Rhett's Make-Believe Marriage

by Liz Isaacson

  Thursday was a blur, but she distinctly remembered going to town and buying a new dress. A new white dress, and no one had asked her any questions about it, though she knew the owner of the boutique. Apparently white was in for the summer.

  Friday came, and she experimented with her hair until Simone came into her bathroom and demanded to know what she’d been doing in there. Evelyn needed to tell her sisters about her insanity, but she honestly had no idea how to start that conversation.

  Callie knew something was up, because she came into the office while Evelyn was in mid-turn, and she said, “Okay, spill.”

  “What?”

  “Evelyn, you’ve been acting crazy this week. Something’s going on.” She stepped further inside and closed the door behind her. “You don’t have to tell Simone if you don’t want to, but we have no secrets.”

  Evelyn met her sister’s eye, pure panic parading through her. “I did something stupid, and I don’t know how to go back.”

  “Stupid?” Callie’s eyebrows went up, her expression alarmed. “Illegal stupid? Or just stupid-stupid?”

  “Stupid,” Evelyn said. “And it’s your fault, because you’re the one who said I should get married to save my business.”

  Callie took a step forward and rocked back, looking down at the coffee mug in her hand. She quickly stepped forward and set the mug down before gripping Evelyn’s shoulders. “Are you getting married?”

  “Today,” Evelyn whispered. “And it’s insane, and I don’t see how anyone in this town is even going to believe it.”

  “To who?”

  “To who?” Evelyn asked, her voice pitching up. “You don’t know?” She moaned and turned away from her sister. “This is never going to work. If I can’t even fake out my own sister, no one is going to believe the marriage is real.”

  “It’s not real, is it?” she asked.

  “No,” Evelyn said. “Of course not.” Maybe she’d been on the best first date of her life just a few days ago. Maybe holding Rhett’s hand had been the single best thing that had happened to her in the past couple of years. But she’d still only kissed him one time, and a wave of foolishness poured over her.

  “It’s Rhett,” Callie said, a smile touching her mouth. “Right?”

  Evelyn nodded, because she couldn’t even vocally confirm.

  “And he’s okay with it?”

  “He seems more excited about it than I do.”

  “I told you he liked you,” Callie said triumphantly.

  “Callie,” Evelyn whined. “I can’t do this. Can I?”

  “Are you lying to anyone?” Callie asked, her big-sister look coming into her eyes. “Doing something illegal? Something to be ashamed of?”

  Evelyn considered the questions. “No, but—”

  “But nothing,” Callie said. “No one needs to know why you got married. They’ll just know you did—and you are. It’s not like you’re telling people you and Rhett are married when you’re not. That would be a lie.”

  “This isn’t how I envisioned my wedding day,” Evelyn said. Out of all the sisters, Evelyn had spent the most time thinking about her wedding. The dress. The flowers. The band. All of it. And she’d never imagined her and her groom at City Hall, no family or friends, flowerless, no reception dinner, nothing.

  “There are so many things about our lives we didn’t imagine,” Callie said, linking her elbow through Evelyn’s. “Now, when is this wedding?”

  “One o’clock.” The words scraped Evelyn’s throat.

  “Do you need a witness?”

  “Rhett said the court would provide witnesses, but I’d love it if you were there.” Evelyn might be able to go through with the ceremony if Callie sat in the front row. She’d always looked to her older sister for advice, approval, and support.

  “How were you planning to get out of the house so we wouldn’t know?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. A client meeting.”

  “Great, and I’ll ride along for something, unless you want to tell Simone first.” She raised her eyebrows in a silent question.

  “Rhett and I already talked about having a sit-down with all of our siblings to tell them,” she said. “I don’t want to leave him high and dry. Simone won’t mind, will she? What do you think?”

  “I think I better go see if I have a dress appropriate for my sister’s wedding.” Callie seemed entirely too enthused about this fake wedding, and Evelyn watched her go, her nerves returning in full force.

