CHAPTER 2: The Ring on My Finger

Something was wrong with my pillow.

It was too soft. Way too soft. My pillow at home was flat and lumpy, the kind you flip over twelve times a night trying to find one comfortable spot. This pillow felt like a cloud. A very expensive cloud.

I groaned and pressed my face deeper into it, trying to ignore the hammer that someone was apparently using on the inside of my skull. My mouth tasted like something had died in it. My body felt like it had been through a washing machine, and the sunlight coming through my eyelids was so bright it burned.

Wait. My bedroom didn't get sunlight in the morning. My window faced a brick wall.

I forced my eyes open and blinked at the ceiling above me. White. Smooth. And... was that a mirror? I was staring at my own reflection, lying in a massive bed, tangled in white sheets, and very clearly not in Brooklyn.

My heart started pounding.

I sat up slowly, holding the sheet to my chest because oh God, I was naked. Completely, one hundred percent naked. I looked around the room and my breath got stuck in my throat. Floor-to-ceiling windows with a view of turquoise water and white sand. Marble floors. A crystal chandelier. Clothes scattered everywhere: a black shirt here, my dress there, shoes tossed in two different directions.

"Okay. Okay, don't panic," I whispered to myself, which is exactly what people say right before they panic.

I swung my legs off the bed and wrapped the sheet around my body like a makeshift dress. That's when I noticed my left hand. I lifted it slowly and stared at the ring sitting on my fourth finger. A diamond. A very large, very real diamond, catching the sunlight and throwing tiny rainbows onto the sheets.

"What the..." I peeled the ring closer to my face. No. No, no, no. This had to be fake. This had to be some kind of party favor or joke or...

My eyes landed on a piece of paper on the nightstand. I picked it up with trembling fingers and unfolded it. The words at the top punched the air right out of my lungs.

Certificate of Marriage.

And below that, two names written in sloppy, barely readable handwriting.

Xander Vincent Williams and Lara Emmanuel.

"Oh my God." The room tilted. I grabbed the edge of the nightstand and sat down hard on the bed. "Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God."

"Good morning."

I screamed. Actually screamed, loud enough to hurt my own head, and spun around. A man was standing in the doorway of what looked like a bathroom, leaning against the frame with a cup of coffee in his hand and a pair of grey boxer shorts hanging low on his hips. His hair was damp and messy, his chest bare and annoyingly perfect, and his green eyes watched me with a mix of amusement and exhaustion.

Vincent.

The events of the night before came back to me in pieces, like a shattered mirror slowly being put back together. The rooftop bar. The dancing. The pizza. The jet. Miami. A chapel on the beach with fairy lights and a man in a white suit reading from a book. Laughing. Kissing. A ring being pushed onto my finger.

"Please tell me this is a joke," I said, holding up the marriage certificate.

He took a sip of his coffee and rubbed his forehead. "I wish I could."

"We got married."

"It appears that way."

"To each other."

"Unless there was someone else in that chapel I don't remember."

"This isn't funny, Vincent!"

He winced. "Could you bring the volume down about three levels? My brain is trying to escape through my ears."

I pressed both hands against my temples and squeezed. This was a nightmare. A full, complete, absolute nightmare. I had gotten on a private jet with a stranger, flown to another state, and married him. Who does that? Who in their right mind does that?

Nobody in their right mind. That was the point.

"How did this happen?" I asked, pacing the length of the enormous bedroom. "How did we go from pizza in Brooklyn to married in Miami?"

Vincent set his coffee down and crossed his arms over his chest, which I was trying very hard not to look at. "I've been trying to piece it together. From what I can remember, and it's not much, you dared me to do something crazy."

"I what?"

"You dared me. On the jet. You said, 'I dare you to do something crazy,' and I said... well, apparently I said yes."

The memory hit me like a punch. I had said that. I remembered saying that. I also remembered the word that came after it, the one that had fallen out of my mouth like it was nothing.

Marry me.

I wanted to crawl into a hole and never come out.

"I need to find my dress," I muttered, looking around the room. "I need my phone. I need to call my friends. They probably think I'm dead."

"Your phone is on the dining table. It died sometime around three in the morning." He walked past me and I caught a whiff of soap and something deeper, something warm that made my stomach tighten even though I was furious. "I had the hotel send up some clothes for you. They're in the bathroom."

I stopped and looked at him. "You ordered me clothes?"

"You can't exactly walk through a hotel lobby in a bedsheet." He glanced at the sheet wrapped around me and his lips twitched. "Although you're making it work."

"Don't."

"Don't what?"

"Don't be charming right now. There is nothing charming about this situation."

He held up both hands in surrender, and that's when I noticed the gold band on his ring finger. So he had one too. We had actually done this. We had stood in front of someone and said vows and exchanged rings and signed a legal document. While drunk out of our minds.

