“A month ago, I wouldn’t have believed such a service existed,” Anne said with a dry laugh. “Leave it to my mother to know, though I don’t know why she would if the men aren’t real. She couldn’t have been your client.” She stopped herself. “Sorry, I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”
Bettina couldn’t help but laugh. “You don’t have to apologize. I know Faylene very well. We met at the gym two years ago. After the first night I learned to look for the cluster of men to see where Faylene was working out. I’m surprised she didn’t come with you—to help you choose your fiancé.”
“Her help is what got me into trouble in the first place. She’s the one who told my boss I’m engaged. I should have corrected her the moment it happened. But I could see that he’d already fallen under her spell and I didn’t want to make her look bad. Now I have to go along with her tall tale. It’s just that…” Her control seemed to falter a bit. “I don’t like deceit. Deceit can hurt people.”
There was something about the unexpected quiet tone of Anne’s voice that made Bettina think that she knew firsthand about deceit and hurt. Bettina found herself drawn to this woman. She liked that Anne cared about her mother. She liked even more that Anne felt uncomfortable with the lie. “Would you care for a cup of tea, Anne?”
“No, thanks.” Anne took a quick look at her watch and visibly made the effort to recapture her professional demeanor. “I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.”
“Just Bettina. I try to live the fantasy I sell.”
“Bettina, I really need to get this done. Please show me what you have so that I can get back to my office.”
Bettina leaned back in her chair. “It doesn’t work quite that way. Your application tells me about your tastes, the kind of flowers you like, music, candy, gifts. Next we build a history for your fiancé, I provide you with a photograph and we start the fantasy courtship. Your fiancé may not be a real man but we have to make the people around you believe he is. Do you have any questions?”
“Yes. Where do you get your photographs?”
“I use models. But you don’t have to worry. Nobody will recognize your fiancé.” Bettina picked up Anne’s application. “If you’re ready, I’d like you to tell me about yourself in your own words.”
Anne sighed impatiently. “I work for Bundles of Joy, a baby products manufacturing company. The man who owns the company—the man my mother seems to have elevated to the top of her eligible bachelors list—believes that people who have children have some mysterious, inborn instinct for selling to others like themselves. I thought I’d have time to prove to him that he’s wrong. Now, one of the vice presidents is retiring and I’m in line for the job.”
“Wonderful,” Bettina said.
“It would be except my chief rival has a perfect husband and two perfect children. I don’t.”
“Do you like children?” Bettina asked curiously.
“I love children,” she said, tugging at her skirt again. Then she added in a voice so low that Bettina could barely hear, “I just don’t plan to have any. And the only husband I will ever have is the one you’re providing.”
The quick flash of angst in Anne’s eyes said more than her words. Bettina had seen that look before, in her brother’s eyes. He didn’t talk about it, but when he was in Hawaii there was an island girl he cared about. Then she died and he became a wanderer determined never to put down roots again.
Using only the name Dane, her brother photographed every rain forest, every archeological dig, and every big news event in the world. He’d built a reputation that guaranteed his choice of assignments and the income to support his vow never to stay in one place. There were no more island girls but at least one or two children with faces of despair found their way into every shoot. Except for two portraits an art gallery had sold, Mitchell filed the rest away in portfolios in a trunk in her basement.
Children and families didn’t fit into the very different lifestyles of either Mitchell or Anne. That’s when the answer came to her. She opened her desk drawer, fishing out the original file of the models she’d used to open her agency. She’d give Anne Harris the perfect fiancé. She’d give her Mitchell. And maybe, if she and Faylene put their heads together, they could figure out how to make Anne’s imaginary fiancé real.
“I think I have just the man you need. Let me tell you about Mitchell Dane.”
1
“THIS IS ANNE HARRIS, again,” the low, breathy voice whispered into the answering machine. “I must get in touch with the model who posed for the photograph of Mitchell Dane. I need him desperately.”
Mitchell listened to the latest message in dismay. He didn’t have to answer his sister’s phone, just check the messages and report any emergencies. In the time it had taken him to put away pancakes and scrambled eggs this morning, Anne Harris had left three messages, each more urgent than the one before. But that wasn’t what had him strung tighter than a bow. It was that the woman’s voice asked for Mitchell.
“I know it’s against your policy, Bettina, but,” she went on, trying unsuccessfully to hide the tremor in her voice with sharpness, “I simply have to reach him.”
He’d strangle Bettina when she returned. This little interlude had been only intended for picking up his mail and dropping off his latest photographs on his way to a photo shoot in North Carolina. The minute Bettina learned he was en route, she suddenly decided to visit their brother in Wyoming.
Granted, a one-woman business tied her down and he did owe her for being his clearinghouse since he didn’t keep a permanent address. But a storage locker in her basement and the occasional use of her spare bedroom didn’t quite equal the problem that seemed to be building. When he’d agreed to handle any emergency that came up, he’d assumed she meant leaking faucets or loss of electric power. What kind of emergency could you have with an imaginary lover?
The whole idea of pretend boyfriends had been crazy from the start. Five years ago, when Bettina had explained she planned a service that provided photos of imaginary lovers who sent gifts and made telephone calls to women, he and his brothers had howled.
She’d come to him because she needed photographs of attractive, sexy men. They had to be the kind of man every woman would fantasize about. Since she was just starting out and had no money to pay for professional models, her plan was to use her own brothers. They’d laughed louder and turned her down. But she was serious and, eventually, because they all lived away from the area, they’d agreed, providing Mitchell did the photography.
Photographing Jess and Ran to look sexy had been a hoot. Forcing his brothers to pose for cheesy beefcake pictures had gotten back at them for all the trouble they’d caused him as teenagers. If there had been such a thing as a catalog for Victor’s Secret, he could have made a fortune contracting out the Dane brothers as cover models. Finally, at Bettina’s insistence, he’d thrown in a couple of shots of himself made in Hawaii. Their photos were to have been temporary until she could afford to pay real models. He’d been assured they’d been retired as Bettina’s bachelors long ago.
But Anne Harris was using his name.
“Where are you, Bettina? Call me the minute you come in, or everything I’ve worked for will be lost,” she said and hung up.
Vacation or not, he didn’t care. Mitchell dialed his brother’s ranch in Wyoming and got his answering machine. “Listen, Bettina,” he snapped, “I know I swore an oath that I wouldn’t bother you unless it was a matter of life and death, but you’d better know there’s a woman named Anne Harris who sounds pretty desperate. I think you’d better call her.”
An hour passed. No Bettina. Mitchell paced the condo that served as his sister’s living quarters and her place of business, and a permanent address for Mitchell Dane