“So you’re telling me I have to tell Aiden Taylor no, then?” Bob said and I froze.

“What’s this guy’s name?” I said in disbelief.

“His name is Aiden Taylor.”

“Oh hell no,” I said. “What’s the girl’s name that he likes? Wait, don’t tell me, is it Liv? No, wait, that’s his sister. Is it Alice?”

“Yeah, how did you know?” Bob sounded surprised.

“Bloody hell. Can’t this family leave me alone?” I said, my face burning as I realized that my new client was Scott’s brother.

“You know him?”

“No. Yes. Ugh, not really.” I sighed.

“So you’re going to take the job?”

“No,” I said adamantly, but then something in me started to get excited. Maybe this was a way to see Scott again. Maybe if I could just see him, I could explain. “Maybe. I want to meet this Aiden first.”

“I can set a meeting up tomorrow if you want.”

“Yeah. I guess that’s fine. Do not tell him I’ve taken the job. Just tell him that I’m willing to meet him to see if I can help him.”

“Okay.” Bob sounded gleeful. I knew he was already picturing his new pickup truck or whatever he was going to buy with the money he made. “Come to the office tomorrow at 11 a.m. and I’ll have you guys meet.”

“Okay.” I hung up and buried my face in my hands. I had no idea if I was making a mistake, but I knew that this was fate’s way of giving me a second chance. At least I hoped it was.

***

“Hi, I’m Aiden.” A tall man stood up and reached his hand out to me. He had a huge smile on his face and his big blue eyes reminded me of Scott, only Aiden had dark hair.

“Elizabeth,” I said and shook his hand. I stared into his eyes to see if my name rang any bells.

“Nice to meet you,” he said with a small smile. “Shall we have a seat?”

“Sure,” I said and sat down in the chair next to his. “Where’s Bob?”

“He said he was going to Burger King,” Aiden said, and I could feel his eyes on my face. “He had some coupon that was going to expire today or something.”

“Of course.” I laughed and sat back, pushing my breasts out. I concentrated on Aiden’s face to see if he was going to look at my boobs, but he continued staring at my face. I liked that. I was testing him to see if he really liked this Alice girl, or if he still had eyes for other women. “So tell me why we’re here, Aiden. I don’t really understand.”

“Sure.” He nodded and he grabbed his phone. “Hold on, I want to show you something.”

“Okay,” I said and watched him scroll through his phone.

“See this?” He handed me the phone and I looked down at the screen. It was a photo of a pretty girl with big blue eyes, blonde hair and a goofy smile.

“Yeah.”

“This is the love of my life,” he said, his voice light. “Her name is Alice. I feel like I’ve known her all my life and I basically have. She’s my sister’s best friend. I’ve loved her forever and I want to spend my life with her.”

“Okay, wow,” I said and gazed at him. “Why are we here again?”

“See this?” He grinned and scrolled to another photo and showed it to me. The other photo was of another pretty girl. This one had brown hair and brown eyes. I felt my heart pounding as I looked at the photo. Please don’t let him say that this was the other love of his life.

“Yeah?”

“This is my sister, Liv.”

“Oh, that’s Liv,” I said and stared at the photo some more. This was Scott’s sister, the one that he’d wanted me to meet.

“Yeah.” Aiden frowned as he looked at me. “You know her?”

“No, no, sorry, continue.”

“Oh, okay.” He looked at me carefully for a few seconds and then continued. “Liv and Alice are the most fun, beautiful, wonderful women, but they’re both very immature. They play a lot of games, have a lot of fun, and sometimes I don’t know what’s serious to them and what isn’t.” He sighed. “I love my sister and I love Alice. I really want to pursue Alice, but I need to see if she’s ready for a real relationship. And to see if she really cares for me or not.” He made a face. “I know this must seem lame, but I thought that by hiring you to be my pretend girlfriend/mystery girl in my life, I could kind of push Alice’s hand and see where we really stand.”

“That’s a bit risky, isn’t it?” I said with a frown.

“Yes.” He nodded. “But it’s a calculated risk that I’m ready to take.”

“Calculated risk, huh?” I laughed. “Spoken like a true lawyer.”

“Well, you know what they say.”

“What does your family think about it?”

“Liv doesn’t know.” He laughed. “I’ve spoken to my brothers Chett and Scott and they both think it could be a good idea.”

“Oh, really?” I leaned forward. I wanted to ask him about Scott. Where he was? What he was doing? How was he? Had he ever talked about me?

“Yeah, but it’s really my decision,” he said seriously. “I wouldn’t expect anything untoward from you. Just have you show up at a few events to see how Alice reacts, plus maybe you can leave some posts on my Facebook account and stuff like that.”