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next to her, beer bottle dangling from his fingertips. Neither of them spoke for a while. She was the first to break the silence. “I suppose you’ve come to take your turn to try to talk me out of this.”
    “No, I’m guessing Erika’s done her damnedest to get you to change your mind.” When she glanced at him curiously, he laughed. “What did you think that I didn’t know? I know my wife well—maybe better than she knows herself. I know she started seeing me because she wanted an excuse to hang around Asher. What she didn’t realize was that Ash would forever be off limits to her after that. He has few principles, but those he does have, he sticks by religiously. He’d never intentionally do anything to hurt a friend or a loved one.”
    “Does Asher know?” She thought Erika would die of embarrassment if he did.
    Ted shrugged. “Probably, but that’s the usual state of affairs for Ash. He’s never met a woman who didn’t want him—with the exception of you. Which is ironic because-”
    “Because what?”
    He lifted his beer, realized it wasn’t open, paused to take a moment to twist off the cap and then tipped it back for a big swallow. “Because he asked you to marry him,” he answered but he wouldn’t meet her eyes and she suspected that wasn’t what he’d originally planned to say. “Anyway, Erika is fighting this because she’ll have to forever give up the fantasy of being with Asher one day.”
    “But…it’s not going to be a real marriage. It won’t even be consummated.”
    He arched a thick black brow. “You think you can live with Asher for two years and he won’t try anything? ”
    She was coming to realize that, but she’d deal with that when she had to. “Even so…considering what you know about Erika, why are you against this marriage? I’d think you’d be all for your wife giving up this fantasy.”
    “Like I said, Ash’s no threat to me. Even if I died on the job, I know he’d be there for her, but he’d still view her as mine.” He took another swig of his beer. “What I’m worried about is that one of you will be hurt.”
    “I don’t see that happening.”
    “I do. You’re not the type to view marriage lightly. You two start playing house together and soon everything is going to get all too real.”
    “So you’re worried that I will be hurt? Ted, I’m going into this with my eyes wide open. I’ll be fine.” But he didn’t appear at all mollified. “I promise,” she said. When he looked away, she frowned. “You’re worried about Ash? Good grief, the man will probably bring a date to sign the divorce papers.”
    “You need to talk to Ash. I don’t think the two of you have thought this through fully.”
     

Chapter Four
     
    If she had any ideas about changing her mind, Asher was certain not to give them time to take root. He had her in his car within an hour on the way to the library. Reluctantly, Ted and Erika accompanied them. Pre-nuptial agreement in hand, they found the courthouse.
    It wasn’t even noon when she was pronounced Mrs. Asher Hollister. Asher kissed her gently on the corner of the mouth and drew back with a giant triumphant grin on his face. If she didn’t know better, she would have thought he was happy to be married to her. As big of a player as he’d always been, she would have expected him to react to the situation with horror.
    They left the courthouse and stopp ed at a restaurant for brunch. Erika picked at her eggs and generally pouted throughout the meal. The men began discussing sports—racing, wrestling, or football. She couldn’t tell which as she had long ago trained her brain to tune out these topics. If the guys noticed anything was amiss with Erika, they were ignoring it well. Ariadne wanted to be more sympathetic to her but she was dealing with her own discomfort. She was sitting beside Ash in a rather small booth. Ordinarily the other couple would have made an effort to separate the two of them. They would have