10. Cara
CARA
The day of the wedding was overcast, and Cara was hard-pressed not to let it get to her.
It’s not my wedding, she reminded herself, as she had so often over the last several days. It doesn’t matter if it isn’t living up to my expectations. Yes, she would have liked to marry on a sunny day, but there was no reason today’s weather should be bothering her.
Maybe it’s just because I’m focusing on the optics.
What it’s going to look like in pictures.
Because that is my concern. She sighed and closed her eyes.
Everything had been going so well thus far.
All they had left to do was to get through today, and then the wedding would be behind them and they could turn their focus to football.
She knew Liam would be easier to handle once he’d been allowed to do that.
He cared so much more about football than he did about his public image.
In a way, there was something pure about that. She respected him for it. All he really wanted was to play the game he loved. She was pretty sure he would give up fame and fortune if he needed to, just to keep playing.
Not that he would like it.
She pulled her phone out of the pocket of her pantsuit. She was waiting for a message from Stephanie, who should already be on her way to the church.
Everything else was in place. Liam was waiting at the altar, along with the priest they’d secured for the occasion.
There was no congregation. This was going to be handled privately, and then there would be a public announcement once it was all over.
But there were flowers decorating the building—the white roses Cara had chosen—and Stephanie’s wedding gown, an elaborate lace and satin affair, was hanging in the church’s coat closet.
She was going to have to get changed quickly.
Cara hoped she’d have had the sense to do her hair before coming to the church, because there wasn’t going to be a lot of time for that sort of thing, and it was important for her to look good in the pictures.
She stepped into the bathroom and examined her own reflection.
She had done her hair and makeup and put on a formal gown for the occasion, thinking she might step into the background of some of the photos and claim to have been here as Stephanie’s maid of honor.
That would put a more legitimate face on the whole thing.
She smoothed her hands over the lavender satin of her gown. Always a bridesmaid, never a bride.
What an odd thought that was. She wasn’t a bridesmaid at all. It was all for show.
Her phone rang. She gasped, fumbling, and almost dropped it. “Stephanie?”
“No, it’s me.” It was Alastair. “I’m in the stairwell behind the altar. Are you telling me she isn’t here yet?”
“She’s only five minutes late,” Cara said.
“But we haven’t heard from her yet?” Alastair pushed. “Are we sure she’s coming?”
“Of course she’s coming. She signed a contract,” Cara said, but Alastair had said out loud the thing that had been worrying her all day.
What if Stephanie didn’t show up? This would get out; it was bound to.
Between the florists and the priest and the people who had decorated the church and the dressmaker and Stephanie herself, there were too many people involved to hope that a secret could be kept here.
That wasn’t an issue if there was a wedding, of course.
They had always planned to reveal that vendors had been hired for the big day.
But how could they explain all this without the marriage to back it up?
“I’ll call you back,” she told Alastair, her voice shaking.
“You’d better figure this out,” he snapped. “The worst thing we can do is leave our clients worse off than they were when we found them, and if there’s a public scandal about a fake marriage…”
He trailed off. He didn’t have to say it. She understood. All the hits Liam’s reputation had taken so far would look like small potatoes if things didn’t go the way they were supposed to today.
Stephanie wouldn’t bail on us. She was already dialing Stephanie’s number, having terminated the call with Alistair without saying goodbye.
“Cara?” Stephanie’s voice was small. She sounded like she had been crying.
“Are you on your way?” Cara knew the answer before Stephanie spoke, but even so, she hoped. “Liam is waiting at the altar. We’re all waiting.”
Stephanie took a long, shuddering breath. “I can’t do it.”
“Stephanie…we had a deal. You signed a contract.”
“I know I did. I spoke with a lawyer about an hour ago.”
“You talked to a lawyer already?” Cara was numb with shock and horror. “You could have called me, then!”
“My lawyer says I can probably get out of it if I’m willing to pay a fee. He says you guys aren’t going to force me to get married against my will, so you won’t press charges unless I break the nondisclosure clause. And I won’t do that. I don’t want to do Mr. Sims any harm.”
“But this is going to do him harm,” Cara said. “He’s depending on you. On this marriage.”
“I can’t,” Stephanie said. “I can’t stop thinking about what you told me, about how when I show up in that wedding gown it’ll be the way I’m introduced to the world.
You’re right about that. This is what people will remember me for.
Years from now, when I’m trying to make a name for myself as an actress, the first thing people will think of is my short marriage to a football star.
It’ll stay with me forever, even after the marriage ends.
