Faked (Ward Family #2)(27)

Childhood wounds went deep, even if you didn't think about them all the time.

"You okay?" Bauer asked. "You went scary quiet on me there."

It was perceptive of him, and it made me give him a curious glance. I'd been quiet most of the trip, but even him, this man who didn't really know me, was able to tell the difference in my silence.

I gave him a small smile. "Just thinking about emotional trauma from childhood, if you must know."

He groaned, leaning forward to turn the music up. "Nope. Not going there, princess. We haven't been fake dating long enough."

After an hour and a half of him trying to engage me in conversation, that was the thing that did the trick. I turned in my seat to appraise his facial expression.

"Come on, I'll share mine if you share yours."

He snorted. "Yeah, right."

"We have an hour left," I said. "What else should we talk about?"

"Literally anything." He changed lanes after a quick glance at his blind spot. "I'd talk politics. Religion. Women I've slept with in the past because I've never done the dating thing. Let's hit one of those for fun."

My head tilted. "How old were you when your dad married Adele?"

Bauer blew out a hard breath. "Remember that one time my high school girlfriend cheated on me? With my best friend? Let's recap that in detail instead."

A smile twitched at the edges of my mouth, but I tamped it down. Being charmed by his reticence to talk about his family's obvious dysfunction would do me no good. Even if he was all but admitting he was a man-ho.

"You're gonna make a great kid shrink someday, princess," he said. "Badgering these poor children into sharing."

"You're very skilled at deflection, Bauer."

He sent me a crooked grin. "I'm skilled at a lot of things, trust me. Not talking about my family isn't even at the top of the list."

Rolling my eyes at the innuendo, I turned back to the window. Seattle was beautiful, but as we drove farther north, the views seemed to increase in grandeur. "No wonder you love it up here," I told him. "It's amazing."

Not that my comment necessitated a response, but Bauer didn't say anything right away. Then he let out a slow exhale, the kind you'd make after a good yoga stretch or when you slip into a bathtub full of hot water and it hits your skin for the first time.

It was the kind of sigh that said my soul is at ease.

"The mountains are the one place where I don't feel stuck in a cage."

Before I could comment on that, the soothing voice on his phone told us to take the exit. There were buildings off in the distance, the Vancouver skyline visible even from where we were heading off toward the water to where Richard had told us to go.

"When did your parents drive up?"

He glanced at his phone screen, and I thought I saw guilt in his eyes. "They, uh, they flew with Richard on his private plane a little bit ago."

My eyebrows slid up on my forehead. "And how come we didn't do that? We could've gotten there in, like, thirty minutes."

"Beeecause I didn't want to be trapped in a flying metal tube with my dad and Adele just yet." Bauer gave me an indulgent grin. "I needed time with my girl before our sleepover tonight."

I pointed a finger at him. "I told you separate rooms."

"And if I have any control over that, your wish is my command." He pointed a finger of his own. "But you know as well as I that if you protest too much, it'll look weird."

With a groan, I dropped my head back on the seat. "This is so stupid. Can't we just tell Richard about the mix-up?"

"Yes, sure we can." Bauer gave me a look. "I'm sure he'd love handing Adele a check after he finds out we all lied to him, knowing exactly who he was."

"Eventually, they'll have to."

"Why?"

"W-well," I stammered, "if he's a major benefactor of the center, won't he come visit?"

"Sure. Does your sister visit the center often?"

I frowned, which made him laugh.

"Lying isn't fun, Bauer. I don't enjoy it. I feel like a fake and a phony and like we're duping this nice man."

"All you're doing is answering to a different name," he pointed out. "When you talked to him for the first time, were you pretending to be Lia?"

"No," I admitted.

The houses grew as we traveled around the winding road surrounded by towering trees and glimpses of water.

"No, you weren't. Listen, the worst part of this is that you have to pretend to like me for a day."

He said it flippantly, but there was an edge to his words.

For a moment, I closed my eyes and tried to imagine that the night had played out the way I'd dreamt it would. What would this feel like if Finn were driving us up to Vancouver, and I had to pretend to be his girlfriend for a night?

And my mind went ... blank.

My heart was quiet.

He probably would have been as uncomfortable with this as I was. And the longer I thought about it, I knew we never would've been in this position in the first place because he wouldn't have approached me and slid his arm around my waist as I spoke to Richard. He wouldn't have looked at me the way Bauer had. He wouldn't have danced with me in a quiet hallway.