Make-Believe Marriage

by CA Quigg

  "Take a seat, please," she said pointing toward a row of wooden seats behind a series of blue screens. An exotic looking woman with brass blonde hair and huge red lips sat a few seats from me, looking pissed off at the world.

  "What did you do?" she asked in a thick eastern European accent.

  I shrugged my shoulders. "Beats me. You?"

  "They think I'm a mail order bride. I've been here for six hours."

  "And are you?"

  "Do I look like a mail order bride? Please. My fiancé is waiting for me at arrivals. We met online. It's true love."

  I nodded. Her story sounded like mine and just as implausible.

  "Mr. Gallagher," called a man's voice.

  Giving my immigration companion a smile, I stood and strode to the desk.

  "What's the purpose of your visit here?" The heavy-set officer who wouldn't look out of place in a Godfather movie, flicked through my passport as if he was looking for something.

  "I work here. My wife and I were visiting my family in Ireland."

  He nodded. "Yes, we've been talking to her."

  My heart thudded, and I desperately needed some water. "Where is she? Can I see her? Speak to her?"

  I had to get to Lizzie not because I feared what she would say; it was because I didn't want her in an interrogation room, being asked the same question a million different ways. Her anxiety levels would be through the roof.

  "Take a seat, someone will come get you soon.. There are some questions we need to ask before we can decide if you can enter the country."

  I wanted to demand to see my wife, but riling the immigration officer or showing any aggression would create more trouble for both of us and I didn't want to antagonize anyone.

  "Thank you, Officer."

  "They're bastards, the lot of them," whispered the blonde when I sat down.

  "They're just doing their job."

  Ten hellish hours had passed, and serval flights had come and gone, and I still sat on the hardwood chair. There were no magazines to pass the time, and a sign said I couldn't use my phone or laptop.

  What was taking so fucking long? The blonde had been denied entry a few hours ago and was on her way back to Slovenia. By the looks of things, I'd soon suffer the same fate and would be on my way back to Ireland before too long.

  "Mr. Gallagher." The same officer as before stood in front of me with a manila file tucked under his arm. "Come with me."

  I grabbed my laptop bag and followed him to a room behind the immigration booths.

  Once we were inside, he shut the door and sat down and placed the file in front of him.

  "Can I see my wife now?" I asked. "I want to make sure she's okay."

  He pointed to a camera on the wall. "My name's Officer Purcell, and everything is being recorded."

  I sat and did my best to disguise the irritation tickling my throat. "Can I talk to my wife?"

  He raised his eyebrow. "You'll be able to speak to Ms. Beaufort soon."

  "It's Mrs. Gallagher," I said correcting him.

  Officer Purcell leaned back in his chair and flicked open the file. Inside were copies of my passport, expired visa, marriage license, and Lizzie 's passport.

  "Would you mind telling me what this is about?" I asked.

  "We received a phone call saying your marriage is a sham. And all evidence points that way. You married Ms. Beaufort a few days ago, and you agreed to pay her money in exchange for a green card."

  He slid a copy of a bank statement toward me, which showed the deposit of one-hundred thousand into Lizzie's account.

  In the ten hours they'd left me sitting, they'd done their homework.

  "Lizzie's father was in an accident, and they have no insurance. I put the money in her account so she wouldn't have to worry."

  The officer nodded, but he didn't seem convinced. "How long have you known Ms. Beaufort?"

  "Not long but long enough to know I love her. " The words didn't sound as alien to me or as frightening as they once did.

  "Love her?"

  To keep my body language to a minimum, I clasped my hands in front of me, and I kept steady eye contact with Officer Purcell. "Yes, love her."

  "Explain how you met."

  "Her father needed an investor for his club, and I wanted to be that investor. At first, our relationship was purely business, but it grew."

  "And do you have proof of that? Phone bills, emails, etc."

  "Everything's at home. We weren't expecting to get interrogated, so we don't have anything with us."

  The officer smiled, but there was no warmth behind it. "If need be, we can get your phone records. We've looked into your background. Your visa was canceled. You applied for a new one and didn't get it. An easy fix would be to find a wife. Someone who needed money. Someone who was desperate."

