Page 34 of Charlie and Her Sweet Escape
Why,whydid I think Rosie would be the voice of reason?
“It’s a simple fiancé swap!” she finished with a bright smile.
“For the love …” Bennett said under his breath. “Fiancé swap? It sounds like you’re making up a whole new reality show.”
While the two bickered about her wording, I sank into the couch, dazed.
Marry Bennett. BennettForrester. It wasn’t like I’d never considered the possibility before—entire journal pages had been dedicated to doodling Charlotte Forrester with hearts all around it. But that was years ago. When I was a little baby teenager who still believed that happiness was within my grasp.
“It’s a marriage of convenience,” Rosie insisted, bringing me back into the conversation. “They happenallthe time.”
“No, they don’t,” Bennett said.
“In fiction they do,” I murmured. I knew how her brain worked.
“Exactly.” She threw both her hands out excitedly.
Bennett frowned. “Don’t get her started on this ‘exactly’ track.”
“This is the real world,” I argued with her, my mind finally catching up with what they were suggesting.
“Exac—”
“We’d get married in four days,” Bennett said over Rosie. “Just like the producers fromWildare planning.”
“Like, married for real? Not a fake wedding?”
“For real,” Rosie said. “Jules says your contract states it needs to be a legal marriage.”
The contract. I regretted signing it. Applying for the show. Ever watching it in the first place. I should have cashed out my tiny retirement account despite my mom’s objections.
“I can’t ask you to do that,” I said to Bennett.
“Technically, I asked you,” he said, with that quirk of his mouth again that made me wish I could see more of it through his beard.
I dropped my head into my hands, overwhelmed. Hansel woke up at my sudden movement and hopped from my lap to Bennett’s, where he curled into a ball and fell back asleep. “Why, though?” I whispered.
“It’s the only solution,” he said.
“No. Why would you agree to do this?” I stared at him, a sudden rush of energy flowing through me. “You can’t marry me, Bennett! You need to find someone you love and marry her and have adorable little Bennett babies who you teach how to sail and catch fish and wear shirts entirely too big for them that they steal from your closet.” Why did that vision make me suddenly want to cry again?
“You’re one of my best friends, Charlie.”
“That’s not reason enough,” I argued. I’d seen Bennett give endlessly to everyone around him, often at his own expense. I didn’t want to be another person putting him last.
“Forrester Expeditions is falling down around him, and he doesn’t have enough money for all the repairs he needs to keep it open,” Rosie blurted.
“Can’t you get a loan?” I asked him.
“Not for the amount I need,” he said. “I’m already paying off loans for the shop and my boat.”
“Oh. That makes sense. And you can get off work for that long?”
“It’s the slow season. I’ll send my few remaining clients over to one of my friends.”
Some of the tenseness left my shoulders, and I really considered the idea. Bennett loved the fishing shop. I couldn’t imagine him without it. If this arrangement—this marriage ofconvenience—could help him, too, then maybe it was okay. Bennett and me, married. I would be an official Forrester. For a while, at least.
I pressed a hand against my stomach. Was Iactuallyconsidering this? I’d gone along with so many Rosie schemes throughout the years, I’d lost count. But this wasmarriage. “It wouldn’t be a real,realmarriage, right? Just a legal business arrangement called marriage?”
