Cael had gone to the restaurant they had agreed to meet beforehand to wait for her. If a shrink and told him that he would be resorting to a loveless arranged marriage he would have called the shrink a fake and even found a way to put him behind bars but now that it was happening to him he could not believe it still.
He knew what Frances looked like, unlike Ophelia who his brother was getting married to Frances had always been the model child every chaebol would want to have. She stayed out of the news and wore only designer clothes. Whenever her family came up in the media her and her sister Estelle’s names were missing from there.
They had so much money but lived such quiet lives that one tends to forget about them from time to time. Estelle had gotten married to an oil tycoon from the eastern world. Some speculated that she was the third wife to the rich man but her personal life was never plastered on the media.
Frances entered the restaurant and her eyes darted everywhere. Cael watched her as she looked from table to table trying to carefully study everyone on it. He could not deny that she was pretty, she was at least part of the population of gorgeous people in their society so that was not part of his worries any longer. She just had to be a tad bit normal and he was okay with that.
He saw a waiter walk up to her and ask her a few questions before directing her to the table where he had been waiting for her.
“Oh you are here already” she said drawing out the chair herself and draping her coat on the bag before settling down into her chair and dropping her bag to the ground. “I am not late or am I?” she asked checking her watch.
“I was just early, finished work early and decided to come here first,” Cael said.
“Oh okay” Frances said biting the bottom part of her lip. He wondered if she was nervous.
“Are you nervous?”
“Of course not,” she said. Her voice was a bit angelic and he admitted to himself that he liked it. “Why do you ask?” she added blinking rapidly.
“You were biting down the corner of your lips just now and now again you are blinking rapidly it is scary,” he said.
She laughed and pushed herself into the chair so that she was leaning in. “Nervous? I was trying to bite down my words so I do not say them”
Cael looked taken aback by her words, her voice was still melodious but her words did not match the tone at which she spoke. “After all my mom asked me not to ruin another date” she murmured but made it loud enough for him to hear.
“Another date?” he asked confused.
“Oh yes, it is my mom’s hobby to send me on at least three dates a month, however, this time she is certain that you would be the one I end up with. Do you think so as well?” Frances leaned in to ask him.
He did not know how to respond seeing that he had prepared to meet a soft-spoken timid girl but she was exactly the opposite of what he thought she was.
“Should we order?” he asked trying to avoid the situation entirely.
She took it as he cue to let it be and not bring it up, all she had to do was get through a moment with him and that would be all. She felt an ick when the waiter came and he dominated the order without asking her what she would like to eat. She was going to call him but held herself.
“So our mothers brought us together,” Cael said. He did not know how to continue the conversation with her.
“Well your mom told mine that you wanted this”
“Who told you talk?” he asked nervous that the guise of arranged marriage he was trying to hide under would be blown.
“I was with my mom when she met yours” Frances said sticking the fork into her mouth and biting on it to reveal a smile.
“Oh then I guess you know the reason is for us to get married” Cael said.
“To get married?”
“Yeah, we are not kids anymore, I guess we are at the time of our lives where we can talk about those things now”
“I can’t get married to you. I do not even know why we are having this conversation right now”
“Don’t act like you are clueless”
“I mean when I arrived at the restaurant, I saw you at a glance but I pretended to be clueless so you have a chance to come pick me up but you sat there staring at me until a waiter helped me out. I stood for a minute before I sat down hoping you would act like a gentleman and pull out the chair for me but you decided not to do but sit and watch me pull out my own chair. You dominated the entire order and did not allow me to have a say in what I would eat and now you are suggesting marriage?”
“Does any of that matter? It is an arranged marriage”
“Oh, you should at least act like you want to put in some kind of effort” She took up her wine glass and swirled the content inside. “You chose a great wine so I am not that angry at you”
“What?”
“Just be honest, you are suddenly trying to get married because of your brother right?” Cael stared at her. She was so soft-spoken, looked timid and even acted that way but her words were not aligning at all.
“Oh please don’t act like I am lying, you have always been off the dating market and you suddenly appear on it now that your brother is getting married”
“Yes I want to get married, watching my brother’s love life makes me want to get married as well” He lied.
“So why an arranged marriage”
“Because I have tried and gotten unlucky so many times in the dating field” he responded. That was not a lie, so many girls had only approached with the hopes of getting rich or getting closer to Cade through him.
“And you think an arranged marriage would be the answer to that?”
“Yes, maybe I can fall in love in the process”
“What if we get to meet each other after this and see how that goes?” Frances suggested.
Cael looked up at her and she smiled. “I guess we started on the wrong foot, this is your chance to rectify it”
“Are you sure?”
“Of course, let us go out on a normal date like normal people”
Frances did not know why but she felt like she needed to at first push him off her but after hearing how pitiful he sounded she felt her heart tug for him. ‘A few dates would not hurt anyone’ she said in her mind as she stared at him fondly.
“Okay then”