  She reached for the coffee Callie had brought in, though she certainly didn’t need the caffeine. Her phone rang, startling her and causing some of the hot liquid to slop onto the back of her hand.

  Rhett’s name sat on the screen, and she hurried to swipe on the call. “Hey,” she said, hoping her voice sounded chipper and excited. He deserved to have a wedding he wanted to remember too, and Evelyn suddenly knew why she was so nervous.

  “Listen,” she said. “I don’t know about this.”

  “Evelyn,” he said. “You’ve said that so much this week. What’s the real problem?”

  “You,” she blurted. “It’s you, Rhett. I don’t want to take your opportunities from you. There’s a lot of great women in this town, and you could really find someone you actually loved and wanted to marry.”

  “Evvy,” he said, a nickname he’d used dozens of times before. “I honestly don’t think that would happen.”

  “It could,” she insisted, staring out the window. “If you’d open yourself up to dating.”

  “Yeah, I don’t think so.”

  “So you didn’t like the dinner dance?”

  “I loved it,” he said. “Because I was with you.” His words hung there, and Evelyn felt them sink right into her soul. A feeling of peace came with them, and she drew in a long breath.

  “Okay,” she said. “As long as you don’t feel like I’m taking something from you. I mean, haven’t you ever thought about your wedding?”

  “No,” he said. “I don’t think I have.”

  “Ever?”

  “Sweetheart, I’m a man.” He laughed, and Evelyn couldn’t help smiling too. She’d stood at this window just over a year ago, a dust storm turning into a tornado that had led to her first meeting with Rhett.

  “And I’m coming to get you in thirty minutes,” he said. “Are you ready?”

  “Yes,” she said, glancing to the closed door. “I have my stuff in my car, so I can just transfer it over.” Her brain screamed at her, and she realized what she’d told her sister and what she’d just committed to Rhett were at odds with one another.

  “Uh, I told Callie about the wedding,” she said.

  “Oh.”

  “She’s actually going to come be a witness, if that’s okay.”

  “So are we not going to lunch first?”

  “Yes,” Evelyn said. “We are. I just need to tell her she has to drive in separately.”

  “Did you tell Simone?”

  “No,” Evelyn said. “So we can still have dinner together tomorrow night. Did you talk to Jeremiah?”

  “Yep. He’s got a brisket in the smoker already.” Rhett didn’t sound nervous at all. In fact, he sounded happier than she’d heard him in a while. Maybe he really didn’t think he was sacrificing anything to help her.

  “Okay,” she said, turning away from the window. “I have to go finish getting ready.”

  “Evvy?” he asked.

  “Yeah?”

  “I know this probably isn’t the wedding you want.”

  Evelyn couldn’t confirm that, though he was right. “Thank you,” she said, because what he was doing to help her deserved to be acknowledged, even if he didn’t know it.

  The call ended, and she sighed. She still had to finish her hair and do her makeup, but she dropped to her knees and just breathed. “Lord,” she finally whispered. “Please help me to know if this is wrong or not.”

  Only silence moved through her, and she wasn’t sure what God was trying to tell her.
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br />   “So I’m going to do it,” she said, pressing her eyes closed, still listening. She didn’t get a strong feeling one way or the other, so she stood up and looked at the ceiling. “Okay, here I go.”

  The Lord still didn’t stop her, and she finished her hair and makeup and went out onto the front porch to wait for Rhett. She texted Callie about the new plans, a quick apology that they couldn’t ride to the county courthouse together.

  It’s fine, Callie said. Go to lunch with your fiancé. I’ll see you soon.

  Evelyn’s head jerked up and she murmured, “Fiancé.” Before she could think too hard about that, Rhett’s black luxury truck pulled into her driveway.

  It was time.

  She got up and picked up the backpack she’d packed with her dress and shoes and went down the steps. Rhett met her, a big smile on his face. “Hey, gorgeous.” He swept her right into his arms and held her tight. “Are you okay?”

  His soft voice was too much to handle, and Evelyn clung to him as every emotion in the book ran through her. “I’m fine,” she said. “I am.” She stepped back and gathered herself together.

