Fated to My Flash-Married Billionaire novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Wrong Ring
Preston kneels to Lydia at Willa's anniversary dinner; Willa walks out, asks a stranger named Rowan Ashcroft to marry her, and is married by midnight. Preston calls: his father's firm lives on Ashcroft's business.
Preston got down on one knee at our anniversary table, and the ring in his hand was not for me.
He was looking at Lydia.
She had come through the kitchen doors in a cream dress, with her hand already out before the box was open.
Six of our friends stood up from the long table behind us with their phones raised.
Seven years to the day, and I was the only person in the room who hadn't been told.
At four o'clock that afternoon he had texted me to wear the green dress, because it was a big night, and to trust him.
At the door he had held me too long and said, "Whatever happens tonight, remember I love you."
I had thought he meant a ring.
At six Lydia had called to say she couldn't come. She had a migraine. She told me to kiss him for me and said seven years made me a saint.
I had cried a little on the phone, because she was the one person who always understood.
Now she was crying in front of me, and the sound was soft and practiced.
"Lydia," Preston said. "I've been a coward for twenty years. Will you marry me?"
"Preston," I said.
He didn't turn his head.
"Willa, not now," he said. "Please. This is the best moment of my life. Don't make it about you."
"It's our anniversary."
"I know what night it is."
Someone behind me whispered, "Oh my God, she's right there."
Lydia pressed her fingers to her mouth and said yes.
Everyone clapped.
A waiter I had tipped well last year put a glass of champagne into my hand.
Lydia turned and held both my wrists. "Willa, I'm so sorry. I never wanted this to hurt you. You know that."
Her fingers were cold, and her nails were done.
I noticed that, and I did not think about it.
I looked at my friends with their phones up, filming my face for a story I would be tagged in by morning.
I put down the champagne.
So I stepped out.
I walked the length of the restaurant in the green dress, past a hundred strangers, and nobody stopped me.
Not Preston. Not once.
The elevator doors were open at the end of the corridor, and I got in and hit the button for the lobby so hard my finger hurt.
A hand caught the door before it shut.
The man from the corner table stepped in. He had been sitting alone with a glass of water and a phone he never looked at.
He was tall, in a charcoal suit, with dark hair and grey eyes.
He held out my clutch.
"You left this at the table," he said.
"Thank you."
"The people in there are going to say you sat there and took it."
"Let them."
"They have video."
I laughed, and it came out wrong.
"Then I'll give them something better to film," I said.
He looked at me, waiting for the rest.
"Are you married?" I asked.
"No."
"Do you want to be?"
The elevator dropped four floors before he answered.
"My mother has set me up with a woman twice a week for two years," he said. "I'd like it to stop."
"Then marry me tonight."
"You don't know my name."
"I don't care."
"Rowan Ashcroft."
I knew it. It was on the side of the tallest building across the river, in white letters you could read from our kitchen window.
"Willa Fenner," I said.
He didn't smile, and he didn't tell me I was drunk.
"I know a judge in Lincoln Park who owes me a favor," he said. "I have terms."
"Say them."
"Two years, then a quiet divorce. Separate bedrooms. No feelings and no hands. And there won't be an heir. I'm telling you now so that's never a surprise to you."
It was an odd thing to say to a woman you'd met one minute ago.
I was too angry to wonder about it.
"One more from me," I said. "You never lie to me about anything that matters."
"Agreed."
The doors opened on the lobby.
Through the glass front I could see a black car idling at the curb, and a driver already standing beside the open door.
"You were planning to leave," I said.
"I was planning to eat dessert," he said. "I was watching you not cry for forty minutes."
At 11:40 that night, in a house on a quiet street, a judge in a cardigan read us our vows from a card.
His wife held the lamp.
Rowan's ring was a plain gold band he took off his own smallest finger. It was too big, so I wore it on my thumb.
When the judge said we could kiss, Rowan touched my cheek with two fingers instead, and I understood that was the deal.
My phone had been buzzing in my clutch since nine.
In the car it buzzed again, and I answered it.
"Where are you?" Preston said. "Lydia's in tears. You embarrassed her. Come back and apologize."
"I'm married, Preston."
There was a long silence.
"Married to who?"
Rowan leaned across the seat toward the phone. "To me."
I heard Preston swallow.
"Willa," he said. His voice had gone high. "Do you know who that is? My father's whole firm lives on his business. Do you have any idea what you just did to me?"
Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend