The Rules of the Fake Engagement:
I signed the contract at my kitchen table.
Which, honestly, felt insane.
A multimillionaire’s legal agreement. A life-altering decision. And me reading the fine print beside a chipped mug that said WORLD’S OKAYEST BAKER, a joke from Maya three Christmases ago that I’d never managed to throw away.
“You could’ve had this courier somewhere nicer,” I told the lawyer across from me.Young associate. Expensive suit. Nervous enough to keep straightening the same folder every few seconds.
He looked painfully aware that he was sitting in an apartment where the radiator clanked every four minutes like it had opinions about all of this.
“Mr. Ashford said to meet you wherever was convenient.” Didn’t look up from his folder. “Said, and I quote, don’t make her come to him.”
That surprised me more than it should have. I filed it away, didn’t poke at it, because I had a document in front of me I needed to read three separate times before I trusted myself to sign it.
Terms, short version. I’d appear as Roman Ashford’s fiancée for six months minimum, subject to extension if the trust needed it. Public appearances, scheduled by his office. Forty thousand up front, monthly stipend on top, completion bonus if I made it the full six without the whole thing collapsing. NDA thick enough to double as a doorstop. And an exit clause, my one non negotiable, the thing I’d made Maya read out loud twice on the phone the night before so I knew I had it right let me walk if it ever turned into something I couldn’t stomach.
I signed it. Sat there a second after, staring at my own signature like it belonged to somebody else.
“One more thing.” The associate slid a second, thinner document across the table. “Rules of engagement. Mr. Ashford drafted these himself.”
Of course he did.
Read them at the table with Maya hovering over my shoulder, wine glass in hand, narrating like a sports commentator.
“Rule one.” She got to it before I did. “Public affection is required and should be read as natural. Hand holding, arm around waist, occasional kiss on cheek or temple for photographs.’ Ivy. He wrote about the temple. Who writes temple.”
“Keep reading.”
“‘Private interactions remain strictly professional. Neither party is required to spend time together outside scheduled appearances.’ Boring. Fine. Next.” Eyebrows climbing as she scanned. “‘Neither party shall discuss the arrangement with press, family, or associates outside pre approved talking points.’ Very corporate. ‘Neither party is to develop or act on genuine romantic feelings during the term of the engagement.'” She looked up. “He put that. In writing.”
“Apparently.”
That’s insane. That’s like putting “do not think about elephants in a legal document.”
“It’s a business arrangement, Maya.”
“Sure it is.” Topped off her glass, didn’t look convinced. I wasn’t fully convinced either, if I’m honest, but I signed that page too, because forty thousand dollars doesn’t care about my feelings and neither, apparently, did the man offering it.
First public appearance, three days later. Small, by Ashford standards. Dinner at some restaurant with a name I couldn’t pronounce, cameras stationed outside because that’s just a fact of life when your last name’s Ashford, people with long lenses hoping you’ll do something interesting on the walk from car to door.
Roman picked me up himself.
That surprised me.
Billionaires usually send drivers. Assistants. Someone with an earpiece.
Roman showed up in person.
When I slid into the passenger seat, his eyes lifted to mine and stayed there half a second too long.
“You look nice,” he said eventually.
Like the words had fought him on the way out.
“I’m not surprised. I’m” Stopped. Started over. “You look nice. That’s all I meant.”
“Wow. High praise. I’ll frame that.”
He almost smiled. Caught it before he shut it down, this crack in the composure, and getting a real reaction out of him instead of the practiced one felt like winning some small stupid game I hadn’t realized I was playing.
“We should go over the basics.” All business again. “Where we met. How long. Nothing elaborate, the less we invent the less we have to remember.”
“We met at your gala. I saved your company. You proposed in a hallway that smelled like shrimp. Great story. Very romantic.”
“We’re not telling anyone that.”
“We’re absolutely telling people some version of that.”
“Ivy.”
“Roman.” Said it back the same flat, mocking tone, and something flickered across his face that wasn’t quite an annoyance. “Relax. I’m good at this. It’s literally my job. Making people believe a version of events that’s mostly true and a lot more charming than the actual logistics.”
“Strange thing to be proud of.”
“Pays my rent. Or it will now, thanks to you.” Said it lighter than I meant it. Something shifted in his face anyway, like he’d caught the weight under the joke even though I hadn’t meant to let it show.