  Despite wanting to reach across the table and rip the officer's throat, I kept my cool. "I love my wife. There's nothing desperate about her. She's the woman I'm going to spend the rest of my life with."

  For the next three hours, he asked me the same questions in several different ways, taking notes and then reading them back. He would occasionally leave the office to verify my answers and then come back only to ask me the same questions again.

  At the end of our third hour, he regarded me coolly and rocked back on his chair. "Do you know what today is?"

  "The tenth?" I wasn't sure where his line of questioning was headed.

  "It's my twentieth wedding anniversary and my wife is waiting for me at home."

  "Congratulations."

  "Your paperwork is telling me one thing. You and your wife are telling me another. You're both either pathological liars, or you're telling the truth." He tapped his pen to his lips and blew out a breath. He stopped rocking and flipped the file closed. "As soon as you can, you and your wife go to the nearest immigration office. Your fate lies in their hands. Today is not the day I split anyone up."

  "You mean I can go."

  He gestured toward the door. "It's open. For your sake, I hope you're not lying to me. If you are and this is a scam, you are your wife and in more trouble than you can ever imagine."

  "Thank you, officer." Relief, the size of Niagara Falls, washed over me.

  That was close. Too close. Who the hell had tipped off immigration? Only one other person knew about the reason behind our wedding, and that was Beaufort. What was the old bastard up to? He was set to lose a lot if we were found out, but I would deal with him and his game playing later. The only thing I wanted to do now was to make sure Lizzie was okay.

  Chapter 29

  Elizabeth

  Throngs of people strode past me while I paced in front of arrivals, and every time the sliding doors opened, I looked up praying I would see him.

  As soon as I reached the booth in the immigration hall, I was escorted into an interview room and interrogated about Caden.

  I'd lied and gave the story we'd concocted. The officer had shown me all of Caden's paperwork and said it was highly suspicious that someone who'd been refused a visa would get married so suddenly.

  I told him we were in love. Yes, it had been fast and sudden, but we knew we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together.

  For hours, I sat in the cold, nondescript room not knowing if I was going to prison or going home. I kept my nerves at bay by reciting the chemical properties of oils in my mind.

  As soon as they released me, I ran through baggage claim, past customs, and into the arrivals hall, but there was no sign of Caden.

  Was he on his way back to Ireland? Would someone show up at my house in a few days and arrest me. This was getting to be too much to shoulder. The constant lies weighed on me and became heavier with every passing day.

  If I didn't love him, I would have told the truth. But I did love him. I loved him enough to break the law and keep on lying.

  He
didn't feel the same way about me, which was why I would never tell him how I really felt. As far as he knew, I was in it for the money and the club. He didn't need to know any different.

  "Lizzie."

  My heart sang. It was him.

  He ran toward me, picked me up, and squeezed all the air out of my body. Tears of relief at seeing him dripped down my cheeks.

  "Are you okay?" he asked. "How long did they keep you?" His lips found mine, and he kissed me with a hunger I'd never known from him.

  When I broke away, I gasped for breath and pressed my hands against his chest. "I was so worried about you. I didn't think I'd see you again."

  "We'll talk about it in the car." He took my hand and led me outside.

  "What about our luggage?"

  "I'll call the airline and have them deliver it."

  We jumped into his car in the multistory parking lot, and when we'd locked the doors, we both blew out a breath and laughed.

  "Jesus, that was close," he said. "I can't believe they believed us."

  Caden might have lied about how he felt about me, but every word I said was true. When Officer Purcell asked if I loved my husband, I told the truth. I loved him with all my heart and didn't know how I would live without him when the time for us to divorce arrived.

  "What did they ask you?" His words came out in a rush, and it reminded me of how fast his family talked.

  "Probably the same things they asked you. When did we meet? Why did we marry so quickly? Our first meeting. Nothing too crazy or intimate."

  He cupped my face between his palms. "I'm glad I picked you to do this with. None of the others would have held their nerve the way you did."

  He released my face, and my heart stuttered. "Others?"

  "I'd researched a few other women in case you refused."

  "Smart," I said trying to keep the hurt and anger from my voice. Why did I think I was the only woman he'd considered? Once again, a man had made me feel like an idiot, and, once again, I'd been taken for a fool. He'd have married anyone. It didn't matter who.