  Rhett stood there and watched her.

  “I am,” she said, putting a smile on her face.

  “We don’t have to do this.”

  “I know.”

  He reached out and cradled her face, bringing her slowly toward him so he could kiss her. Evelyn appreciated the warmth of his mouth against hers, the gentle yet insistent way he kissed her, and suddenly everything that had been crooked aligned.

  His smile broke their kiss, and he chuckled. “I’ve been dying to do that again,” he whispered.

  Her first instinct was to ask if he was serious, but she knew Rhett, and he didn’t say anything he didn’t mean. At least he never had in the past.

  “Let’s go to our wedding lunch,” he said.

  Giddiness filled Evelyn, and she let Rhett take her bag and help her into the truck.

  “I told Tripp,” he said as he settled behind the wheel. “He’s coming to witness too.”

  A surge of adrenaline moved through her. “What did he say?”

  “Well, I sort of told him on Tuesday night that I was going to marry you.” He chuckled as he backed out of the driveway. “He just didn’t realize it would happen so soon.”

  “But he was okay with it?”

  Rhett shrugged like it didn’t matter what his brother thought. “He actually had some really good questions we haven’t exactly ironed out.”

  “Oh? Like what?” Evelyn had dozens of questions herself, but she’d been pushing them away for days, because she hadn’t been sure until that moment that she’d actually go through with this.

  “Yeah, he wanted to know where we were going to live.”

  Evelyn tried to breathe, but she choked instead. Her heart pounded in her chest, and she stared at Rhett. Oh-so-cool Rhett, who didn’t seem frazzled by this conversation at all.

  “Well, we—we don’t need to live together.”

  “So we’re going to be married on paper only.”

  “I mean, well…yeah.” She stared at him. “Was that part not clear?”

  “Sure, yeah,” he said, his voice a little strained. “I guess I’m just wondering what that kiss meant if this is just a paper-only, platonic relationship.”

  Chapter Eight

  Rhett learned in the next few moments that he had excellent peripheral vision. He didn’t have to look at Evelyn to see the pure confusion and panic on her face. She opened her mouth and closed it a couple of times, finally looking out her window, showing him the curled and pinned up-do.

  “I mean, I don’t know what you felt just a minute ago, but I kind of liked kissing you.” He hadn’t hidden how he felt about her—at least not since breakfast on Tuesday.

  “We can still kiss.”

  Rhett didn’t think she’d thought through this plan at all. “Evelyn, tell me what you think is going to happen next.”

  “We’re going to lunch.”

  “And then?”

  “Then we’re going to get married.”

  “And then?”

  “And then…I haven’t thought that far ahead.”

  “You know what people do when they get married, right?” His face heated just saying the words.

  “Of course,” she said, an angry undertone in her words now. “But Rhett, our marriage isn’t real.”

  “Oh, it’s real,” he said. “I have the paper and everything.”

  “But we’re—I thought you knew it wasn’t really real.”

  “I do know that,” he said. “But you’re trying to convince the town that it is real. Don’t you think we should live together?” He glanced at her, though he’d successfully watched her reactions without such direct eye contact. “My place is pretty big,” he said. “There’s a few rooms on the second floor that we don’t even use.”

  Evelyn remained silent for a few moments. Then she turned toward him and reached for his hand. He let her slip her fingers into his, almost sighing with contentment. It seemed surreal still that their relationship had changed so much in such a short amount of time. But Rhett wasn’t complaining. He’d always liked Evelyn, and so what if her desperation had fueled their relationship to move faster than it might have otherwise?

  “Okay,” she said. “I can move into your house.”

  “Great,” Rhett said. “I think that’s probably the best idea.”

  “Do you think I could keep my office at my house?”

  “Sure,” he said, easing to a stop as they came to a stop sign. “So we’re going to lunch at the steakhouse. I know you like a good filet mignon.”

  “I do,” she said, and some of the tension between them evaporated. He took her hand on the way in, and the conversation was normal, about his brothers and her sisters, and how things were going on the ranch.

