouth tastes better than that.’

‘Well, I wouldn’t know that, would I? What with you refusing to kiss me and all…’

Caitlin refused to rise to the bait. ‘That had better get washed off before it becomes glue.’

Aiden glanced at the camera between them and winked, then studied the telltale flush that touched Caitlin’s cheeks. ‘You know you’re going to have to do it at some stage.’

‘You made the mess; you clean it.’

‘I wasn’t referring to the mess.’

‘I was.’ Her chin rose as she stared him straight in the eye.

Aiden stared right back. ‘It has to happen for all this to be convincing.’

An eyebrow quirked. ‘Next you’ll be suggesting we sleep together for the sake of realism. I didn’t sign up for that kind of a show.’

The male hormones in his body transmitted a very vivid mental image from her words, and Aiden frowned. Six months alone had made him a raging sex maniac all of a sudden?

‘Honey, you’d better watch that head of yours doesn’t get too large for the doorways in this place.’

‘I am not kissing you while that beard is there, so you can forget it!’

‘You’re prejudiced against beards for some reason?’

‘As a matter of fact, I am.’

‘Because…?’

He waited patiently for an explanation, filling the time by stirring the bubbling beans in the saucepan in front of him.

When there was no explanation volunteered he glanced at her from the corner of his eye. ‘Well?’

Caitlin was annoyed by how easily he made her angry. She was usually cool, calm and collected. Occupational necessities when restaurants were full and head chefs were yelling in hot kitchens. But Aiden could raise a spark in her from a glance, a single statement—from several spots of tomatoey sauce on her cooker-top.

‘Well, what?’

He removed the pan from the hob and said nothing.

Caitlin sighed in frustration. ‘They scratch.’

He hid a smile as he removed toast from the grill and laid it on two plates.

‘And they do actually cause rashes on sensitive skin.’

Another mental picture formed. ‘You never did get round to showing me that.’

Her mouth quirked at the edges. ‘And neither will I.’

‘Spoilsport.’

The quirk became a smile as she moved closer to watch his attempt at arranging cheese on beans on toast to make it look appetising. When she was right by his shoulder she lowered her voice and asked, ‘Aiden Flynn, are you flirting with me?’

Aiden continued concentrating on his masterpiece. ‘Is it working?’

She leaned in close to his ear to whisper, ‘No.’

He smiled as he sprinkled the last of the grated cheese. ‘Well, then obviously I’m not.’ Lifting a plate, he turned to wave it beneath her nose while looking into her eyes. ‘Because if I was flirting with you it would be working.’

Caitlin’s dark eyes studied his too blue eyes just inches from hers. She searched for answers, for the reasons behind his Jekyll and Hyde personality. But all she could see looking back at her was a warm sparkle of challenge. As if it was some kind of game to him. Maybe it was. Maybe his way of coping with the next few months was to make it ‘fun’. He obviously hadn’t as much to lose as she did if it didn’t work.

‘I need this thing to work, Aiden.’

He blinked long dark lashes at her with a question in his eyes. ‘The show?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why is it so important?’

She avoided his questioning eyes with a downward glance at the plate. ‘It just is.’

Aiden had read her questionnaire for the show and memorised over and over the study guide from the night before. ‘You want your own restaurant that badly?’

‘As badly as you want to fund whatever it is you need a year off work for.’

He continued to hold a steady gaze as she looked back into his eyes. It was what he’d filled in on his own questionnaire. And it was half true, in a way. He needed what the show would bring him to take time to fulfil a promise. To complete a legacy. On the form all he’d said was ‘to fund a career break’. But the words didn’t even cover half of the story.

The look in her eyes said she wanted to know more.

Aiden wasn’t ready for even half an answer. ‘It’s important to me too.’

She seemed to think about pushing him for an explanation, but with a shrug of her shoulders she let it go. ‘Then we’re together on this?’

‘I guess we are.’

A small nod, and then she reached out to take the plate from him. ‘Then maybe you should stop making this into a game of some kind.’

‘That’s my doing, is it?’

‘Isn’t it? All this word-play you have us doing?’

‘A game is exactly what this thing is. Why shouldn’t it be fun along the way?’

Because there was too much to lose.

Avoiding his ridiculously blue eyes, she turned and took her plate to the table overlooking the small outdoor courtyard. ‘For us both to win we need to work together. To concentrate on what we’re doing. With no distractions. And we can’t do that if you keep playing with words and taunting me.’

‘Oh, I see.’ He picked up his own plate and moved across to join her. ‘We should run it like some kind of military campaign, should we? Every word and gesture rehearsed ahead of time?’

‘Yes.’ She frowned at him as he sat down and handed her a knife and fork. ‘We have to plan for every eventuality.’

He thought about her words for a few moments, then asked in a calm voice, ‘Is that how you run your life? Everything planned out in advance?’

‘It makes sense.’ She continued frowning at him. His lack of approval was evident. ‘You set yourself goals, targets to aim for, and you work ’til you get there. I suppose that’s very alien to you and your bohemian approach to a career?’