  He turned the key in the ignition and maneuvered out of the spot. "Is everything okay? You're quiet. We need to celebrate."

  "I'm fine," I lied. "Just wondering how they flagged us."

  "You weren't told about the tip-off?"

  "Tip-off? What tip-off." Dread spread upward from my toes until it consumed me.

  "Purcell said someone had been in touch to say the marriage was a sham. There's only one other person who knew."

  "There's no way… He's a bastard, but he wouldn't risk putting me in prison."

  I refused to believe my dad would blow the whistle on us-on me-like that. Not when he had as much to lose as I did. He would lose the club, and he would lose me. It was one thing to berate me and make me feel inadequate, but threatening my freedom?

  "I can't believe he would do that to me. I mean I can… but I can't."

  "There's no other explanation. No one else knows." He glanced over at me. "You haven't told anyone, have you?"

  "Did you honestly just ask that? The only person I'd tell would be Darcy, and I didn't. I wouldn't."

  God knows, I wanted to tell my sister, but I didn't want to face the betrayal and hurt it would cause. If I'd told her before we'd married, she would have talked me out of it and if she had, some random developer would have torn down the club and would now be in the midst of building ugly condos.

  For the rest of the drive home, I closed my eyes, but I didn't sleep. Too many thoughts and questions about Caden crowded my brain. Now that I'd fallen in love with him, how was I going to get out of or marriage without falling apart?

  I would lose myself to work and forget about him that way. When I got home, I would research an oil blend to help heal a broken heart, but as much as I loved and relied on my oils, there was nothing in the world that powerful.

  ****

  The full moon illuminated the calm ocean, and a chill filled the air. I stood by the cliff side watching the star-filled horizon and inhaled the comforting smell of home.

  This was where I belonged Caden would never settle in a tourist town like Sundown Sands. A place that hibernated in winter and woke up in spring.

  He came up behind me and lay his chin on my shoulder. I leaned back and allowed him to take my weight. Exhaustion weighed me down, and my body felt like lead. My emotions were in turmoil as if I'd spent the last twenty-four hours crying.

  Tomorrow, I would confront my father. If I stormed to his house now, I wouldn't be strong enough to withstand the barbs from his waspish tongue. One thing was for sure, he would never make me cry again.

  Once too often he'd betrayed my trust. I loved him, but I was done with him and his crazy schemes.

  "Take me to bed," I whispered.

  I needed Caden to love me, to cherish me. I wanted to forget everything that had happened. I wanted to be his wife and feel loved even if I wasn't.

  "Look at me," he said.

  I turned to face him. "There's no way I can ever thank you for what you've done for me. Agreeing to meet my family. Lying to the immigration officer. I don't know how I'll ever repay you."

  I stood on my tiptoes and placed a chaste kiss on his lips. "You can repay me by taking me to bed. If you don't, I'll spill my guts to every person I meet."

  The sound of his laughter curled my toes. "Anything for you, Lizzie."

  Chapter 30

  Caden

  Moonlight streamed into the bedroom. I kissed every inch of her body as I stripped off her clothes. I wanted to fuck her hard and to feel the relief I so desperately wanted. But she needed more than that. I needed to show her how thankful I was for everything she'd done. Words weren't enough, and what was about to happen would be nothing like the playful sex we'd had at the hotel.

  I stood behind her and pressed kisses down the column of her neck. A small whimper fell from her lips, and my balls tightened at every sound she made.

  She intoxicated me in a way no other woman ever had, but it was because of the sex and nothing else.

  I unhooked her bra and peeled the straps from her shoulders and let it fall to the floor. Her luscious tits were made for my hands and mouth. They were made to be worshiped. I peppered her shoulders with small kisses and slid my hands around her stomach and up to her breasts.

  Her heart thudded fast, and I flicked my fingers back and forth over her taut nipples until they puckered into points.

  "Do you like that?" I asked.

  "Yes," she breathed.

  Her body was an enchanting wonder, and one I intended to explore. Being with her warmed my soul and seeing her so vulnerable and so open shook me to the core.