The Billionaire's Secretly Fake Bride (MANHATTAN BACHELORS Book 3)

by Susan Westwood

  Ryder just smiled at her pleasantly. “I saw your car. That won’t do at all. I’ll buy you a new car to drive. I want to be sure that you’ll be safe and that you’ll have a reliable means to get around. You can get rid of the car you have and I’ll get something nice for you.”

  She stared at him. She could barely believe what she was hearing from him. It had to be a dream. Nothing but a strange and totally surreal dream. “You’re going to buy me a car?” she asked in absolute astonishment.

  He nodded again. “Yes, that’s no problem at all. You can keep it. It’ll be yours even after you leave. I’ll also provide all of your clothes and upkeep for you, beauty salons and things like that. You’ll need to look the part. I’ll give you a ten thousand dollar a month allowance for whatever you might need. The main thing is that on the surface this must look like a real engagement and marriage. Especially in front of my father. He’s the one who needs to buy this marriage the most. There can be no confusion… no doubt in his mind whatsoever.”

  Regina nodded. “I understand. It has to be believable.”

  Ryder looked at her pointedly. “It does. Can you make it believable? Can you make him and everyone else believe that you and I are dating, that we’ve fallen in love and that we want to be married so that we can spend the rest of our lives together? How good an actress are you?”

  She laughed softly. “I can do it. I pretend to be nice to everyone in a strip club every night. I can put on a show.”

  He realized just how right she was, and he gave her a smile and a nod. “Okay then. I think we’ve got ourselves a deal.” Reaching into the inner pocket of his jacket, he pulled out an envelope and opened it, drawing out a thin stack of folded papers.

  “I’ve had our main family attorney draw up a private prenuptial agreement. In this contract, it states that we’ll be married and that if the marriage ever terminates, you will be paid a lump sum of one million dollars and nothing more or less. It basically outlines the marriage and divorce to a point that you could see for yourself that it’s a business arrangement, though no one else might realize that right away. Please, take your time and read it.” He handed it to her and she read it all, from the first word to the last.

  Biting at her lower lip a little, she took a pen from him and signed the last page on the line over her name. It was official. She sat there and stared at her name, wondering what it was that she had just done, and hoping that it was a decision for the best. She was certain that it must be. It had to be. It was even more than she needed and it was happening exactly when she needed it to happen. Not only was it helping her, but it was helping him as well. There was no downside to it that she could see.

  He took it from her then and he signed it as well, putting his name not too far from hers and making the document official. His breath was held tight in his lungs all the while he was signing it, and when it was done, his breath came out in a gush of air and emotion, and he prayed that he was doing the right thing. He couldn’t afford to make another mistake with his father, and he was desperately hopeful that this fallacy marriage would not be a mistake. It would be disastrous for him if it was.

  Ryder folded the agreement and slid it back into the envelope, tucking that back into his pocket from where he’d pulled it out. “I think it would be best and easier for everyone to believe if we date constantly over the next six weeks and then make the engagement official in public.”

  Regina tipped her head slightly to one side, thinking about what was to come. “How big is this wedding going to be? Will we be eloping or will this be something sort of bigger?”

  He smiled. “Let’s make it huge. Let’s make it gargantuan, so that it’s really in my father’s face. We’ll go all out with it. Invite anyone you like, make it big, make it fancy, and I’ll pay for the whole thing.”

  She laughed at him and he held his hand up with a wink. “Here, let me get you started.” He reached into a different pocket and pulled out a checkbook. With a swift flourish, his hand moved the pen in his fingertips over the paper of the check and a minute later he tore it out of the book and handed it to her. “This is your allowance for this month. We’re halfway through the month, but consider the other five thousand a starting bonus. In two weeks’ time, I’ll give you next month’s check for ten thousand dollars. I hope this will help you for now with what you’re doing and whatever you might need it for.” He smiled at her again and handed it to her.

  She stared at it as she took it into her fingers. “I’ve never seen or held so much money in my life.” She couldn’t even wrap her head around the fact that she was holding ten thousand dollars in her hand, and that it was the first of her monthly allowances, for however long she might be legally married to the man sitting across from her. It was completely incomprehensible to her.

  “Well, you’ll have a lot more than that to hold before too long. That’s just to get you started.” He gave her a wink and then pulled out a one-hundred-dollar bill and set it under the coffee cup before him. He hadn’t taken another drink from it after the first disastrous sip. “I’m sure she could use a one-hundred-dollar tip too, so let’s make her night.”

  He was pleased with being able to help the waitress at the diner, and impress Regina all at once. Regina smiled as she watched him, liking what she was seeing.

  “You know,” she began with a curious laugh, “You’re not at all who I thought you might be.”