  “Do you miss your forensic cases?” she asked.

  “A little,” he admitted. “I just don’t want another one like that monster I just finished.”

  “Could you take smaller cases?”

  “Yeah, probably. But I took my name out of the rotation for a while.”

  “Evelyn?” a woman asked, and they both looked up at her.

  “Hello, Erica,” she said, glancing at Rhett. “You know Rhett Walker.”

  She looked at him, and Rhett thought he should probably know her, because she knew him. “Of course. I’d heard you two were together.”

  “That’s right,” Rhett said, beaming up at her. He wanted to tell this nosy woman that they were less than an hour from getting married, but he kept the secret under his tongue. He loved that he had something only him and Evelyn shared, and he couldn’t wait to keep getting to know her in different ways.

  She started to talk to Erica, and Rhett let his mind wander down paths he never had before. Sure, maybe they were doing things in a strange order, but Rhett didn’t mind. It wasn’t like he was marrying a complete stranger.

  He knew Evelyn.

  Erica finally left, and Rhett said, “We better get going if we want to have time to change before the ceremony. We’re supposed to check in twenty minutes before anyway.”

  Their eyes met, and Evelyn said, “All right, Rhett. Let’s do this.”

  Forty-five minutes later, Rhett stood in front of the mirror, looking into his own eyes. He could admit he looked…apprehensive. Fine, he looked scared out of his mind.

  “You want to do this,” he told himself. “She needs the help, and you can give it.” Plus, he liked her. He couldn’t forget that. He wasn’t getting nothing out of the deal, and he knew it.

  “Rhett.” Tripp stepped over to him and handed him his dress hat, the one he wore to church each week. “It’s time.” He put both hands on Rhett’s shoulders. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  Looking into his brother’s eyes, Rhett once again felt at peace with his decision. “Yes,” he said. “This is the right thing to do.”

  “All right, then,” he sa
id. “Let’s go do it.” They both turned toward the door that would take them out into the room where the weddings were performed. “Have you talked to Callie?”

  “Yeah, I saw her,” Tripp said.

  “And?”

  “And you know Jeremiah is going to be livid,” Tripp said. “I’m thinking maybe we tell him before the others. Privately.”

  “I don’t know,” Rhett said, though he also suspected Jeremiah would take this marriage the hardest. “If I tell him, he might not make dinner.”

  Tripp snorted. “If you don’t tell him, he may never talk to you again.”

  Rhett paused at the door. “You really think that?”

  “I think Jere’s had his heart shredded,” Tripp said. “He was mad about the pact, bro. He’s going to go nuclear over a wedding.”

  “But you’re okay, right?” Rhett searched his brother’s face, and he found the answer he needed. “Who knows? Maybe you and Callie could have something.”

  Tripp burst out laughing. “You’re really out of touch, aren’t you? All those breakfasts with Evelyn. All the pining.”

  “I have not been pining.”

  “Oh, you have. Just a little, maybe. But definite pining.”

  Fine, maybe he had been pining for her a little bit. “What did I miss?”

  “It’s Liam who likes Callie.” Tripp wiggled his eyebrows and pushed into the room. Rhett followed him to find Callie sitting on the front row already, her hands folded in her lap. She was a pretty woman too, Rhett could admit that. But nothing about her accelerated his pulse. Not the way Evelyn did. The way Evelyn always had.

  He took his spot, and the judge looked down at him. “Are you marrying yourself, sir?”

  “No,” he said, glancing back to Callie. “I mean, I didn’t think so.”

  “She’s coming,” Callie said, looking to the door opposite of the one Rhett had just come out. The room felt huge, like it could swallow him whole in a single bite. There were so many rows, and he wondered if people actually brought their friends and families here to witness their marriage.

  He couldn’t imagine that. If this were a real wedding day for Rhett and Evelyn, he knew she’d plan it in a park. Or on her ranch. Pastor Daniels would officiate, and her father and aged grandmother would be sitting on the front row.