I didn’t have to think about that question. My answer to it was the very reason I was sitting across from him. “I would,” I said, leaning across the table as he was. “I’d even marry a stranger.”
It was strange, sitting across from the woman I was going to marry. It was strange to know I’d be spending the next few years with this person I knew very little about.
Nina was both the perfect candidate for this, and the worst. Perfect in that she was easy to be around, didn’t act intimidated by me, and embodied commitment and dedication in an age where both were in scant supply. She was the worst candidate for this because, try as I may, I felt some level of attraction toward her.
Attraction wasn’t a new concept for me—desire I was on a first-name basis with—but this, it was different. I’d never felt it before, so I didn’t have a name for it, nothing to compare it to, and no way of knowing where it would lead.
I’d hoped for an eventual friendship with the woman I married, one that stemmed from mutual respect and dedication to the plan. I could see all of that in Nina. It was what I saw in addition to that that scared me.
The one woman in the world who was off-limits to me in that way was her, the woman I was counting on becoming my wife. I couldn’t let emotions and feelings and all of those other things that drove people apart endanger our arrangement. Nina was, for all intents and purpose, off-limits.
We were marrying each other—that was the plan. Desire, attraction, and love were not part of that plan.
Across the table, Nina was watching me, waiting. The light flickering from the candle was illuminating her, making her green eyes glow and her hair look like it was on fire. She knew I was staring at her. Where others would have diverted their gaze moments ago, she just kept staring right back.
“Since you know my life story, tell me a little about yourself,” I asked, letting my gaze shift first. Hers stayed on me though, still unyielding. I could feel it.
“It’s all in the folder I just gave you,” she answered.
“The folder I haven’t had a chance to open yet? Humor me.”
She leaned into the table. “I’m marrying you for money. How much more humor do you need?”
God, I was smiling again. I wasn’t a smiley person, but I couldn’t seem to control myself around this girl. “What are your hobbies? Interests? What do you do for a living? Nothing too personal, see?” I waved between her and me. “Conversation. You talk, I listen. I talk, you listen. It’s nice.”
She sighed, fighting a smile of her own. “I like taking pictures. It’s more of a hobby than a career, but who knows? Maybe one day I’ll actually sell a picture and make enough money to splurge on a bottle instead of a box of wine.”
She was making a joke. I liked how I could already tell that about her. The odd sense of humor. The straight face she kept when she delivered it.
“Speaking of wine . . .” I made eye contact with our waiter and lifted my hand. When he came over, I almost wanted to order a hamburger for myself just to see the look on his face from before when Nina had ordered hers. Priceless. “Willfully Independent? Please order the wine for us.”
When I motioned at her and waited, she almost looked stunned. I’d taken her by surprise.
“I’ll have some . . . white wine,” she ordered, rolling her shoulders back and putting on a face like she knew exactly what she was saying. Which she didn’t.
“What kind of white wine, ma’am?” the server asked, glancing at me like he was waiting for me to jump in.
I lifted my hands in response.
Nina cleared her throat and sat up straighter. God, it was like the more unsure she became on the inside, the more assured she tried to look on the outside. “The kind that’s . . . good.”
I had to fake a cough to keep from laughing.
Nina shot a glare in my direction. She probably knew exactly what I was disguising. The waiter looked even more perplexed than he had over the hamburger order, so to help everyone out, I handed her the leather-bound menu listing the bottles of wine. Nina scanned it for a few seconds before stabbing her finger at one.
I didn’t recognize the name of it, but I did notice it was the cheapest bottle on the menu. I wondered if that was why she’d ordered it or if it was sheer coincidence. Most of the women I’d taken to dinner picked the most expensive bottle listed because they could and I’d pay for it.
I didn’t know what to think of Nina—the woman I was going to marry—ordering the cheapest bottle on the menu. Had she done it for my bank account’s benefit or because she just couldn’t comprehend spending anything more than fifty dollars for a bottle of wine?
I didn’t know, and I found myself wanting to ask. I found myself wanting to ask her everything I couldn’t seem to make fit because people I could read. Most people. Their motives were easy. Their choices predictable. But hers . . . not at all.
Of course the woman I would marry was the only soul I’d never been able to get a read on right from the start.
The waiter was long gone and she was still scanning the wine menu. Her eyes got wider the farther down the list she went.
“You’re a photographer?” I asked, stealing another moment to admire her when she wasn’t looking.
“Photographer is putting it generously. I’m more a hobbyist with a camera.” She closed the menu and scooted it to the edge of the table.
“But you’ve got some photographs on display?’
When her eyes lifted to mine, she caught me staring. Again. Instead of the glare I was used to, her eyes shifted away like she was uncomfortable. Was I making her so? The way I was looking at her?
“I’ve got a few photographs on display.” She searched the room like she was looking for something, but I thought that might have something to do with the way she’d just caught me looking at her.
“In what galleries?” I leaned back in my seat and tamed my stare.
“None you’ve ever heard of, I’m sure.”
Actually, I probably wouldn’t have heard of any of the galleries in the city. I wasn’t the kind of guy who paid exorbitant amounts of money for a painting that looked like someone had taken their compost pile and slimed it all around a giant piece of canvas. I didn’t buy things for the sake of owning them. I didn’t buy things for the sake of impressing people.