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He opened the door to his office. Last time they were in here he’d been interviewing her for the nanny job. Again he offered her the chair and he took the stool. It was not a big office and sitting close to Blake was not helping.
Morgan cleared his throat and began. “Well, Fawn’s lawyer has come down a bit from her initial threat of suing for full custody and now wants to negotiate for shared custody. Which is ridiculous, not only because Fawn travels a lot for her work, but mostly because there is no way I will settle for anything except me having full custody of my daughter. The most I will give her are supervised visitation rights.”
“Did you say that in the meeting?”
“Yes. And they said if I would not budge, it could get nasty.”
Blake sat forward. “But with her PR concerns, Fawn has more to lose than you in a court battle.”
“Not really. I could lose Ciara.”
“What? No. That can’t possibly happen.”
Morgan shook his head. “Bad move to go into court thinking anything like that. Yeah, I had figured her history of giving me full custody and never even visiting Ciara would make it an easy win. But my attorney said it depends on the judge and that Fawn has a chance of winning at least shared custody because she has a two-parent household. I’m a single dad with a reputation in the fighting arts, so they will try to paint me as a rough and dangerous guy and a bachelor with no clue about raising a daughter.”
“But you were going to show Fawn is an unfit mother,” Blake said, clearly disturbed by the news.
“Right. Meanwhile, I’m the one who has a record. When I was a teen with no dad, I got into some trouble. The record has been expunged, but who knows what kind of strings her fancy lawyer can pull? So I’m the one who might come out looking worse. I have plenty on Fawn that is damaging. Unfortunately, most of it is not documented. It won’t be as easy to show she is unfit, unless I can prove she is doing drugs again. But she may be totally clean now.”
“Is there any way to—”
“I have a PI checking into her. This thing is costing me a mint. But protecting my daughter—”
“You can cut down my salary.”
His eyes met Blake’s and he realized he was not even surprised she had offered that. She was exactly what Harper and Phil had said about her—as good as gold. “No, I won’t do that. But I do need to ask a favor of you. A big one.”
“Anything. Anything at all.”
Morgan rested his elbows on his thighs, his head down. Then he sat up and looked directly at Blake and spilled it all out at once. “After Fawn’s attorney left, my guy leveled with me about some judges’ preferences around girls having mothers and stable two-parent households, so I told him Ciara would soon have that with me because I was engaged to be married.”
“You’re engaged?” Blake went pale and he couldn’t deny the part of him that hoped it was because she had feelings for him.
“No. I’m not,” he said. “It just came blurting out. I was getting desperate. But now if I tell him it was a lie my credibility goes down. Then he may not believe my statements about Fawn, and some of those are truly hard to believe.”
“I can only imagine, judging from what you have told me about her.”
Morgan went on, his chest tight. “There is more. I said that my fiancée was already living with me and helping me care for Ciara.”
Now Blake went quiet, but Morgan could see her thoughts churning, the confusion in her face. “So…you were thinking of me?”
“Yes.” When she did not speak, he said, “Will you do it, Blake? Pretend to be engaged to me? I’m so sorry to put you in this position, but I—”
“It’s okay. I understand. I know how this is weighing on you.” The sympathy in her doe eyes nearly turned him to butter. “What would it mean on my end?”
“He said they may send a social worker around to check up on us if the case goes forward, but then they damn well better do the same with Fawn. At this point, we are still in the preliminary stages with our attorneys talking. Aside from that, the thing we have to deal with immediately is a party this weekend. It is at a posh estate in the Hamptons. A friend of Trent’s.”
“Trent is your lawyer?”
“Yeah. He invited me, said he wants to introduce me to some people and asked me to bring you. Which tells me he is either skeptical about whether I’m telling the truth on this, or he is trying to be supportive.” He shrugged. “I can’t tell which. When it comes to this subject I get so angry that my usual skill at sensing a situation goes out the window.”
“I’ll do it.”
“You will?”
“Of course,” Blake said, her voice firm, her wide eyes clear and determined. “No way would I want to see Ciara put at the mercy of a woman like Fawn. Not to mention that it is wrong to let a self-serving liar win.”
“Thank you.” Morgan wanted to spring out of his seat and hug her, but he knew it might scare Blake into thinking this fake role meant he was also asking her to oblige him physically.
