“Emma?” Katie prompted.

Emma picked up her fork and stabbed into the shrimp salad. “We’ll need to talk to Legal.”

Katie’s blue eyes dimmed in the lamplight. “To declare bankruptcy.”

Emma drew a bracing breath. No. They weren’t declaring bankruptcy. Not when they had a slightly more palatable choice.

They were going to throw their lot in with Alex Garrison. If they didn’t, they’d be out on the street, and he’d be undermining their father’s life’s work by this time tomorrow.

At least with Alex there was a chance. If they had a few good years, maybe they could buy him out.

And it wasn’t like Emma had a boyfriend waiting anywhere in the wings. Nor was she likely to have one in the foreseeable future. Plain-looking, plainspoken hotel executives who traveled half the year weren’t exactly hot prospects on dating dot com.

Truth was, a marriage on paper wouldn’t be that big of an inconvenience for her. A justice of the peace, a couple of publicity snapshots, and they’d barely have to see each other again.

She looked Katie straight in the eyes, not giving herself time to rethink the decision. “We have to talk to Legal so we can make sure Alex can’t do something crazy with our inns.”

Katie’s eyes went wide. “You’re going to do it?”

Emma dropped her fork and drained her glass. “I’m going to do it.”

Two

Mrs. Nash had been calling Alex Alex his entire life. But since he’d moved out of his penthouse and back into the family’s Long Island mansion six months ago-another of Ryan’s brilliant plans to improve his image-she’d taken to calling him Mr. Garrison. Every time she did it, Alex glanced around for his father.

The old man might have been dead for three years, but he still had the power to make Alex jump. It was bad enough that Alex had taken over his father’s study, he didn’t need to take on his name as well.