My Fiancé Took Her on Vacation Instead of Marrying Me? I Married WAY Better novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: Leave Denied
In front of the whole team Bryce denies Amanda's afternoon off to marry him and gives Kylie paid leave to Coral Bay instead, so Amanda quits and calls her grandfather, who tells her the groom owns Coral Bay.
The day before Valentine's Day, I put a leave request on my fiancé's desk so I could go marry him.
Bryce Dorrance didn't pick it up.
"Friday afternoon?" he said. "Amanda, it's the thirteenth."
"I know what day it is. Our appointment at City Hall is at three."
Bryce was my fiancé.
He was also my boss.
Dorrance Travel was his company, and the whole design team sat in an open room with glass walls, so nobody had to pretend not to listen.
The whole room stopped typing.
"I can't spare you today," he said. "Request denied."
He said it loud enough for the back row.
Then he turned to the desk by the window, where the new assistant sat with her chin propped on her hand.
"Kylie, your leave form. Give it here."
Kylie Chilton was twenty-four and had worked at Dorrance Travel for three months.
She floated across the room and laid her form in his palm.
Bryce signed it against the glass wall without reading it.
"Paid leave, Monday through Wednesday. Approved."
He looked back at me.
"She already booked her flight to Coral Bay. You'll cover her inbox while she's gone. Be reasonable about it."
My hands were very still on my desk.
"You're flying to Coral Bay tonight," I said. "For the Ashcroft pitch."
"Right. So I'll keep an eye on her down there. She's never been out of the country."
"And our wedding?"
He actually smiled at me.
"We'll move it back a little. A few days won't kill anybody."
Kylie hooked her arm through Bryce's.
She leaned her head on his shoulder, right there in front of the team.
"Thank you so much for understanding, Amanda," she said. "I'll bring you back something from duty-free. Bryce says you like those little chocolates."
Bryce didn't move his arm.
I had worked at Dorrance Travel for three years.
For three years I had smiled through moments.
I had stayed late, fixed his clients, rewritten his decks and let him take the credit.
That was the version of me Bryce was waiting for.
He didn't know what the date meant.
When I asked him in December if we could marry at City Hall before Valentine's Day, he said sure, whatever made me happy, and went back to his phone.
He never asked why that date.
Three years ago, my grandfather and I made a deal.
I could live any life I liked, as anybody I liked, for three years.
If I married a man of my own choosing before Valentine's Day, the rest was mine to keep.
If I didn't, I would come home and honor a promise my grandfather made a long time ago.
A marriage, already arranged.
The deadline was today.
I looked at Bryce's arm and Kylie's head on his shoulder.
Then I smiled.
I unclipped my employee badge from my blouse and dropped it in the trash can under my desk.
I pulled a blank sheet out of the printer tray and wrote across the top in pen.
Resignation, effective immediately.
I signed it and dated it.
"Fine," I said. "I won't take leave."
Bryce nodded, satisfied.
"I quit," I said.
The room went so quiet I could hear the heating vent.
Bryce's face went blank for a second.
Then he laughed through his nose.
"Amanda. What is this?"
"It's my resignation."
"You're quitting so I'll marry you this afternoon? Seriously? Grow up."
He reached past me, picked the page up off my desk and dropped it into the recycling bin without looking at it.
"Kylie's never had a real vacation in her life," he said. "What's the harm in you picking up a little extra work for her? You've been here three years. Act like it."
"I really don't want to cause problems," she said.
She was still smiling.
I stood up.
I took my coat off the back of my chair.
"Where are you going?" Bryce said.
"To make a call."
He shook his head at the room.
Nobody laughed with him.
I walked down the hall and pushed through the door to the fire stairs.
I sat down on the concrete steps and found the number I hadn't called in six weeks.
He picked up on the first ring.
"Amanda."
"Hi, Grandpa."
My grandfather didn't say anything for a second.
He knew. He always knew from my voice.
"It's today," he said.
"I know."
"Is the young man taking you to City Hall?"
I looked at the gray wall in front of me.
"No. I give up. That pact of yours, I'll take it."
I heard him put something down.
"Are you sure?"
"I've never been more sure of anything."
"Good," he said. His voice went warm and hard at the same time. "Then you'll be glad to hear the groom is already in Denver."
"Today?"
"He flew in this morning. He can be at City Hall by three, if you still want your appointment."
I laughed, a short, strange sound in the stairwell.
"Grandpa, who is he?"
"Henry Ashcroft. His grandfather was my oldest friend."
The name went through me.
Ashcroft Resorts.
"Which Ashcroft?" I said. "Not the one who owns Coral Bay."
"That's the one," my grandfather said. "He's flying down on Sunday. Apparently some little Denver travel company is pitching him on Monday morning."
I closed my eyes.
Bryce had been rehearsing that pitch for two weeks.
Using the deck I built.
"Grandpa," I said, "that little company is Dorrance Travel."
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