Chapter 3

C H A P T E R 3

It was a cold morning. Looking outside, the snow had started to pile up quite high. Daniel Westminster breathed out cigarette smoke by the french windows. He looked down at his phone again to examine the pictures Sarah had sent him.

There was a photo of a handsome young man. Daniel had always thought the man looked cute. He had lovely peach blossom eyes, and a flirtatious smile played on his lips. 

He felt familiar. Sarah had said that they went to the same university, so he must have seen him around before.

A soft knock interrupted his thoughts and broke him out of his reverie. He turned to see a maid wearing a neat and simple uniform standing by the door.

"Sir, Miss Victoria has arrived. She is waiting for you on the terrace."

'In this weather?' But Daniel nodded anyway. Victoria loved watching the flowers. "Thank you, Margaret." The maid bowed and left without another word. 

Daniel disposed of his cigarette in an ashtray and tucked his phone into his pants pocket. He lingered only for a moment, standing by the open windows, letting the cold air wash the smell of cigarette smoke off him. Then he started heading downstairs and walking to the terrace. The terrace of the villa overlooked a large garden full of flowers. It was also equipped with a lovely sitting area with glass tables, flower vases, and white chairs. Victoria had been the one who helped him choose the plants and decoration, as he was completely clueless about interior design and simply let her do as she pleased. 

The woman was already waiting for him there. Her lovely face, soft blonde hair, and white dress made her look gentle and soft as she sipped on her cup of tea, watching the roses, but Daniel knew better. Her attire didn't seem that equipped to deal with the cold weather, and he briefly wondered if she was cold, but discarded his worry quickly. He calmly approached and sat across from her.

As soon as he sat down, Victoria slammed down her cup of tea with shaking hands.

"You have a boyfriend?" Her voice was icier than the weather. It was like the temperature had dropped down several degrees. She glared at him from under her wide brimmed hat. 

"It is as I told you in the text," Daniel replied.

"Is this a joke? Do not try to lie to me, Daniel. I am not stupid."

"It is not a joke. I am introducing him to my mother next weekend. I thought you should know first."

Victoria laughed. Her laugh was forced and stilted. "You suddenly have a boyfriend out of nowhere, and now you want to introduce him to your parents? Do you really think I'm stupid?" 

"We have been dating for a while. I did not tell anyone because I knew you would react like this." Daniel answered steadily.

"React like what?"

Hysterically. Violently. There were many choices of words for what Victoria might have become if she had met Nathan without a warning first. None of those word choices were appropriate for him to answer her with if he still wanted to live.

"I do not want you to be rude to him when you see him." He said simply.

Victoria stared back at him, her expression was flabbergasted. "You do not have to lie to your mother and bring back some random guy just because you want to insist that you're gay!"

"His name is Nathan." Daniel cut her off. "I love him. And I am not lying to you nor my mother. I will introduce him to my family, and I would appreciate it very much if you would be polite to him when you finally met."

"You are lying!" She yelled, in tears. Seeing Daniel didn't react at all, she gritted her teeth. "Just tell me you don't like me, don't use this stupid excuse! How long are you going to keep up with this charade?!"

"I have explained very clearly to you that I'm not interested in you romantically. That does not have anything to do with my sexuality." He frowned. "It does not matter if you don't believe me. Just do not act like this when you see him. I don't expect you to get along with him, but do not disrespect him. Please."

He seemed to have convinced her, or at least rendered her speechless, as she merely glared at him. For a moment, he thought she would suddenly reach across the table and strangle him, or worse, gnaw off his finger so she could use the fingerprint to unlock his phone, then expose the secret plan that would surely kill both of him and Sarah sometime in the future.

Instead, she stood up abruptly, grabbed her teacup off the table, and threw it to the ground. The porcelain shattered loudly and broke into pieces. "I hate you!" She screamed at his face childishly. With one last hateful glare, she grabbed her purse and strode away.

A few moments later, he heard the sound of her Bentley angrily driving away.

He exhaled. 

It could have been worse, she could have thrown that cup to his face instead of the floor. Though Daniel knew she probably threw it imagining it was him. A maid came to clean it up. Daniel continued to sit on the terrace for a while, drinking his tea. He watched the roses, which still bloomed beautifully despite the winter.

Victoria would not give up that easily. Even if he managed to convince her, she would very likely try to create trouble for him next week. He only hoped it would not involve his parents, and he would be able to deal with it without his parents finding out.

When it started to get too cold, he went back inside.

In the evening, Daniel received a call from Sarah.

"Nathan has agreed," Sarah spoke without preamble. "I have briefly explained the basics to him, but you should be the one who tells him all the details. I will give you his number."

His phone beeped as he received her text. He stared at the line of numbers.

"Alright, don't forget to send his contract to me."

"Sure. I have also set him up as a freelance designer at Dreamsoft. I did not expect it to be so easy to convince him."

Daniel nodded. They had planned to give Nathan an easy position at the game development company in case the money alone wasn't enough to convince him. Besides, by letting Nathan work at the company Sarah's grandfather owned, it would be easy to assure that Nathan would always be available whenever Daniel needed him. This was part of Daniel's consideration for his fake boyfriend; they could not possibly ask Nathan to stop job hunting or spend nearly a year being unemployed. Daniel had a long term plan for this fake relationship to convince his entire family.

They spoke for a while longer about Nathan and the contract before Sarah could not hold her curiosity anymore. She sounded a bit hesitant before she asked, "How are things on your side?"

"You mean Victoria? She did not take it well."

Daniel could almost see her rolling her eyes on the other side. "Yeah, no surprise there. Are you sure she would not try to poison your boyfriend when you bring him to meet your mother next week?"

"She would not go that far," Daniel said. Victoria had always been one who prefers a more direct approach. He sincerely doubted she would go as far as to plan a discreet murder. She was more likely to stab Nathan to death in a brief, hot headed fit of hysteria.

Sarah laughed. "Remember when she thought you were dating that girl from your economics class?"

Daniel winced. That whole ordeal had been so mortifying that he still felt guilty towards his old classmate. Victoria had stalked the poor girl for weeks before she was finally convinced that they were not dating. "Do not use that crap against her. She was going through things at that time and I had not really been there as her best friend."

Sarah scoffed. "You always make excuses for her."

"She is still my best friend. She helped me a lot when I was having difficulties, but I was so busy that year that I didn't notice the problems she was going through." Daniel sighed.

"Isn't that why she now thinks you owe her your hand in marriage?"

"I am hanging up the phone."

"Wait! Daniel!" Sarah cackled. "I am sorry! Alright, I will not bring it up again." She huffed.

He could feel that Sarah wanted to ask for more details, but she was too prideful to show that she cared about Victoria.

In the end, after a brief chit-chat about nothing, she merely warned him. "Put her on a leash. I am not bringing Nathan home back to his mom in a body bag. Alright, I gotta go now. Talk to you later."

Daniel remained silent for a moment. "Thank you, Sarah."

"Do not mention it." She said good naturedly. "Bye bye."

She hung up the call.

He looked at the number she sent him before. He should probably give it a call. He thought over what would be the appropriate thing to say to the person you were paying to be your fake boyfriend so you could convince your entire family that you're gay.

He was never one to postpone awkward conversations. But he still felt oddly nervous about the whole thing. He looked at the time showing it was 9.42 pm. It was already late, maybe he should just call him the next day.

Sarah had just spoken to Nathan that morning anyway, maybe Daniel should give him some time, or it would look like they were pressuring him.

He did not expect to find, by the next morning, that Nathan would have texted him first.