Catalina Martin
Catalina Martin, also known as Lina, is her story's first-person narrator and protagonist. She is 28 and moved from Spain to New York to get a job as a middle manager for InTech, an engineering services provider. Everything is going pretty much as planned with one singular exception. Catalina has been lying to everyone about her fantastic American boyfriend.
This hasn’t been a big deal until her sister announced wedding plans. Catalina has just a month to find someone to pass off as her amazing boyfriend before she travels back to Spain for the ceremony not to mention all the expectations of her family who have listened excitedly to all her empty boasts.
The narrative turns on the unexpected twist to her situation that Catalina could never foresee. The book opens with her relaying this information to a friend and co-worker. A male employee with whom Catalina has a prickly working relationship happens to overhear the description of her situation and makes a shocking suggestion for how Catalina can get herself out of this self-induced jam.
Aaron Blackford
Aaron Blackford has incredible blue eyes. Yes, he is also that person with whom Catalina doesn’t get along all that well. Yes, he is the eavesdropper who submits an insane solution to her problem. But most importantly, Aaron has incredible blue eyes.
Of course, those blue eyes probably have little to do with the fact that Aaron is deemed the ultimate prize to win at a bachelor auction to raise money for rescuing animals. The auction eventually gets narrowed to just two bidders. Catalina makes the final bid.
Aaron is more than just a blue-eyed bachelor worth big money for Catalina. Resistant at first, she realizes that his offer to pretend to be her amazing boyfriend is her only option. Since Aaron’s blue eyes are not enough to overcome the personality quirks that have caused him to clash with Catalina, however, just getting to Spain is problematic enough. Once in Spain, he must navigate a foreign country and a rapidly evolving relationship with the somewhat emotionally volatile pretend girlfriend on his arm who can’t stop from commenting on his quite amazing blue eyes.
Gerald
Gerald is the bald, chauvinistic, insecure, and power-hungry superior of Catalina’s. From the beginning of the story he is shown to be abusive to employees in general, women more specifically, and Catalina in particular.
As any good director wanting to maintain his power would do, Gerald demands absolute loyalty from his team. A member of that team happens to chance upon Catalina and Aaron enjoying dinner together and like any good spy would, paints a picture of what was seen in the most suspicious light possible. Gerald takes this information and accuses Catalina of trying to sleep her way up the corporate ladder.
A dramatic confrontation with Aaron over the allegation aligns with Catalina getting nearer to the breaking point of having to deal with the abusive patriarchal leadership of the company. By the end of the story, set a year later, Gerald is out and Aaron is the one with more power.
Daniel
Daniel is the best man at the wedding of Catalina’s sister. Probably because the groom happens to be his brother. Daniel also happens to be Catalina’s ex-boyfriend she left behind in Spain.
Catalina is not looking forward to seeing Daniel since their break-up was not exactly a smooth one. Tension is immediately established between the ex-boyfriend and the pretend boyfriend. Eventually, it is revealed that Catalina did not merely choose to leave Daniel behind when she left for America. He was one of the reasons for that decision.
Daniel finally takes the opportunity the reunion affords to apologize for his behavior which led to the bitter breakup. In doing so, however, he also highlights the personality defects which led to Catalina wanting to put an entire ocean between them. Traces of Gerald pop up in the condescending manner he treats her. Perhaps her brutal emotional evisceration of Daniel is partly directed toward Gerald. Or then again it could just be that Daniel is a total schmuck.