I grabbed the clothes from the bathroom and got dressed as fast as I could. Jeans and a simple white top, both of which fit perfectly, which was both impressive and irritating. When I came out, Vincent was dressed too, in dark jeans and a grey shirt, and he was on his phone speaking in a low voice that sounded all business.

He hung up and looked at me. "I called my lawyer. He's going to start working on an annulment immediately."

"Your lawyer. Of course you have a lawyer on speed dial."

"I also have a pilot, a jet, and apparently a wife. It's been a productive twenty-four hours." The sarcasm was dry enough to start a fire.

I bit the inside of my cheek to stop myself from laughing because I was angry and laughing would ruin that. "How soon can the annulment happen?"

"He's looking into it. A few days, maybe a week. We were both drunk, so there are grounds to dissolve it quickly."

"Good." I grabbed my phone off the dining table and plugged it into a charger he handed me. "Good. That's good. We get the annulment, we go back to our lives, and we never speak of this again."

"Agreed."

We stood there looking at each other in the middle of this ridiculous penthouse that was bigger than my entire apartment building, and the silence was thick enough to swim in. He cleared his throat.

"Our flight back to New York leaves in two hours. I've arranged a car."

"Of course you have." I sighed and pushed my braids out of my face. "Thank you, by the way. For the clothes. And for sorting out the flight. I'll pay you back."

He shook his head. "Don't worry about it."

"I'm serious. I'll pay you back. I don't like owing people."

Something flickered across his face. Interest, maybe, or respect. He nodded once. "Understood."

The flight back was quiet. I sat by the window and stared at the clouds, trying to process the fact that I had a husband. A legal, documented, ring-on-my-finger husband. A man I had known for less than twelve hours. My grandmother would have a heart attack if she found out. Samuel would never let me live it down.

I must have fallen asleep at some point because I woke up with my head on Vincent's shoulder and his jacket draped over me. I sat up fast, embarrassed, and he just smiled a little and looked out the other window. Neither of us mentioned it.

When we landed in New York, a car was already waiting. He gave the driver my address, which I had told him at some point during our wild night, and we rode through the city in silence. When we pulled up outside my building, I stepped out and stood on the sidewalk, unsure of what to say.

Vincent got out too and walked around to face me. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small white card. "Here. My details. My lawyer will have the annulment papers ready in a few days. I'll reach out."

I took the card and looked at it.

Xander Vincent Williams. CEO. Williams Group.

My heart dropped to my feet. I read it again. And again. The name. The company. Williams Group. The same Williams Group I had just been hired at. The same company where I was starting work on Monday morning.

"Xander?" I looked up at him. "Your name is Xander?"

"Vincent is my middle name. I use it when I'm... not at work."

I stared at his face and tried to breathe. "You're the CEO of Williams Group."

He frowned slightly. "Yes. Why?"

My phone buzzed in my pocket. A text from Khloe: WHERE ARE YOU? ARE YOU ALIVE? I SWEAR TO GOD LARA.

I took a step back. "I have to go."

"Lara, are you okay? You look like you've seen a ghost."

"I'm fine. I just... I need to go. Send me the papers. I'll sign them." I shoved the card into my pocket and turned toward my building, my hands shaking, my mind screaming.

I got through the front door, up the stairs, and into my apartment where Khloe and Maya were standing in the hallway with matching looks of fury and relief.

"Where the hell have you been?" Khloe grabbed my shoulders. "We were about to call the police!"

"I was in Miami."

They both blinked.

"Miami," Maya repeated slowly.

"Yes. Miami. I got on a jet, flew to Miami, and married a stranger." I pulled the ring out of my pocket where I had slipped it during the car ride and held it up. The diamond sparkled under the kitchen light.

Silence. Complete, absolute silence. And then Khloe snatched the card from my other hand and read it. Her eyes went wide. She looked at me, then back at the card, then at me again.

"Lara." Her voice was barely a whisper. "Xander Williams. THE Xander Williams?"

"You know who he is?"

"Everyone knows who he is! He's one of the richest men in the country!" Khloe shoved her phone in my face. A photo of Vincent... Xander... stared back at me from a magazine cover. Same green eyes. Same jawline. Same devastating smile.

Maya sat down on the arm of the couch. "Lara, you married a billionaire."

"I know."

"And you didn't even know who he was."

"I know!"

"Well," Khloe said slowly, a grin spreading across her face that I did not trust at all, "at least you have good taste."

"This isn't funny, Khloe. He's not just some random billionaire." I sank onto the couch and buried my face in my hands. "He's the CEO of Williams Group."

"So?"

"So that's where I start working on Monday."

The grin

fell off Khloe's face. Maya's mouth dropped open. The room went so quiet I could hear the clock ticking on the wall.

"My husband," I whispered through my fingers, "is my new boss."