Page 7 of Date and Switch

“Say we leave this meeting and I decide to do this thing. When would you be able to leave?”

Given my current employment situation with no prospects on the horizon, and the fact that I had to make a now or never decision about my apartment—this offer couldn’t have come at a better time.

“I just need to sort out getting my things into storage,” I say.

“So, next month?”

Wow. Next month. This was really happening. That seemed so soon. My head nodded though as if next month was totally the most sensible suggestion.

“Aren’t you worried about your work only having a month to prepare for you to be gone for almost a whole year?”

As soon as I asked the question, I realized my faux pas. Common sense screamed if the dude could spend what equated to a small house in most suburbs to take a trip around the world—dude wasn’t working for the man. Or maybe he had a trust fund. Either way, it was evident he answered to no one.

“My whole family work together. It’s a family-owned company.” He told me, “Also, there will be lots of downtime on the ship. There are at least three, possibly more periods where we’ll be at sea for an entire week. Those weeks I’ll absolutely be handling as much as I can.”

He didn’t owe me any explanations. The way he said it—with an authoritative edge that said he expected me to put up a fight about him working—spoke volumes as to where work fell on his priority list. Perhaps that was something he and the original Sarah fought over.

Don’t! I told myself. I refused to speculate on the reason for their relationship’s downfall. It wasn’t my business. Not only that, it was literally the only reason I got to go on this once-in-a-lifetime trip. What happened between them was Bryce’s story alone. He owed me nothing. I was a random stranger he was generously allowing to tag along.

“I should probably tell you before we get too far ahead of ourselves…” Felicity told me everything I needed to do to rectify what I was about to tell him, yet my stomach still cramped with nerves. “My legal name is Seraphim Miller. Sera is a nickname. I don’t think it will pose a problem.”

He halted his coffee halfway to his mouth, setting it back down with an aggressive thunk.

“Of course that is going to pose a problem. The flight, tickets, transfers, boarding passes, excursions, and reservations are all under the name Sarah M. Miller. Changing a middle initial or adding an H to Sarah I figured could be explained away, but this?”

He ran a hand down his face before pushing a lock of his bramble-colored hair off his forehead. It looked really soft. Why couldn’t I stop noticing the most random details about him? As if this were a date. In a way it felt date like. My lady parts needed to get the memo that this was nothing more than two hopefully eventual friends planning a trip.

“Do you have your confirmation with you?” I asked, holding out my hand.

He pulled up the confirmation on his phone and passed it to me. In a single ring I was connected to customer service with a projected wait time of nine minutes. When the line rang and Tamryn connected I realized we never actually confirmed I would be going with him.

“Hi Tamryn,” I began, feeling the adrenaline spike in my blood stream while I spoke. “I need to correct an error on a ticket reservation. You see, my fiancé booked my ticket under a nickname. In his excitement, he forgot that legally I’m Seraphim Miller, not Sarah Miller.”

“Let’s get that taken care of then.” I could hear her rapid-fire typing while she spoke with me. “I will need to speak with the reservation maker, is Mr. Ellis nearby?”

I handed him my phone as if it were a hot potato and he was “it.”

“Bryce Ellis.” Given how business-y he looked for this coffee outing, his brusque phone etiquette shouldn’t come as any surprise. However, it didn’t jive with the idea I had of who Bryce Ellis was in my head. “That’s correct. Seraphim Miller. I’m sorry for my oversight. Yes, her middle name is…”

“Claire.” I whispered, trying not to giggle at how panicked he looked when he didn’t have the answer readily available. “December twenty fourth, nineteen eighty-eight,” I whispered, knowing they’d ask that next.

“Yes, it’s twelve twenty-four eighty-eight. I know. I realize that isn’t what is in the system. When the last representative took my information, I was in such a hurry to just get it booked to give to my fiancé.” His voice pinched when he said it. Like the words didn’t even want to come out of his mouth, “I made up her birthday because I didn’t want to ruin the surprise. Boy was I wrong, huh? Overshot that one by about six years. No, of course I know how old she is, I just couldn’t do the backwards math in my head fast enough to determine what year that would equate to. I appreciate your understanding. Oh, our departure date, of course let me confer with my fiancé just one moment.”

Bryce pressed the mute button on my iPhone and covered the microphone, “So fake fiancé of mine—it appears there are only two bookings left for this cruise, three weeks from now or Christmas eve.”

Looks like we were headed around the world in three weeks.

five

I was insane. I had to be. Breaking up with Sarah had officially broken my brain. In one hour and fifty-three minutes I’d be on a plane to Miami ready to embark on a seven-month journey around the world with a woman I barely knew.

My sister-in-law thought this was the best idea Penn ever had. She wanted me to be a regular on her radio show. Technically both Sera and me. Tillie—who went by Raven on the air—insisted that ever since they’d discussed my drunken little TikTok people called into her show on the regular looking for updates.

Being in the hotel industry allowed for a lot of work to be done concurrent to this time away. This was a perfect opportunity to research the European expansion Penn and I had worked on over the last year or so. While we explored Europe, I could research the towns that had a need for a boutique hotel for the mid-tier Euro-Tour traveler. Someone who typically would travel in a mid-tier price point. Not quite a Best Western or a Motel 6, but not the Ritz either.

“We need a ‘let’s get this party started’ first day picture.”

Sera flopped into the chair next to me, barely maintaining a firm grip on the champagne flute she held in her hand.

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