Chapter 2

Cillian’s POV

“Sorry I’m late, love” was the dumbest line I had ever said out loud.

I said it anyway. And she took my hand like it was a life raft.

Her fingers were ice cold. Her pulse jumped under my thumb, fast and hard. She was five foot six in flat shoes and she stared up at me like she couldn’t decide whether to hug me or call security.

I liked her immediately. That was the first problem.

“You must be the fiancé,” said the man in the navy suit. Brendan. The ex. He looked at me the way a man looks at a stain on his shirt. “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch the name.”

“Cal,” I said. “Cal Dunne.”

It was my grandfather’s name. Calum Dunne. He’d tended bar on the South Side for forty years and never once owned a suit. I’d borrowed it because it was the only name in my head that had never been in a newspaper.

“Cal,” Brendan repeated. “And what do you do, Cal?”

“This and that.”

“That’s vague.”

“I’m a vague guy.”

Nell’s fingers tightened on mine. I felt her trying not to laugh.

I should explain how I got here.

My name is Cillian Doyle. I own the building we were standing in. I own eleven more like it, in six cities, and a hospitality company with four thousand employees who all call me Mr. Doyle. I was in the ballroom that morning wearing a gray sweater and a ball cap because someone had been selling my secrets to Desmond Fitzgerald for six months, and I wanted to know who.

Three of my expansion plans had leaked. Two of my bids had been beaten by a single dollar. Every leak traced back to my own building. And now the Fitzgerald family had booked my ballroom for their daughter’s wedding, which meant planners, florists and caterers crawling through my back halls for two weeks.

So I came to watch. Alone. No name, no staff, no security.

And then I walked into a woman lying to a room full of people, and I couldn’t stop myself.

“Well!” Desmond boomed. “An engaged planner. Nobody told me. Aoife, isn’t that lovely?”

“So lovely,” said Aoife, and she meant it. She clapped her hands.

“Where did you two meet?” Brendan asked.

Nell opened her mouth.

“At a wedding,” I said.

“Whose?”

“Nobody’s. It was a funeral.”

Every eyebrow in the ballroom went up.

“He was a bartender at the after party,” Nell said quickly. “I was there for work. I mean, I was working the funeral. It was a big one. Catering. Flowers.”

“You plan funerals?” Desmond said.

“I plan everything,” said Nell. “Weddings, funerals, bar mitzvahs. I once did a divorce party with a horse.”

“A horse?” said Aoife, delighted.

“He was very well behaved.”

“So you’re a bartender,” Brendan said to me. He smiled. “That’s great. Honestly. I think that’s great.”

“I do other things.”

“Like what?”

“Security. Consulting. Whatever pays.”

“Such a nice range,” said Brendan.

“I have a lot of range.”

Nell coughed into her fist. It sounded a lot like a laugh.

Desmond studied me for a long, quiet second. He was the sort of man who took a man’s measure by the width of his hand and the quality of his shoes. My shoes were four years old and scuffed. My hand was, I hoped, harmless.

“Saturday, then,” he said finally. “Seven o’clock. Bring the ring, Cal. Let’s have a look at it.”

“The ring,” said Nell.

“It’s being sized,” I said.

“Again?” Brendan said.

“It’s a very small finger.”

Nell looked at me. Her lips pressed together. Her eyes were wet at the corners with pure held-in laughter.

Then Desmond took his daughter and his future son-in-law toward the far side of the room to talk about tablecloths, and it was just the two of us and the small furious woman in flat shoes, and her small furious friend.

“Outside,” Nell said. “Now.”

~

She didn’t speak until the elevator doors closed on the three of us.

The friend, Roisin, stood in the corner with her hand over her mouth. Her shoulders shook.

“Who are you?” Nell said.

“Cal.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s what I’ve got.”

“Do I know you?”

“No.”

“Then why did you help me?”

“You looked like you needed a rescue.”

“I don’t need rescues.”

“Everybody needs one sometimes.”

“Is that a line?”

“It’s a fact.”

She pushed a strand of brown hair behind her ear. Her cheeks were pink. She had a spray of tiny freckles across her nose that she had clearly spent years trying to cover. Her eyes were hazel, quick, watchful, not the eyes of a woman who took anyone at face value.

“You can’t walk into a stranger’s business and announce you’re her fiancé.”

“You announced it first.”

“That was an emergency.”

“So was this.”

Roisin snorted.

“He’s not wrong,” she whispered.

“Do not help him.”

“He was very good, Nell. He said the horse thing.”

“That was me.”

“He said the funeral thing.”

“I said the funeral thing!” She spun on me. “What kind of man says funeral?”

“A quick one.”

She stared. I stared back. The elevator hummed.

I saw the exact second she made up her mind. Her chin lifted. Her shoulders dropped, just an inch.

“How much?” she said.

“Sorry?”

“How much? What’s your rate?”

I blinked.

Roisin’s mouth fell open.

“You do this for a living,” Nell said. “Don’t you? Plus one. Stand-in. Fake boyfriend. The whole outfit and the funeral. There are apps.”

I had no idea what to say. I looked at her. She looked back, dead serious, jaw set. She thought I was a professional. She thought I was a man for hire.

Here was the exit. Just tell her the truth. Cillian Doyle, owner of the building, doing recon.

But then I’d lose the cover. And she’d be on her own with Brendan and Desmond and a room full of people who smelled blood.

And I wasn’t ready to stop looking at her.

“Two hundred an hour,” I said.

Roisin choked.

“Two hundred.” Nell went pale. “That’s, that’s a lot.”

“Weekends are extra.”

“Extra how?”

“Depends.”

“On what?”

“On whether I like the client.”

Her eyes narrowed. “First hour’s free,” she said.

“Is it?”

“You owe me for the funeral.”

I smiled. I couldn’t help it. “Fine. First hour’s free.”

“I’ll pay you Saturday. I’ll have the money by Saturday. Somehow.”

“We’ll work it out.”

The elevator opened on the lobby. Marble, brass, my father’s portrait over the front desk. She marched out ahead of me with her clipboard and her chin up. Roisin trailed behind her, mouthing at me over her shoulder. Oh my God.

I stopped in the middle of the lobby. Tugged my sleeve down over my bare wrist, where my watch usually sat. I’d left it in the car. A man in a Patek Philippe doesn’t get mistaken for a bartender.

“Wait,” I said.

She turned.

“Give me your number.”

“Why?”

“So I know where to be.”

She fished a business card from her clipboard and held it out. Gallagher and Company Weddings. Nuala Gallagher, Principal. A small pen doodle of a cake in the corner. The card was creased and soft, like it had lived in a lot of pockets.

“Nell,” she said. “It’s Nell.”

“Cal.”

“Don’t be late Saturday.”

“I won’t be.”

She held my eyes a beat too long. Then she left, and her small, brave shoes rang out across my marble floor.

My phone buzzed. A text from my head of security, Malachy.

Checked her out. Gallagher and Co owes forty grand to Fitzgerald Properties. They own her lease.

I read it twice. My stomach dropped.

The woman I had just tied myself to had a motive to sell me out.