A Deal Made In Texas. Michelle Major
popping it into her mouth.
“Hey, you two.” His youngest sister, Valene, slipped into the chair on his other side. She wore a gray sheath dress and an understated pendant necklace around her neck. When had the baby of the family grown up so much? “What’s the deal with you and Christine?” she asked Gavin.
He glared at Schuyler. “So much for keeping things on the down low.”
“I didn’t say anything,” she told him, arching a brow at Valene.
“She didn’t need to.” Val sipped her glass of orange juice. “I caught Christine doing the walk of shame from your room this morning on my way to work out.”
“Seriously?” Schuyler demanded, eyes narrowing. But to Gavin’s utter shock, her stare was focused on Valene and not him. “You worked out already? Stop making me feel like a slacker, Val.”
Val rolled her eyes and winked at Gavin. “So...”
“She wasn’t doing the walk of shame,” Gavin said through clenched teeth, wishing for something stronger than coffee in his china cup.
“Don’t get me wrong,” Valene told him, ignoring Schuyler’s continued glare. “I approve. She’s a definite improvement over that bimbo you were dating when I came to Denver last year.”
“She’s probably too good for you,” Schuyler added absently. “How did you get her to take you on in the first place?”
“Feels like an interrogation,” Gavin muttered under his breath.
Schuyler chuckled. “You know I’m joking. You’re a catch, Gavin.”
“It’s just a surprise that you’ve let yourself be caught.” Valene bit into a slice of bagel slathered with cream cheese.
“I don’t want to talk about this with either of you.” He inclined his head toward the rest of the family, who were gathered around Maddie and Zach on the other side of the room. “Especially not here.”
“You need our expertise,” Schuyler told him. “Christine is amazing. She’s the kind of woman...”
“I’d want at my side for always,” Gavin whispered, unaware that he’d spoken aloud until both of his sisters gasped.
Schuyler grabbed his arm. “Are you saying...”
“Did you ask her to marry you?” Valene leaned closer. “Are you and Christine engaged?”
Gavin felt his Adam’s apple bob in his throat as he swallowed hard. “I didn’t say that.”
“It’s true, though. I can tell by the look in your eyes.” Valene let out a little squeal of delight then lifted her bagel and smiled blandly at the group sitting at the next table. “Try the blueberry cream cheese. It’s amazing.”
“Can you two be more obvious?” Gavin tugged his arm out of Schuyler’s grasp.
“You’re getting married,” Schuyler told him, and he didn’t dare contradict her. “You can’t keep it a secret.”
Fake dating to fake engaged in twenty-four hours. His stomach pitched as he thought about Christine’s reaction to this new development.
“And there’s no reason to.” Valene dabbed at the corner of her mouth with a napkin. “Everyone loves Christine.”
“She’s a private person,” he said, realizing the excuse sounded lame.
Schuyler nodded just the same. “I get that, but she’s like one of the family to us. She’s going to be one of the family soon. How soon? Have you set a date?”
He shook his head, trying to reel in his thoughts. What was he doing here? “Not yet. We didn’t want to take any attention from Maddie and Zach.”
Both of his sisters nodded in agreement.
“I’m sure that was Christine’s idea,” Valene said. “She’s so thoughtful. We’ll make sure she knows how welcome she is.” She looked past him, her eyes widening. “Oh, they brought out a fresh tray of pastries. I need to get to them before Everett and Connor snag the best ones.” She pushed back from the table. “I’ll be right back. Who wants a donut?”
“Me.” Schuyler raised her hand. “Bring one for Gavin, too. He’s probably hangry and hungover.”
“I’m neither,” he said, although his head was starting to ache. Was it too early for a shot? “But I’ll take a Bloody Mary, please.”
Valene laughed as she walked away.
Schuyler wasted no time. She turned to Gavin and started in on him again. “Christine is going to get the wrong impression if you try to keep her a secret much longer, especially since you’re in Austin for the rest of the month. She needs to start wedding planning, and I can help. Think about it, Gavin. She’s going to be your wife. I get the business about being private, but if you make her feel like everything’s okay, she’ll believe it.”
“Do you think I haven’t?”
“I think you don’t have much experience with a woman who you can be proud to bring home to Mom and Dad.”
“That’s not—” Gavin stopped, ran a hand through his hair. It was exactly the truth. Even though his relationship with Christine was a complete fake, he hadn’t dated anyone with her amount of class and elegance in years. Christine was the kind of woman a man thought of spending his life with, and Gavin’s stomach pitched at the realization.
“Bring her to the family reunion,” Schuyler told him, breaking into his tumbling thoughts.
“What family reunion?”
“The one I’m planning to introduce everyone to the new Fortunes.”
He shook his head. “I thought we were the new Fortunes.”
She leaned forward, her eyes dancing with excitement. “There are more, Gavin. Dad has a half brother, Miles. He lives in New Orleans and has seven kids. Ben and Keaton put me in touch with the youngest son, Nolan. He’s recently moved to Austin.”
Ben Fortune Robinson had spearheaded the search for his illegitimate siblings after discovering that his tech mogul father was really Jerome Fortune, who’d faked his death years earlier. Jerome reinvented himself as Gerald Robinson and built his tech empire, but in recent years the family’s focus had been on their new siblings. Keaton Whitfield, a British architect who was now living in Austin, had been the first of the secret illegitimate Fortunes Ben had tracked down. Together, the two of them had worked to uncover Gerald’s other grown children and bring them into the fold.
Schuyler was the Fortune expert as far as Gavin was concerned, so he knew from her that Gerald’s estranged wife, Charlotte, had actually known about his other children for the duration of their marriage and hidden the information from everyone. To learn there were even more previously unknown Fortunes out there... Gavin didn’t know what to think.
“Schuyler, last year you were the one who wasn’t sure if the Fortunes could be trusted. That was the whole basis for you infiltrating the family through the Mendozas.”
She smiled wistfully. “Thank heavens for that brilliant idea. Otherwise, I never would have met Carlo.”
“Can we keep on topic?” Gavin asked. Once again he wondered what it would have felt like to grow up an only child.
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