Mix 'N Match (No Match for Love) (25 page)

Zoey stood and stared at herself in the three-sided mirror. Madame Rousseau brought over a pair of red high heels. Zoey slipped them on, immediately feeling her spine straighten and shoulders pull back. She looked at herself in the mirror and imagined walking toward Mitch and holding his hands as she promised to love him forever.

In this dress, she felt completely, totally herself.

“It’s beautiful,” Zoey murmured.

“You like?” Madame Rousseau asked.

Zoey nodded.

“You buy?”

Again, Zoey nodded, blinking back the tears in her eyes. She could no sooner leave without this dress than cut off her own arm. “Absolutely.”

Madame Rousseau smiled, grasping Zoey’s chin and kissing her cheek. She pointed to the veil. “For you. No money.”

“Thank you,” Zoey whispered, touched. But she also felt dishonest. What would Madame Rousseau say if she knew the wedding was all for show?

Zoey paid for the dress and shoes, thanked Madame Rousseau again for the veil, and left. What would Mitch think of the dress? Would he love how it showcased her individuality and style, or would he be embarrassed that she wasn’t wearing something more traditional?

It didn’t matter. That dress made her feel amazing. It gave her confidence in the person she was, and she wouldn’t lose that person for anyone. Not even Mitch.

Phillipe waited at the curb. Mitch got out of the car and helped Zoey lay the dress bag and boxes with the shoes and veil in the trunk.

“Did you find what you were looking for?” Mitch asked.

“I think so.” Zoey got in the car, avoiding Mitch’s gaze.

“I did, too.” Mitch shut the door. “To Luke’s, Phillipe.”

Phillipe nodded and pulled into traffic.

“I haven’t seen Alan today,” Zoey said. “Maybe the wedding won’t be necessary.”

“I saw him as I was leaving the tuxedo shop. He saluted at me.”

Zoey snorted. “Are you serious?”

“I know.”

“He has some serious guts.”

“Yeah, well, those guts will earn him fifty thousand dollars if we aren’t careful.”

“This plan is going to work.”

He reached out, placing a hand over hers. “I hope so.”

Zoey withdrew her hand and folded her arms as her stomach trembled. Traitor. The fake wedding was making her all girly and romantic and confused. But Mitch couldn’t handle her in real life.

Mitch cleared his throat. “I talked to Jasmine. She’s coming to Paris next month.”

All thoughts of the wedding fled. “Really?”

“Yes. She’s impressed them so much that they’re taking her to fashion week.”

Zoey laughed, clapping her hands. “That’s great. I always knew she could do it.”

“I was worried, but she’s proved that I was concerned for nothing. I’m really proud of her.”

“Man, I wish we were still going to be here. I’d love to go shopping with her on the
Champs Élysées
. She has such great taste.” Jasmine would make a great sister-in-law. Brooke was the closest thing Zoey had to a sister, and shopping wasn’t her thing.

No. She couldn’t think of Jasmine like that. This wedding was fake. Absolutely positively one hundred percent fake.

“Zoey . . .” Mitch cleared his throat. “When all this is over, I want to talk.”

“No.”

“Zoey—”

“When we get back, I’m quitting Toujour and doing makeup full-time.” The words were out of her mouth before she even realized what she was saying. But wearing that wedding dress had helped her realize she needed to leave behind the career that stifled her.

Mitch’s eyes were wide. “Are you sure?”

Her heart thudded in her chest, but Zoey pressed on. He had to know that this is who she was—the kind of person that made reckless career decisions at the drop of a hat.

But it wasn’t reckless, at least not to her. It was right, and she’d been thinking about it for months.

“Yes. I might have to get a few roommates or move to a different apartment, because things will be tight for a while.”

“I’m sure Brooke would let you drop to part-time at Toujour, if you’re worried about money. It’d give you a steady paycheck until things were off the ground.”

Zoey took a deep breath. “No. I want to do it full-time.”

Mitch’s lips pressed into a tight line. “When will you tell Brooke?”

Zoey’s chest tightened as she thought about how that conversation would go. But it was long overdue. She couldn’t keep pretending to be something she wasn’t, even if it disappointed her best friend. “As soon as she gets back from her honeymoon.”

Zoey could see the questions swirling in Mitch’s mind. She knew what he was going to ask—
What will you do for insurance? What about a 401(k)? What happens when the clients dry up? How can you possibly think this is a responsible financial decision?

“Okay.”

“Okay?” Zoey let out a snort. “Aren’t you going to point out all the ways this could blow up in my face?”

“No.”

“No?”

Mitch sighed, rubbing a hand over his curls. “It’s who you are, and while I know that making that kind of choice would stress
me
out, it’s exactly what
you
need to thrive. We’re different, Zoey. But that’s kind of the beauty of us.”

“There is no
us
.”

“There could be.”

Zoey didn’t have a comeback for that, so she folded her arms and didn’t say a word.

“The security firm should be here any moment to go over the apartment,” Mitch said. He propped the door open for Zoey with his foot since his arms were full. One held two boxes—shoes and a veil, according to Zoey—while the other held the garment bag with his tux. The tuxedo he was going to get fake married in. He shook his head, trying to calm his nerves.

Zoey brushed past him, the dress bag held high above her head. Her eyes were fiery with challenge. “I still think this is unnecessary. He didn’t place a bug in my stuff.”