‘You can’t plan for everything. No matter how you try to. That’s life.’ He spooned a forkful of food into his mouth, chewed a couple of times, and continued talking with his mouth full. ‘You should know that from what happened to your fiancé.’

His words were like a blow to her chest and she felt her eyes stinging angrily. ‘How dare you?’

Pushing her chair back from the table, she glared down at him from above. ‘How dare you throw that at me like it was some little glitch in my great plan for life? Some little wobble that I should have planned for!’

He swallowed his food, looking up at her with a frown, ‘That’s not what I meant.’

‘That’s exactly what you meant. You’re trying to prove that your way of living life, from one opportunity to the next without any ties or emotional involvement, is a better way of living.’

He remained calm. ‘That’s not what I said.’

Caitlin flung an arm in the air at her side. ‘You who has never had a relationship that lasted more than sixty seconds!’

‘Six months.’

She ignored him and leaned down to press home her words. ‘At least I had love in my life, Aiden. Even if it was taken from me before either of us had planned.’ She tilted her head to one side and stared at him with sparkling eyes. ‘And I wouldn’t trade a single second of it. Is there anything in your life you can honestly say the same thing about?’

Without waiting for an answer she spun on her heel and left the room at speed, before running up to her room and slamming the door.

CHAPTER FIVE

AIDEN listened to her running footsteps up the stairs and along the landing, and heard the slam of her door. Then he took a deep breath and leaned back in his chair.

Well, hell.

There was movement from his side and Mick turned the camera on him for a close-up.

‘Go away, Mick.’ Aiden didn’t even look at him as he spoke the words. ‘Give me a second, here.’

‘No can do. My boss would kill me.’

‘Your boss will thump you if you don’t.’ He glanced up at the lens. ‘And you know I pack a mean punch.’

Mick grinned behind the camera. ‘Touchy today, aren’t we?’

‘Mick—’

The glare would have been enough to make most grown men step back at least a couple of steps. But Mick merely continued grinning. ‘It’s in my contract to film everything. Them’s the rules.’

‘I wrote the damn rules.’

‘Well, you dug yourself a bit of a hole there, then, didn’t you?’

With a shake of his head he looked past Mick’s shoulder to the courtyard beyond. ‘Remind me never to hire you again.’

The camera continued rolling as Aiden stared off into space. Then, after several minutes’ silence, Mick spoke with a soft voice. ‘Finding this one tough, huh?’

He smiled a small smile. ‘She’s not what I expected, I guess.’

It was an interesting dilemma. He thought back over the brief he’d originally put together for the show and the plan he’d formulated from it. He’d had a type of woman in mind from the start, but Caitlin Rourke was a surprise to him. She was—more than he’d expected.

‘More complicated.’

‘You expected some party girl who would see this all as some big fun game?’

‘Maybe I did.’

There was a second’s pause. ‘A bit like Caitlin just said, in a way.’

After another brief glare Aiden closed his eyes and sighed. ‘Probably.’

‘But it’s not a game to her.’

‘Yeah.’ He opened his eyes and smiled sarcastically. ‘Because owning a fancy place of her own is such a big deal.’

‘And that’s wrong in your eyes?’ Mick frowned slightly as he asked the question. ‘Is it wrong for her to get that because she’s so young, or something?’

‘Things that matter that much are sweeter when you work hard for them. When you’ve had to make sacrifices along the way. It makes it more worthwhile when you achieve your goals.’

‘More honourable than lying your way there? Or fooling the people that you care about along the way?’

‘I happen to think so.’

The camera continued rolling.

‘She’s had an easy go of it up ’til now. Everything all neat and tidy.’

‘Apart from Liam.’

Aiden looked up at the lens again. ‘Was that his name?’

Mick nodded without moving the camera an inch.

Aiden mirrored the nod. ‘That had to hurt.’ He looked up at the ceiling. ‘Still does, by the looks of things.’

Hell.

With a frown he pushed his chair back from the table. Standing up, he looked at the camera again. ‘I don’t suppose I can persuade you two to stay here while I go grovel?’

Two heads shook in unison.

‘Caitlin?’

There was silence from the other side of the closed door.

Aiden glanced at Mick and Joe, who both stared back at him.

‘Look, I didn’t mean to upset you about your fiancé. That wasn’t what I was aiming for.’

The silence continued, and another sideways glance saw Mick shrug his shoulders and Joe smile weakly.

Then a small voice sounded from behind the pine door. ‘What exactly were you aiming for, then?’

He thought his answer over carefully before stepping closer to the door. ‘I was just trying to point out that you can’t plan for everything. Neither of us can.’

The answering silence was deafening.

Aiden leaned his forehead against the door as he tried to think of something to say that wouldn’t put both his size tens right in it again.

‘I just don’t know how else to get through this if we don’t plan it out. My family knows me too well.’

The restaurant obviously meant more to her than he could possibly understand. In a small part of his mind he wanted her to have the guts to get it by herself. To fight and work for what she wanted rather than having it handed to her in some get-rich-quick scheme. He knew only too well from recent experience that she had enough backbone to stand up and fight against him when she believed he was out of line.

So where was that mettle when it came to fighting for her dream? It didn’t make any sense.