The restaurant was the kind of place where the menu doesn’t list prices, which I’ve learned is its own specific red flag. Cameras went off the second we stepped out of the car, that burst of light that made my whole body flinch even though I’d braced for it, and Roman’s hand found the small of my back like it was nothing, like it was the most natural thing in the world, steering me through the little gauntlet of lenses toward the door.
“Easy.” Close to my ear, not for the cameras. Just for me. “You’re doing fine.”
I hadn’t realized I needed to hear that until he said it.
Inside, over some first course I couldn’t have named at gunpoint, we settled into something that wasn’t comfortable exactly but wasn’t the stiff hallway negotiation either. He asked what I actually did. Real work. Before this. I told him about the events I’d built from nothing, small businesses launched off a folding table and too much optimism, the year I catered forty weddings and learned more about human desperation than any therapist could teach.
“You’re good at reading rooms.” Not a question.
“Occupational necessity. You get good at knowing who’s about to cry, who’s about to fight, who’s five minutes from wrecking someone’s wedding over a seating chart. Learn to head it off before it happens.”
“Is that what you were doing at my gala? Heading it off.”
“That’s exactly what I was doing at your gala.”
He studied me across the table with that look I was starting to recognize the one where he seemed to be filing something away for later. Except this time it didn’t feel clinical. Felt like he actually wanted the information for its own sake, not for some file.
“My family’s going to ask you things like that,” he said. “At the estate. Sunday.”
“Figured.”
“They won’t all be friendly about it.”
“Didn’t figure that part was optional.”
Something tightened in his jaw, just slightly, and for a second I thought he might apologize for his own family in advance, which felt like such a strange thing to want from a near stranger that I almost didn’t recognize the wanting when it happened.
“You can still walk away,” he said instead. “Before Sunday. Before this gets harder to undo.”
“Are you trying to talk me out of the deal you offered me three days ago?”
“Making sure you know it’s still an option.”
“Noted.” Held his gaze, testing something I didn’t have a name for yet. “I’m not walking away, Roman. I signed the contract. I keep my word once I sign something. Ask literally anyone who’s ever hired me.”
He nodded slowly, like the answer satisfied something in him past the practical. And for one second, across a table in a restaurant that didn’t bother listing its prices, it stopped feeling like a business arrangement. It felt like the start of something neither of us had bothered writing a clause for.
We did it again on the way out. The whole performance. His hand at my waist, my head tipped toward his shoulder the way I’d seen a hundred times in paparazzi shots of couples who actually meant it, cameras going off in that relentless clatter that spiked my pulse every single time no matter how many times I told myself to expect it.
“Smile.” Barely moving his mouth. “Like you like me.”
“I do like you. Marginally. Don’t let it go to your head.”
That startled a real laugh out of him, quick and low, felt it more than heard it, his chest against my shoulder for half a second before he caught himself and smoothed it back into something more photogenic. Flashes kept going. Some reporter shouted something behind us about a wedding date and Roman just steered us both toward the car without answering, hand firm and warm on my back the whole way there.
“Don’t get too comfortable,” I muttered once we were in the car. Mostly to myself. Mostly reminding myself of something I was already starting to lose track of. “This is still fake.”
“I’m aware,” he said. Didn’t move his hand off the seat between us the entire ride home. Neither of us mentioned that either.
Car dropped me at my building around eleven. I was halfway up the front steps, key already out, when my phone buzzed. Unknown number.
This is Julian. Roman’s assistant, more or less. Sunday, 11am, someone will collect you for the estate. The dress code is understated, not flashy, the family notices everything. Also for what it’s worth that thing you did at the restaurant tonight, steering the crowd off the wedding date question. Smart. He noticed too.
Read it twice on my doorstep, cold air cutting through my coat, and felt something warm and stupid unspool in my chest that had no business being there at all.
Then, three minutes later, a second text. Julian again. Shorter. Something about it curdled the warmth cold almost instantly.
One more thing. The family already knows you’re coming Sunday. One of them asked for your mother’s name specifically before I’d even finished the briefing. Wanted to flag it in case it comes up weird. Probably nothing.
I stood on that doorstep a long time after. Keys in my hand. Not moving.
Probably nothing, he’d said.
I didn’t believe him. Not for one second.
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