And the Earth also wasn’t round. It was the only explanation that made any sort of sense, but Mitch understood why Zoey didn’t want to believe it. She had been naive, but she hadn’t purposefully tried to hurt Brooke or Luke.

“I know,” Mitch lied.

“And there’s no way he got in this apartment to place a bug. The doorman barely lets us inside without ten forms of picture ID and an oath sworn on a Bible. Besides, if Alan had been listening to our conversations, he wouldn’t need to track us because he’d have all the information he needed.”

“A tracking device wouldn’t let him listen to our conversations.” Mitch let the door swing closed. He wasn’t worried that the apartment was bugged, but allowing the security firm to sweep the entire apartment would hopefully help Zoey feel less singled out.

He dropped the boxes off in Zoey’s room, then hung the tuxedo up in his own. He pulled it out of the bag so it could breathe, running a hand along the rich fabric to smooth out a wrinkle.

The dress bag Zoey had held was surprisingly slim, the box for her veil much smaller than expected, and his mind spun with the possibilities. What kind of a wedding dress would Zoey pick? She had looked amazing in Brooke’s long, lacy dress, but he couldn’t imagine her choosing something like that for herself. But maybe Zoey hadn’t put much thought into the purchase, since the wedding was all for show.

A lump rose in Mitch’s throat, and he tried to swallow it back.

He didn’t want it to be all for show. He wanted Zoey.

A knock at the front door pulled him from his thoughts. Mitch dropped his hand from the tux and strode into the front room and opened the door. A man with a black goatee and a woman with a ponytail stood there, both carrying duffel bags and wearing matching jackets with the security firm’s logo.

“
Bonjour
,” the woman said. She was young, perhaps twenty-five, with her hair threaded through a baseball cap. “Are you
Monsieur
Harris?”

“Yes,” Mitch said.

“I am Adelaide, and this is Ricard. We’re from the security firm.”

“Thank you so much for coming,” Mitch said. “Please, come in.”

“
Merci
,” she said.

“You want us to check for electronic tracking devices,
oui
?” Ricard said.

“Yes,” Mitch said. “The whole apartment, please. We have a pesky reporter that’s been following us, and we think that might be how.”

Zoey’s bedroom door opened, and she leaned against the frame, a frown on her lips. Mitch scratched the back of his neck, feeling suddenly uncomfortable.

“Where would you like us to start?” Adelaide asked.

“My room,” Zoey said, staring straight at Mitch. “You won’t find anything, so it shouldn’t take long.”

Maybe Mitch was wrong, and Alan wasn’t tracking them through Zoey. Her eyes accused him of not trusting her, and guilt made his stomach churn.

“Okay,” Adelaide said.

Adelaide and Ricard set their duffel bags down right outside Zoey’s door and unzipped them. Ricard withdrew a long rod with a flat circle on the end, and Adelaide pulled out a hand-held device that looked like a two-way radio.

Zoey motioned to her room with a flourish. “After you.”

They nodded and stepped inside. Ricard immediately began sweeping the disk all over the walls, a steady
beep beep beep
emanating from the equipment. Adelaide ran the hand-held device over Zoey’s bed. Adelaide nudged the closet open, then motioned to Zoey’s suitcase. “May I?”

“Be my guest,” Zoey said.

Mitch watched, hands buried in his pockets. The devices continued to beep, low and steady.

“The closet is clear,” Adelaide said.

“Excellent.” Zoey grabbed her purse off the small bedside table and turned it upside down, dumping the contents on her bed. “Scan that, too. If something is going to be bugged, it’ll be whatever’s in there. That’s everything from the charity gala that I brought to France.”

Adelaide nodded, sweeping the contents. Mitch rolled forward on the balls of his feet, holding his breath. The wand swept over a lipstick tube, compact mirror, and zebra-print wallet.

Behind Mitch, the
beep beep beep
grew louder and faster.

“I may have found something,” Ricard said.

Mitch whipped around. The wand swept back and forth across the floor right in front of Mitch.

“What is it?” Mitch asked.

“It seems to be on your shoe,” Ricard said.

“
What?
” The word exploded out of Mitch, and he looked at Ricard incredulously.

Adelaide quickly walked over to Ricard. “Yes, it sounds like you have something.”

Zoey crawled over the bed and stood next to Mitch. “No way. He was around Alan for less than a minute.”

“May I see your shoes please, sir?” Ricard asked.

Mitch slowly sank onto the bed.

This couldn’t be happening.

Mitch removed his shoes, and Adelaide swept her hand-held device over each one. The beeping grew fast and loud. She set down the device and picked up one shoe, then nodded at Ricard. “Good work.”

“Where is it?” Mitch yanked the shoe out of Adelaide’s hand and held it up to the light. He turned the shoe this way and that, but nothing appeared out of place.

Zoey ran a hand through her hair, causing the newly lilac highlights to fall into her face. “Alan isn’t James Bond,” she said.

“I don’t see anything.” Mitch turned the shoe around again, more slowly this time. The light hit the shoe, creating a shadow over the outside arch, right above the sole.

Not a shadow. A sticker. Mitch peered closer. It was no larger than a quarter, and nearly flush with the leather.

Zoey gasped. Heart thundering in his chest, Mitch slid his finger under the object. The material was firm, and the adhesive clung stubbornly to the leather. Mitch forced the edge up with his fingernail and started tugging. His grip slipped, and he grabbed the sticker again, pulling harder. Slowly it peeled away, leaving a sticky residue on his shoe.