But he had opened an old wound and he felt guilty about that. The best way to get rid of that ugly feeling would be to try and make amends.

‘Tell me how you were with him.’

The bed creaked a little, and he could imagine her turning to look at the door.

‘With Liam?’

‘Yes, with Liam.’ He leaned back from the door again and waited, his breath held still inside his chest.

‘We flirted a lot.’

Aiden smiled and let the air escape in a small burst of laughter. ‘You don’t like it when I flirt with you.’

‘You said you weren’t flirting.’

Turning around, he grimaced slightly at the camera and then sat down on the floor with his back against the door. ‘I may have lied about that. I did say I could lie when the cause arose.’

‘Why would you do that?’

‘Lie to you or flirt with you?’

‘The second one.’

He leaned his head back. ‘Maybe I’m just a flirtatious kinda guy.’

Her smile came through in her voice. ‘Nah, not you. You’re too sullen for that game.’

‘You think I’m sullen?’ A glance at his crew found them both smiling. ‘All right, I guess I can be—a little. But maybe you bring out the flirty side of my nature.’

‘You don’t even like me, Aiden.’

It wasn’t that he didn’t like her. That was one of the things that probably bugged him the most. Having spent all morning alone in her house, he’d done a bit of an investigation and found everything from photograph albums to family videos. He liked what he’d seen just fine. That wasn’t the problem.

‘I think I’m maybe a little envious of you…’ The words made their way out into the big wide world of their own accord. ‘Of all people like you.’

She went silent again for a brief moment, then, ‘Why?’

‘Because not everyone’s had this fairy tale of a life that you’ve had.’

‘Losing Liam was hardly the best thing that ever happened to me.’

‘I know.’ He softened his voice. ‘And I know that’s something you’ll probably never completely get over. But you were right in what you said. You were lucky to have found it in the first place. That doesn’t happen to many people these days.’

When silence followed his words again he let the words keep coming. ‘And you have a great family—a close family who are all there for you. It’s why the show chose you. To see if you could manage to make all the people that know you so well believe in a lie.’

‘And why did they choose you?’

They hadn’t. He’d chosen himself. Because the role he had to play was so complex and only someone who had produced the thing from the very beginning could know what to do when things got difficult. To get the dramatic result they wanted. To make things difficult for Caitlin.

But in volunteering he’d also managed to fulfil another major criteria. He was as opposite to Caitlin Rourke as it was possible to be. In practically every way.

‘Because I’m the flipside of you.’

‘In what way?’ There was barely a heartbeat of a pause before she figured it out. ‘You don’t have a family, do you?’

He frowned hard.

‘None at all?’

The pity in her voice made him sick.

‘Aiden?’

‘What are you going to do about it, Caitlin? Adopt me? I’m a little past the age for you to do that.’

The bed creaked again and her voice sounded a little closer to the door. ‘That’s why you have no experience of fairy stories and your face being scrubbed?’

‘Don’t go crying on me in there.’ He turned his head towards the door a little. ‘There are millions of us around the world who didn’t have a family of their own. I was one of the lucky ones. I had loads of families.’

‘That’s why you spend you life drifting around. No serious relationships, no long-term career. Because you have no grounding in those things.’

Actually, she was wrong on that one. He had a career. A damned good one, as it happened. He’d worked hard to get to the top of his game and he was hell on legs at it. But he couldn’t tell her that or he’d blow the whole thing.

‘I’ve been in serious relationships—’

‘Serious relationships last longer than six months.’

‘Not if they don’t work out, they don’t. Just because they’re short doesn’t mean they weren’t great. That’s life.’

‘And why didn’t they work out?’

He vaguely noticed that her voice sounded very close as he answered, ‘They just didn’t.’

There was a sliding noise against the door as Caitlin sat down on the opposite side of their protective barrier. ‘What were you like with them?’

‘Flirtatious, sullen, jealous, happy. More of everything. More alive. The usual share of things in any good relationship.’

They sat in a silent understanding after he spoke.

Aiden closed his eyes again for a few moments. Stunned by how much of himself he was giving to her in such a short space of time. He knew that reality shows often brought out an unusual level of intensity in people’s relationships. But he really hadn’t been prepared for it happening to him. It surprised him. But what surprised him more was that it didn’t feel as if he’d just had teeth pulled. It felt somehow right. As if by being honest he had lifted some kind of barricade that he hadn’t even known he’d been carrying around.

It was just weird that it was with someone like Caitlin.

Her voice was low, so quiet that he might not have heard it if he hadn’t been a mere door’s width away from her. ‘Then that’s how you need to be with me.’

‘And how you were with Liam is how you need to be with me.’

‘So that we can fool everyone into believing we’re in love?’

‘Yes.’

Her voice sounded different to his ears—uncertain, a little nervous. She was going out on a limb. Veering from her habit of a lifetime that had things all laid out and every eventuality prepared for. It was a big step for her, and Aiden knew that as soon as the words left her lips.

‘Then that’s what we’ll do. We’ll look at each other and see the great things we saw in the people we cared about. And we’ll make believe as it comes along.’

Aiden felt a wave of something resembling fear cross his chest. ‘Yes.’

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