I stood facing my fiancé in my bedroom, my heartbeat racing as the nerves started to set in. Our plan was so going to be ruined if he spilled the beans!
“Lauren, explain to me now what is going on,” Michael said calmly, almost too calmly.
“It’s a long story.”
“I’ve got time.”
“I don’t…” I started, only to stop, “We’re in the middle of a plan to save the perfumerie down the road.”
“Perfumerie?” Michael asked.
“I worked there when I was here on gap year ten years ago,” I said, “It sort of saved me from an early ticket home, and I really loved the place. It’s up for sale right now and there is a lot of shady business going on, this lady wants to buy it and rip it down in favor of some awful tourist trap resort. I sort of got myself involved in trying to fight her plan.”
“Sort of?” Michael smirked.
“Ok, I might be at the center of it,” I replied, “But that’s beside the point… you can’t be here!”
“Why?” he asked, a frown starting to cross his face.
“Right so, the thing is, people here think Jake and I are married,” I said quickly. But not quickly enough, Michael still heard.
“Married?!”
“We’re not!” I defended, “I mean we’re nothing. Absolutely nothing. Other than accomplices I guess.”
“I don’t get it, why do people think you’re married then?”
I felt myself blush, Michael knew that I had a past but I hadn’t gone into detail. “We were together ten years ago,” I said truthfully, “He was like my gap year romance. Here in Eze.”
“Right…”
“This is his house now,” I explained, “It’s where I stayed ten years ago and when I got back to town one of my old friends here mistakenly assumed I was still with Jake and gave me the keys. I kind of played along because I needed a place to stay for the night. And then I just stayed indefinitely.”
“Lauren…” Michael groaned.
“I know, it was wrong of me. And then Jake showed up and things got really complicated.”
“Obviously.”
I paused for a minute, noise coming from downstairs. A loud rapping on the door halted our conversation, Jake poking his head in. “Lauren, I need you down there soon,” he hissed, “People are asking questions.”
“Right,” I said, turning back towards Michael, “You can stay, people just can’t know the truth. We don’t want scandal.”
Michael raised his eyebrows, looking from Jake to me. “What so I’m just supposed to wander amongst these people I don’t know and pretend I’m some random friend?”
“My best friend, staying with us for the night,” I said, making up the lie on the spot. Oh hell, I was getting really good at making up lies so quickly.
“Fine. I need to speak with you after this whole charade Lauren, I might as well stay.”
“Ok, sure,” I said, agreeing quickly.
I started to leave the room, stopping when Jake cleared his throat.
“Listen for anything suspicious being said,” Jake added before we left, “There’s this woman called Dominique Gerard, she’s got a bit of a pinched face, she’s working with my colleague Stephen to get me taken off this sale.”
