She still didn’t look at him. Didn’t dare.

God, what had she done? So much for keeping her disastrous love life—real or fake—out of the office. She’d kissed her boss. Her boss. Jesus.

After counting to three, she blurted, “I’m sorry. So, so sorry, Mr. Gale. I have no idea what came over me, but she kept yelling and calling you worthless, and you work so hard and don’t deserve to be treated that way, and I just, I don’t know, snapped. I couldn’t take it anymore, so I…I…”

“Did the perfect thing,” he said, his voice as calm and collected as always. “Damn brilliant, really.”

“It was stupid and irresponsible and—” She staggered back and glanced at her boss’s face for the first time since they’d been left alone. “Wait. What?”

Instead of anger and disgust, which she’d totally expected to see, he smiled at her. Actually smiled. And he had dimples. Two of them. In his cheeks.

What just happened?

Chapter Three

Benjamin rubbed his jaw, and his smile widened as he replayed the look of pure shock on his mother’s face when Maggie threw herself into his arms and declared their love for one another. Love. What a silly notion, and an absolutely perfect weapon against his mother’s ultimatum. She would be as disoriented in the face of love as he would be, because neither of them had a clue what it was.

The Gale family ran on ambition, not feelings. And that was a damn good thing, too. If she had said they were marrying for money, or for convenience, his mother would have been on them quicker than a lion on a wounded gazelle.

But instead, she’d used love. It had been enough to send his mother running, and it had bought him some much-needed time to get his shit together. He had no doubt his mother could challenge his position if he refused to at least try to settle down and be responsible. But if he already had a fiancée…

Hell, she didn’t have a case against him. And she was fully aware of that.

Maggie’s ruse had literally saved him. Of course, she was panicking, and looked as if she might be close to running from the office. But after she handed him that ingenious plan, there was no way he was letting it slip out of his fingers. He’d make her see that it was resourceful, not irresponsible. Her lie saved both their asses.

They were in a win/win situation.

She licked her lips—lips that he couldn’t get his mind off of now that he’d had a taste—and shook her head. “N-No. It was stupid. All she has to do is ask a few questions around the office, and she’ll find out the truth. She’ll fire me. I won’t be able to pay my rent, or help my parents out back home. I’ll be disgraced, and no one will hire me. I’ll have to leave the city and go back to milking cows and training—”

Milking cows? Jesus. People still did that? Didn’t they have machines for that? “Maggie.” He pressed a finger to her soft lips, and she shut up. It took all his self-control not to kiss her into a silence, but he had a feeling if he did so, she’d bolt. She was already seconds from hyperventilating as it was. “It’s okay. Everything’s okay.”

She flushed even more. “No, it’s not. I messed up so bad, just like I always do, but this time it’s at work.”

“But we don’t have to tell anyone. No one needs to find out.” He lifted her chin with two gentle fingers, and her upturned face was more vulnerable than he’d ever seen it before, and so impossibly beautiful. He tried another smile, hoping to set her at ease, but if anything it seemed to freak her out even more—probably because he didn’t smile much anymore. Or ever. “We can make this into something real. Well, not real, but for the sake of everyone else it will look authentic. Like we were dating all along.”

Her gray eyes—they were definitely gray with blue flecks, now that he was this close to her—watched him, full of so many questions he could practically hear them. She was so different from the society women he usually dated.

The last one, Elizabeth, he’d been with for a year, and she never showed him even an ounce of emotion or softness. But Maggie? Ah, she showed every emotion as she experienced it, and it was refreshingly sweet. He didn’t know how to do the same. All his life, he’d been trained to hide his feelings.

But she was so…so damn open.

A surge of protectiveness hit him. He’d do what it took to help her keep her job and to make her stay by his side. With her help, he could get to the bottom of his mother’s plan. Hell, maybe he could talk to his brother and see if he was as eager for the position as his mother made him out to be.

He would win this battle.

But he’d need Maggie’s help to get it done and to avoid endless dates with the insufferable, money-grubbing, empty-headed snobs his mother usually set him up with.

She stepped back, and he dropped his hand to his side. “No one will believe it. We’re never alone together.”

“Yeah, we are.” He stepped closer, towering over her short height. She bit her lip and gave him a onceover. The air between them became charged, and he curled his fists into tight balls to keep from touching her again. “All the time. We always work later than everyone else, just like tonight. If we announce our engagement, people will all slap their thighs and go, ‘That’s why they always stayed late.’”

She shook her head once. “It can’t possibly be that easy.”

“The hell it can’t. People are gullible. Show them what they expect to see, and they believe it. If we tell them we stayed behind late to hide our love from the world, they’ll eat it up.” He paced, unable to stand still with so many ideas running through his head. “My mother will fall for it, too, since she already saw us on a date.”

She spluttered. “It wasn’t a date.”

“I know that, and so do you.” He pointed at her. “But she doesn’t.”

She tugged on her fingers. “Okay, fine. Whatever. But why would you want to pretend to be engaged to me?” she asked, watching him as he paced back and forth. “I don’t get it.”

“You’re the one who told her we were engaged in the first place,” he said. “Not me.”

“I know. And again, sorry. I’m never impulsive like that. I have no idea what came over me. I guess I just wanted to help you.”

“I’m not impulsive either, and I always think things through. To the point of exhaustion, even.” He stopped in front of her. “But I can see the merit of us pretending to be engaged, and you should be able to as well.”

She pressed her mouth into a tight line. “And that is?”

“Well, for starters, you could be fired if she went to the board with what she ‘saw’ here tonight—and she does have that power, if she can convince them.”

She paled. “She does?”

“Yes. It’s against company policy, so we could both be punished. It would help her force me out as CEO, and you would be fired on the spot.” He rubbed his jaw. “But with your smart lie, we wouldn’t have to worry about it. If we act as if we’re in love, and have been for a long time, we’ll both be safe.”

“That’s great and all, but we’ll have to convince people we’re in a relationship.” She held her hands out, palms up. “How do we do that?”

He’d seen it in movies, so it couldn’t be that hard. Smile a lot. Kiss a lot. Hold hands. Stare into each other’s eyes meaningfully. I can handle that.

“We act happy, just like regular couples do. Kiss. Smile. Date. Instagram how in love we both are, and how we can’t wait to get married.” He shrugged. “And then, after a suitable amount of time, we break up and continue on as we have been.”

She shook her head. “But we have to pretend to be in love? That’s crazy. Isn’t it?”