Chapter 1: The Marriage We Signed Like a Joke
The first time I married Lucien Blackwood, I was seventeen and laughing.
Not because it was funny, but because if I stopped laughing, I might have cried, and crying in front of a boy who looked like he owned the world felt like losing twice.
The office smelled like cheap air freshener and old paper. There was a crooked poster on the wall that read LEGAL AID FOR ALL, peeling at the edges as if even it had lost faith. My shoes were too worn, my dress borrowed, and my hands kept twisting together in my lap like they wanted to escape my body.
Lucien sat across from me, relaxed, tall, and annoyingly calm for someone about to sign away a year of his life.
"You're shaking," he said, glancing at my hands.
"I'm cold," I lied.
"It's thirty degrees outside."
"I'm dramatic."
That made his lips twitch, just a little. Not a smile. Lucien Blackwood didn't smile easily. I had learned that in the three weeks since our lives crashed into each other like badly written fate.
The lawyer cleared his throat. "If you're both ready, we can proceed."
Ready.
I glanced at the contract again, the words blurring together no matter how many times I read them. One year. Legal marriage. No emotional obligation. Financial compensation. Confidentiality.
No love.
My chest tightened at that last unspoken rule, like my heart had already been warned not to try.
Lucien picked up the pen first, spinning it between his fingers. "You can still back out," he said quietly, so the lawyer wouldn't hear. "I won't force you."
I laughed again, sharp and brittle. "And go back to what? My mom's hospital bills? Sleeping in a friend's living room? Pretending I don't hear the landlord's voice in my dreams?"
His jaw tightened. Guilt flickered across his face, quick and gone. "I didn't mean—"
"I know," I cut in. "You meant well. Rich people always do."
That finally earned me a real look, his dark eyes locking onto mine. There was something there I didn't understand yet. Something heavy. Something lonely.
"Sign," I said, sliding the paper toward him. "Before I change my mind."
Lucien signed his name like it was just another business deal, neat and confident. When he passed the pen to me, it suddenly felt heavier than it should have.
This is just a contract, I told myself. Just a year. Just pretending.
My name looked small beside his.
Arielle Monroe.
The lawyer smiled, clapping his hands once. "Congratulations. You're officially married."
Lucien and I stared at each other.
Then we both burst out laughing.
It was ridiculous. Two teenagers, married by paperwork, tied together by desperation and money neither of us wanted to talk about. If anyone had told me that moment would become the beginning of the worst heartbreak of my life, I would've laughed harder.
Outside, the sun was too bright for something so serious. Lucien's car waited by the curb, sleek and black, the kind of car people stared at. I hesitated before getting in, suddenly aware of the invisible line I was crossing.
"Rules," Lucien said as he drove. "We should set them."
I nodded. "Rule one: don't treat me like I'm something you bought."
He glanced at me, surprised. "I wouldn't."
"Rule two: no controlling my life. School stays. Friends stay."
"Agreed."
"Rule three," I said, then paused. My voice dropped. "We don't fall in love."
Silence filled the car, thick and uncomfortable.
Lucien exhaled slowly. "That won't be a problem."
I told myself the strange sting in my chest was just nerves.
Living with Lucien was like living in a different universe. His house was quiet in a way that felt expensive, every surface clean, every room too big. My laughter echoed there, out of place, like graffiti on marble.
"Do you always talk this much?" he asked on the first night, watching me pace the living room.
"Do you always talk this little?" I shot back.
That became our thing. Me filling the silence. Him pretending he didn't like it.
At school, rumors exploded within days. A ring didn't stay secret long, especially not on a girl who used to worry about lunch money. Girls stared. Boys whispered. Teachers looked at me like I'd grown up overnight.
Lucien insisted on picking me up sometimes, leaning against his car while students pretended not to stare.
"You're embarrassing me," I told him once.
"You married me," he replied calmly. "That was the embarrassing part."
I laughed, then stopped when I realized I liked standing beside him too much.
At night, the house grew quieter. That was when the contract felt loudest. We slept in separate rooms, a hallway between us like a warning. Sometimes I heard him pacing late at night. Sometimes he heard me crying softly into my pillow, thinking I was alone.
We never talked about those nights.
Weeks passed. Jokes came easier. Arguments too. Lucien learned how I took my tea. I learned how he hated thunderstorms and pretended not to. We were playing house, and somewhere along the way, the pretending started to feel dangerous.
One evening, after a stupid argument about dishes, I blurted, "Why did you choose me?"
Lucien froze.
"For the contract," I added quickly. "Why me?"
He didn't answer right away. Then, quietly, "Because you didn't look at me like I was a solution."
I didn't understand then. I just knew something inside me shifted.
That night, I lay awake, staring at the ceiling, the ring cold against my finger. I told myself this was temporary. That feelings were off-limits. That contracts didn't have hearts.
But my heart didn't know how to read legal documents.
And somewhere between borrowed laughter and silent nights, between rules we swore to follow and moments we pretended didn't matter, I began to realize something terrifying.
This marriage was supposed to last one year.
I wasn't sure my heart would survive that long.