  “I could say exactly the same thing about you.” He answered her in return. “Now, that ten thousand is yours to do with whatever you like. I will need to take you clothes shopping this week so that I can present you to my father this weekend. I want you to look the part. When can I take you shopping?” He looked at her and she realized that he was completely serious.

  “In two days?” she asked more than told him. She was off from school and she knew she’d have a little bit of free time, especially if she wasn’t going to have to work any longer.

  “Two days it is then.” He stood up with a grin and waited for her as she rose from her seat and they walked together out of the diner and back to the parking lot at the strip club. When they got to her car, she reached out and shook his hand.

  “Thank you for giving me this chance and for taking such good care of me. It means a great deal to me.” She gave him a grin and he reached an arm around her and hugged her gently before putting her into her car and waiting until she had coaxed it to life. Bit by bit she managed to get it out of the parking lot and on her way home. She was exhausted but she was happy. She glanced in her rearview mirror and saw that Ryder was standing by his car watching her drive away. She could see that he was happy too.

  He was watching her go, surprised by her and the kind of woman that she was, surprised that she was working so hard to get an education and that it was in business. He was surprised that she had said yes to him, and that she had even showed up and called him. He was surprised by everything about her, and it made him smile to think of her being in his life for a brief period.

  Chapter6

  Regina drove away in a daze after her meeting with Ryder. She had managed to keep her cool the entire time they’d sat across from each other. The whole meeting had been surreal to her, but when he placed the check in her hands, her mind had just stopped right then, and she hadn’t been able to think clearly much after that.

  She concentrated as well as she could on getting home and she felt so tired that she thought she was going to go to bed, but she knew that the reality was that her mind was in such a tangle over the incredible change in her life that she was never going to be able to get to sleep that night.

  The ride home seemed to happen in an instant. Her attention wasn’t on the road ahead of her, and she’d driven the route from the strip bar to her house so many times, especially at that wee hour of the morning, that it happened in a daze and she was parking four blocks from her house before she knew it.

  The realization that she was going to be living in a big house clear at th
e end of Long Island in a matter of weeks was astounding to her. She wondered if she should keep her little house so she’d have some place to move back to when she was divorced, but then the thought occurred to her that she was going to have a million dollars, if it all went right, and she could live anywhere that she wanted to. She’d be able to afford a place where she didn’t have to drive around a wide area in her neighborhood just to find a parking spot.

  Her whole world was going to change. She got out of her car and locked it, pulling her bag onto her shoulder and heading to her home. Step by step she walked, and her thoughts seemed to go in every direction as she passed through the night and the sleeping neighbors around her. She wouldn’t be walking past them in the early hours of the morning anymore. She wouldn’t be exhausted from working and going to school and trying to make it all work.

  She was going to be quitting her job and focusing completely on school. She thought of how her time would change. How she would be able to spend time on herself and with her friends. She would be able to sleep and do things that she loved to do, going out to have fun and enjoy herself. She thought about how her health would change; she would have time to go to yoga, she would have time to sleep all she wanted to, to work out, to eat healthy meals instead of grabbing food on the go.

  Regina stepped through her front door and walked slowly into her home, looking around at it as if she was seeing it for the first time. It was her home, as it had been since she had moved into it and settled herself, but it looked totally different to her at that moment. It looked like a stranger and an old friend to her; like a living memory. She wasn’t going to be living there anymore, not that she had lived there much while she was a resident.

  She had spent nearly all of her time away from it, yet it was still the place that she went back to when she needed to rest or nourish herself or shower and relax at least a little. She was going to leave it; her little sanctuary, and change her entire life. It was a strange feeling; one of shifting sands beneath her feet. She was stepping out of her safe zone into the unknown, and there was no telling what her future would hold.

  She drew in a deep breath and let it out in a long slow sigh. Crossing the living room in a few steps, she went into the kitchen and sank down into the chair at the side of the table where she always sat. Before her on the table was the same stack of bills that she had been weeping over the night before, and the eviction notice laying where she had left it. It seemed like nothing at all to her then as she looked at it.

  She reached into her bag and pulled out her wallet, slipping the check from it carefully. She’d taken extra care not to fold or wrinkle it in any way. She wanted it to be in perfect condition when she took it to the bank later that morning. She wanted to take her time with the experience of walking up to the counter at the bank and depositing a check for ten thousand dollars.

  Her banker knew her and she wondered what he would think when, instead of coming in with a wad of cash to deposit, she would be handing him such an enormous check. She suspected that it wasn’t that common that people deposited amounts such as that in their personal checking accounts out of the blue.

  She set the check on the table and looked over at the eviction notice just a few inches above it. A smile formed on her face and she felt a laugh bubble up in her. Had it really only been twenty-four hours since she had sat there weeping over her life and her dire circumstances, she wondered. Was it really possible that everything in her entire life could have changed in just one day, she asked herself.