And I can’t do that. I’m sorry. I just can’t. ”
Cara wanted to go on arguing with Stephanie, but the truth was, she couldn’t think of any good arguments. Stephanie had just made far too much sense. Of course she didn’t want to go through with this marriage. Why would she?
It was always a long shot.
But now Cara felt as though a great chasm was opening beneath her. She had depended on this. This was the way she had envisioned for Liam to get his good name back. And now it was falling apart.
She got off the phone, her heart racing. What was she supposed to do now? Making her way out of the bathroom, she looked over at the wedding dress hanging up in the coat closet.
No. No way.
And yet…
Liam had to get married today. That much was unavoidable. There was going to have to be a wedding, one way or another. Before she had the chance to give serious thought to what she was doing, Cara had taken the dress off the hangar and returned to the bathroom with it.
It doesn’t really matter who the bride is, does it? As long as someone walks down the aisle, and as long as she doesn’t have any scandal attached to her…
God. Was she seriously considering this?
It might be the only way. That was the thing.
They couldn’t have a wedding without a bride.
Stephanie and Cara were close enough in size that Cara would probably be able to fit into that dress.
Liam was desperate enough for the whole thing to work that he wouldn’t protest. And Alastair would probably be impressed that she had managed to pull it off in the face of a wrench being thrown in the gears.
I’ll definitely get that promotion if this goes the way I want it to. In a few weeks, I’ll be taking new clients, Liam will be back on the Stingers, and the marriage will be dissolved.
So really, what was the downside?
She took a deep breath, fighting to steady her nerves. It was now or never.
Quickly, before she could change her mind, she shucked off her dress and stepped into the wedding gown. Fortunately, it closed with a zip. If she’d had to do up laces, she didn’t think she could have managed it.
She regarded herself in the mirror with a mounting sense of the surreal. This is my wedding day. This is my wedding gown. But it wasn’t, of course, not really. She was doing this because she had to. It wasn’t going to be a real wedding. It wasn’t going to be a marriage.
Her phone buzzed again.
It was Alastair. He had texted a single word, in all caps. WELL?!
Cara decided to leave the phone in the bathroom. She could recover it afterward.
She hurried out the door and toward the nave, pausing only to grab a bouquet of white roses from one of the vases she passed along the way.
Who knew when the photos would start? Thank goodness she’d had the foresight to do her own hair and makeup, though she could never have guessed the day might progress as it was currently going.
This can’t be happening, a small part of her mind protested. I’m going to wake up and find out that I’m dreaming the whole thing, that none of it is real.
But then she was opening the door to the nave and walking through, and there was Liam, standing at the altar.
For a moment, he seemed not to have noticed that one bride had been replaced with another. He glanced at her, glanced away, and then turned a fixed gaze back to her, his eyes going wide.
Cara was torn. She wanted to rush down the aisle to his side so that she could get to work explaining herself.
At the same time, embarrassment had suddenly overwhelmed her.
What was she thinking, standing in as his bride without even asking him first?
This had the potential to be intensely humiliating.
What was she going to do if she got to the altar and he shook his head, said that this was never what they had agreed to, and walked off?
He’d be perfectly within his rights if he did.
She was changing the deal on him, showing up like this when he had been expecting Stephanie.
Maybe he wouldn’t be interested in this plan if it meant he had to marry Cara.
And why do I care? It’s not as if I’m so eager to be married to him. I’m doing him a favor. Honestly, he should thank me on bended knee. Of course he wouldn’t be reasonable to reject me. He would be a fool to do that.
As all these thoughts went through her head, she was continuing down the aisle, drawing closer and closer to Liam.
Already, there could be no turning back.
Already she was committed to this course of action.
To leave now would be to create a story of a runaway bride, which would be even worse than the gossip they’d have risked if she had done nothing at all.
If she was going to get them through this mess, she had to stick with her plan, as awkward as it was.
She reached Liam’s side.
“What are you doing?” he hissed at her.
“Trust me,” she murmured. “Just trust me.”
He stared at her as if she was asking him to jump out of a plane without a parachute, but he must have realized that he had no choice in the matter. A moment later, with a low but audible groan, he was slipping his arm through hers and turning back toward the priest.
The priest made no remark.
It occurred to Cara that he had never met Stephanie. He probably didn’t even realize anything was out of order.
The last thing she noticed before the ceremony began was Alastair, emerging from behind the altar with a look of shock on his face.
And then the priest was leading them into their vows, and Cara’s spontaneous marriage to a client was officially underway.