1: America's Golden Boy

Saturdays were reserved for walking Suzanne’s Labrador, and Zoey had memorized the dog’s favourite routes like the back of her hand. First came a stop at Craig’s Confectioneries, where Miss Pebbles insisted on getting a bite of the sweet cakes he usually sold her, sometimes for free. Then came a trip to the park, where Zoey would watch her employer’s overjoyed pet trot around with its tail wagging furiously.

She had spent months searching for side jobs because being a barrister barely earned her enough to cover her meals and electricity bills. Lately, however, her landlord had been complaining about her delayed rent payments and seemed increasingly eager to have her out. He hadn’t explicitly threatened to evict her, but Zoey had a feeling it was only a matter of time.

The walk back to Suzanne’s expensive condo was short. Zoey prepared Miss Pebbles’ food and set it aside for later, then decided her shift was officially over at noon. She unchained her bicycle from the railings and pedalled home. Along the way, she decided to grab a snack and stopped at a coffee shop.

“I’ll have one to go, thank you,” she said with a smile to Jeff, the familiar face behind the counter, as he handed her a cup.

On her way out, she noticed a flyer that someone had slipped into the seat of her bicycle. Bold lettering at the top caught her attention, advertising what appeared to be an unusual job opportunity.

WEDDING CRASHER NEEDED. $10,000 REWARD.

Call *number* for details.

Zoey scoffed as she read the words under her breath.

“Ten grand to call off your own wedding. How bad could it be?” she mused, then laughed at the absurdity of it all.

She gave the flyer another look. Maybe it was a prank or one of those ridiculous stunts people pulled for YouTube clicks. There was no way anyone would pay that much money for something so bizarre.

It had to be fake.

Right?

“Right,” she muttered, shoving the paper into the back pocket of her jeans before riding off.

“Zach and I spoke not so long ago,” Zoey heard her mother say over the phone as she climbed the stairs to the third floor of her apartment building. “I heard he got a new car.”

“Yeah, well, he’s Zach, and he’s doing pretty great,” Zoey replied, already anticipating the inevitable turn the conversation would take. Her mother had always believed comparing her to other people was a perfectly healthy way to motivate her.

“And how are you doing, sweetheart? Still juggling part-time jobs as a janitor?”

“I’m not a janitor!” Zoey protested, getting a little defensive before remembering that Patricia Mendez was clueless in a harmless kind of way. “I’m not even a cleaner, Mom.”

“Oh? What is it that you do again?”

“I’m a barrister, and I pet-sit on the side.”

“Tomato, tomahto, honey. You need to settle down. You haven’t even had a boyfriend in ages—”

Zoey tuned out her mother’s increasingly shrill voice, struggling to keep her temper in check as she approached her apartment. That was when she noticed an envelope lying on the floor outside her door.

Frowning, she crouched to pick it up and tore it open.

THIRTY-DAY EVICTION NOTICE.

The words at the top of the letter seemed to blur for a moment as her heart sank. She had known this was coming, but she hadn’t expected it to happen so soon.

“Zoey? Are you there?”

“Yeah, Mom. I’ll call you back.”

She ended the call without waiting for a response, her gaze fixed on the letter in her hands. Thirty days. That was all the time she had to figure out where she was going to live, and she doubted pet-sitting would earn her the money she needed to clear her three-thousand-dollar debt.

She remembered the flyer and brought it out of her pocket. She placed it in front of her phone’s camera and immediately took a picture of the job description. Then she hit send, and within seconds, Zach was on the other end of her message.

“Do it!!!” was Zach’s response, and before she could think about it, he sent another message. “Wait, I want in.”

The truth was, Zoey didn’t know what she was getting herself into or who the people behind it were. But if it was real, then it was undeniably God-sent.

She looked at the number at the bottom of the flyer for a moment, hesitating because she didn’t know if playing the devil’s role meant it was against God’s plan.

She dialled anyway. The phone rang for a long time, as if the person on the other end hesitated just as she did. Then someone picked up, and there was a pause.

Zoey heard the person breathe before answering. “Hello.”

It was a man. His voice sounded gruff and a little younger than thirty.

“H-hi,” she stuttered out a greeting. “My name is Zoey Mendez. I saw an ad for a job…” She let out an awkward laugh. “For a wedding crasher. I was wondering if this is legit.”

She paused to give him room to answer, but none came, and she wondered if anyone was still on the phone.

“Hello?”

“I’ll send you an address. Meet me there tonight.”

The phone went dead.

Zoey spent the next few hours debating whether what she needed to wear was a dinner gown or the worn blue sweatshirt her mother had given her last Christmas.

“He could be a morally grey CEO, like a character in one of those spicy dark romance novels,” she told Zach on FaceTime as she showed him her only dinner gown. It was a black silk gown that she had saved for special occasions, and she suddenly remembered that she had never really been to any.

“You mean like Christian Grey in Fifty Shades of Grey?” Zach laughed at her. “He was hot, actually. But what if this guy’s a serial killer?”

Zoey threw the gown aside and brought out a simple brown hoodie to match the jeans she was already wearing. “Then I’m sure this will be the perfect outfit to get daggered in,” Zoey said sarcastically.

Then her phone buzzed, and she saw the message.

THE OBSIDIAN. YOU HAVE THIRTY MINUTES.

“Guess there won’t be a need for dress selections,” she told Zach.

The Obsidian was a renowned restaurant that Zoey knew a lot of rich folks frequented. But it was private, secretive even, as she realised when the server ushered her into an underground private dining area. She felt out of place the minute she walked in. There wasn’t a thing about the place that reminded her of the ordinary bourgeoisie, especially not in her brown hoodie.

She was ushered to a table by the window.

“Are you expecting anyone?” the waiter asked.

“Yeah, they should be here in a minute.” She subconsciously checked the wall clock behind him. She was ten minutes early, which gave her enough time to feel small and unwelcome.

“Would you like to get anything in the meantime?”

She scanned the environment. Women wore diamond earrings or engagement rings, while men had wristwatches and footwear worth millions. Water would cost her rent here.

“No, I’ll just wait, thank you.”

She smiled and watched the slender waiter retreat. She brought out her phone and texted the same number she had called earlier.

I’m here.

She waited until ten minutes had passed and wondered who would give a time they couldn’t meet themselves. Then twenty minutes passed, and she had already decided she was right all along.

Everything was a prank. Nothing but horrible clickbait she had fallen for. She wondered if there was a hidden camera silently capturing every embarrassing moment of her desperation.

Fifteen more minutes passed, and she was done waiting. She stood up to leave but halted in place the minute she saw a figure walk in. All heads turned the instant he entered the private dining area, and it was only right that they did. Zoey swore she knew that man. She had seen him countless times on TV, on billboards, and across her social media feeds.

Jordan Fischer was the man every woman had dreamed of since childhood. He was the lead singer of one of the most famous bands and America’s absolute gem. Her knees buckled at the sight of him, and she debated rushing over to him for an autograph.

Unconsciously, she dug her nails deep into the satin cloth covering the dinner table as she watched him. Then she gasped aloud when she realised he was actually walking towards her.

He was four feet away, then three feet, and finally two feet away when she finally realised he was the man she was supposed to meet.

“YOU’RE JORDAN FISCHER?!”