  It was beyond comprehension to her. She sat in the chair and stared at her bills and her new money, and decided that she would do something that she never did; she would take the morning off from school. She would go to the bank, deposit the money, and pay off all of her debts, except for her student loans, which were more than the amount of the check on the table before her. Those loans would be paid with future checks, but everything else was going to be taken care of.

  A sense of peace and relief washed over her and for the second night in a row, she dropped her face into her hands and began to cry, though for an entirely different reason the second night. When she had managed to get all of her emotion out, she took a deep breath and decided to get a really good night’s sleep. She was starting a new life, a very different new life, and she could think of no better way to start it than waking up after a solid and long night’s sleep to take her new money and erase nearly all of her debt.

  Her pillow had never felt so good. Her eyes were wet, but there was a smile on her face when she went to sleep, and her dreams when they came were sweet and peaceful.

  She slept through most of the morning, waking up after nine and sitting up in bed in a sheer panic at first, until she remembered what was happening and that she was doing everything differently. A new life, a new woman, a new everything.

  She showered and dressed and laughed a little, realizing that she was going to have all new clothes when she went out shopping with her soon-to-be fiancé a couple of days after that morning. Her closet would be filled, but it would be a new closet in a new home, and everything would be different.

  After she was ready and had enjoyed a leisurely cup of coffee, she picked up her phone and called Marie. Marie’s cell phone only rang a few times before she answered it, and her voice gave away her worry.

  “Are you okay?” She asked in a short breathless voice.

  Regina smiled happily. “Yes, I’m great. I’m beyond great; I’m amazing. How are you?” She returned, wanting to know how her friend was doing.

  There was a momentary silence on the other end of the phone. “Well, I’m good, but I’m a little surprised to hear from you at this time of day. Aren’t you in class right now? Why are you calling me?”

  Regina laughed then and felt an all new wave of relief and happiness flood through her. “I’m not in class, actually, and thank you for remembering that I would normally be in class right now. I’m at my place. I was calling to let you know what’s going on right now. There are some pretty big changes happening.”

  “What’s happening?” Marie asked with a cautious tone.

  Not even knowing where to begin, she tried to sum it all up as best she could. “Well, remember that guy I told you about, the one who came to the bar and offered me a job being his fake wife?”

  “Yes, I remember that. We just talked about him. I told you to call him and see if he really meant it. Did you call him?” Marie asked with a hint of excitement in her voice.

  “I did.” Regina answered with streams of excitement in her reply. “I called him and it went terribly. I didn’t think that we were going to find time to meet and talk, and I gave up on him. Luckily for both of us, he didn’t give up on me. When I walked out of work this morning, he was waiting for me by my car. We went and had a cup of coffee and talked about the deal, and I agreed to it.” She still couldn’t quite believe the words that were running through her mind and spilling forth from her mouth.

  Marie couldn’t believe them either. “You… you’re going to do it? You’re going to marry the guy?”

  Regina nodded. “Yeah, I guess I am.” She smiled wide and let out a long breath. “There’s so much to tell you, but one of the biggest things is that he’s giving me a monthly allowance of ten thousand dollars, and he actually sat before me and pulled out a check book last night and wrote out a check to me for ten grand and gave it to me.”

  Her heart began to pound just thinking of it. “I can pay my rent. I can pay all of it at once. I can pay all of my past due bills. I can pay almost every penny I owe to everyone for everything. I can’t even begin to tell you how incredible that feels to me. I couldn’t imagine this feeling if I tried to.”

  “Holy cow!” Marie gasped. “You have ten thousand dollars? For real?” Her best friend asked as if she had to have heard her wrong.

  “Yeah, I have ten thousand dollars. I thought I’d see if you would like to go out to lunch with me today. I’m skipping school. I’m paying my bills.
I would love to see you and to take you out to lunch and spoil you a little bit. We could do a bit of shopping if you like, too. Let me splurge on you some. What do you say?” Regina was overcome with giddiness as the very real possibilities cascaded through her mind.

  “I… I say yes, definitely! Let’s go! I would love to see you and hang out with you. That would be amazing! We haven’t had a real girl’s day in so long. Thank you!” Marie laughed out loud. “Gosh, I’m so glad that you called him and that it all worked out. I can’t wait to hear the details, and you can tell me all about them when we meet up, but for now I want to know how you’re feeling. I mean, I know you must be feeling good, but this is a huge step. How are you really doing?” Marie sounded happy and slightly concerned.

  Regina thought about it for a long minute before she finally answered. “My mind keeps wandering to all of the possibilities. Paying off my bills and saving money for the future. I want to pay off my student loans too. He’s going to buy me a new car. I’m getting a new car. Just in time too, my old wreck of a vehicle is on its last leg. Or tire. Something. It’s done, and it’s not going to make it much longer. I get to keep the car when the deal is over and we get divorced. I can’t even believe how lucky I feel right now. It’s crazy.”