“This is going to sound insane,” I told him, “but would you like to marry me?”
He blinked at me slowly.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “What?”
I took a breath and pushed through the awkwardness.
“I need a husband. Quickly. You need stability. I can give you a home, clothes, food, and money. In return, you pretend to be in love with me long enough to get my parents off my back. That’s it. No romance. No strings. Just an arrangement.”
He stared at me like I had lost my mind.
And maybe I had.
“Lady,” he said after a long pause, “you cannot be serious.”
“I am.”
He studied my face a little longer, probably trying to figure out whether I was cruel, unstable, or both.
“I’m Stan,” he said finally.
“Miley.”
He gave a short laugh, half disbelief, half surrender. “You know what? Fine. Why not. I’ve had worse offers from life.”
That was how it began.
I took him shopping the next day. Then to a barber. Then to a decent restaurant where he ate like a man trying not to look too hungry. Under the dirt and beard was a face I hadn’t expected — handsome, sharp, and strangely familiar in the way some people seem instantly easier to trust than they should.
Three days later, I introduced him to my parents as my secret fiancé.
They were ecstatic.
