Chapter 3 #2
“Come sit,” Wesley nods at a bench near the edge of the rink, slightly out of the traffic. I hesitate—work brain says I should be shooting, not sitting, but my legs say try me, and my heart says don’t be stupid.
I sit.
Wesley drops beside me, careful not to touch. “You okay?” he asks without looking at me.
“Fine.” I take a sip. “My dignity’s at large. If found, return to owner.”
He huffs. “You did great. You’ll be passing me by New Year’s.”
I giggle. “Thanks for not letting me go viral as the girl who concussed herself at Rockefeller Center.”
“Any time.” He tilts his head. “You seem...different today.”
I choke on hot chocolate. “Different how?”
“A little...” He grins. “Wobblier than usual.”
I swat him. “Wobblier? That’s your medical diagnosis?”
“Yes,” he says solemnly. “Terminal case.”
I laugh, but something in my chest slips its leash. Snow flurries. Tree lights blink. Ris is squealing like she’s auditioning for Broadway. I should leave. I should put distance between us before I ask to sit in my coworker’s lap.
Instead I stay. Because he’s warm and solid and he hasn’t once looked at me like I’m a problem to solve.
“Hey,” Wesley says, lower now. “You wanna tell me what’s bugging you?”
The truth sits heavy on my tongue. I could lie. Or I could do the reckless thing.
“I’m...coming to terms with losing my inheritance in ten days.”
His brow ticks up. “What’d you do, kill somebody?”
“Much worse. I turned out to be a modern, independent woman.”
“And that’s...frowned upon?”
“My late grandmother thought so.” I sip cocoa to buy time. “She put it in writing. Engaged by twenty-five or lose the trust. I mean, who even gets married that young anymore?” I snort, bitter and amused. “That’s basically adolescence with a credit card.”
The truth tastes bitter. If I lose this money, I lose the foundation I’m building. Those girls don’t get free dance classes, and it’s like my grandmother wins even after she’s dead.
“Ah.” His mouth curves dryly. “The ultimate crime. Breaking tradition. Also known as terror by dead people.”
I blink at him. “You just casually dismantle social constructs between shifts?”
“Pretty much.” His knee bumps mine. Heat zips up my leg. “Is it a lot of money?”
“It’s not about the money really,” I mutter.
“It’s the principle.” I pause, then launch into my rant.
“It’s not like being twenty-five now is the same as when Grandma was twenty-five.
” I roll my eyes. “Back then, they danced all night, stumbled home smelling of tequila, and called it romance. Us?” I gesture at my cup.
“We’re up at five a.m. journaling our intentions, choking down green smoothies, and sweating through Pilates. We’re basically monks in hoodies.”
He raises an eyebrow. “So what’s the Brule?”
“Brule?”
“Bullshit rule.”
God, I like this guy. “Get engaged by New Year’s Eve or forfeit my inheritance.” He doesn’t flinch. Just listens. “I found out a few days ago.” My words crack slightly. “Not exactly enough time to order a fiancé on Prime.”
“Nope,” Wesley snorts. Then, “So what are you going to do? Follow the brule? Or make your own?”
I bark out a laugh. “I’m not dating. Not like I can speed-run a relationship.”
“No boyfriend, huh?” He keeps it easy, but a corner of his mouth ticks up, quick and gone.
I take another sip, then blurt before I can think better of it. “What I need is a fake fiancé. Like in a Christmas movie. Borrow one, keep the receipt, return January first.”
His look sparks for a heartbeat. “You’d still try it on, tag tucked in? To see if it fits?”
I nearly snort the hot chocolate. He drinks, all innocence, but his eyes give him away. We’re watching the same reel.
“Would be efficient,” he adds casually.
“Easy,” I rasp, glaring over the rim of my cup. “Shame those don’t exist.”
Then he really turns, gaze steady on mine. “Why not?”
“Why not what?”
“Why not find one?”
“I was joking.” I think.
“I’m not.” He breathes, slow and certain. “I’d do it. If you think I’d pass muster.”
Rockefeller Center hums. The lights blink. The city holds its breath.
“You would?” I ask, my laugh coming out strangled. “We barely know each other.”
“We work together. We live in the same building.”
“We share an elevator sometimes. That’s not the same as—” I gesture helplessly. “Wesley, this is insane.”
“So is losing out on your inheritance because your dead grandmother had opinions.”
“It sounds too easy,” I say, because saying yes would make me a lunatic.
“How hard can it be?” He counts it off, practical. “We convince whoever needs convincing. Trustee? Lawyer? Parents?”
“Sure, I suppose. But what’s in it for you?”
He’s quiet for a beat. I watch his expression shift—vulnerability cracking through the easy charm.
“You don’t have to tell me,” I say quietly.
“No, it’s—You told me your issue.” He scrubs a hand over his face.
“Everyone back home thinks I made the wrong choice,” he says slowly, like he’s pulling each word out with pliers.
“Left Alaska for the professional hockey league. Chose money over roots, fame over family.” He looks at the ice.
“My ex is engaged to a guy who works my dad’s boat.
Stable. Reliable.” He shrugs, trying to make it light, but fails.
“The thing is, she’s probably right. He can give her everything she wanted. But it still fucking stings.”
“You want to prove you didn’t sacrifice everything.”
“Something like that.” His voice drops. “And honestly? I want her to feel it. That gut punch when you realize the person you thought would always be yours...isn’t.” His eyes meet mine, unflinching. “That makes me sound like an asshole.”
“No,” I say. “It makes you sound hurt.”
He exhales; his shoulders loosen. “Everyone back home pities me. ‘Poor Wesley, couldn’t keep his girl.’ I’m tired of being the guy who got dumped.” He leans forward, elbows on his knees. “Showing up engaged changes the narrative. Suddenly I’m not the loser. I’m the guy who moved on and upgraded.”
“Upgraded,” I repeat, mouth twitching. Is that what I am in this scenario? An upgrade? Proof that he didn’t fail?
Then again, I’m using him to avoid Bennett the fucking Fourth. So maybe we’re even.
“You know what I mean.”
I do. We’re both trying to prove something to people who don’t deserve the effort.
“I need two days from you,” he says. “Christmas in Alaska. We give the town a show. When Hannah sees us—happy, engaged, winning—maybe she remembers what she walked away from. And I get to enjoy my schadenfreude.” He grins. “That’s German for ‘scoreboard, bitch.’”
“And I get a fiancé to flash at brunch. Festive.” I lift my glass, mouth curving. “Frohe Weihnachten.”
“Yeah.” His grin sharpens. “But at least we’re honest about it. Well, to ourselves,” he corrects himself.
I study him. His gaze is steady. The tree glows, proud of itself.
I find myself picturing two futures: brunch with pearls, and a woman who lets a lumberjack teach her to stand on blades. My mother’s face. Bennett’s waxy smile. My uncle’s reassurance that says he’ll burn a building for me.
Ten days.
“Deal,” I hear myself say.
His smile goes feral. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” The word comes out steadier than I feel.
He extends his hand like we’re closing a business transaction. I take it. His palm is warm, calloused from hockey sticks and God knows what else.
“Partners?” he asks.
“Partners.”
We shake on it, there on a bench at Rockefeller Center while snow falls and the tree glows and somewhere in Alaska, his ex-girlfriend plans a wedding.
My phone buzzes again. Mother, probably. Or Bennett. Or the universe, trying to warn me.
I silence it and turn to Wesley. “So. When do we start?”
He grins—the kind of grin that makes sensible women do reckless things. “How about now?”