Sentenced to Marriage

Chapter 16

The first step…

Mr. Edmond enjoyed enticing my curiosity but refused to say anything, more, claiming that some facts needed to be properly swallowed. I pouted, stating that it wasn’t fair, yet he stayed resilient. As we got down the hall, I finally got my purse back, along with my phone and documents

“Remember, you cannot tell anyone about the contract, and that includes your friends and family,” he warned, as he saw me checking all the missed calls on my phone.

I gave him a wry smile, acknowledging how hard it would be to lie to everyone for two years. First, I needed to come up with a believable story for Liam, but how could I explain getting married to a guy his ex was supposed to marry? As Mr. Edmond drove us to my apartment, I pondered whether or not to call Liam. In the end, I came up with an idiotic evasive response that I had sent in a text message.

“I’m OK, I’m still alive. My purse got lost and I’ve got it back only now.” He replied in less than a minute. “Thank God! I thought that this guy caught you and now you have to suffer some severe consequences.”

I laughed nervously at the phone. I wished I could tell him how close to the truth he was, except for the fact that it didn’t feel like suffering. Of course, there was also a possibility that I was slowly turning into a masochist. I couldn’t help it; part of me felt unexplainably excited and eager to taste the life of the richest, but at the same time, I felt like a complete hypocrite. I felt torn. I wouldn’t lie to say that this contract solved my major money problem; my Grandma could get the treatment she needed, and I didn’t need to worry about paying the rent and bills on time. All I needed to do in return was to play the character of a loving wife. It all looked too good to be true. I kept focusing on things I didn’t know, and that filled me with anxiety and made me impatiently wait to find out what the whole mess that I got myself into looked like. The sole fact that Aren was able to beat his bulky security guard stated that he wasn’t an ordinary boy from a wealthy family. And talking about the family, I found nothing about the Lans. Did Aren actually build his empire by himself?

“Welcome to my apartment,” I said, opening the door and letting Mr. Edmond in. “I will give you a tour. If you take a single step further, you will find yourself in my living-room-slash bedroom-slash-kitchen. And the little thing that looks like broom storage is a bathroom.” I chuckled a little mockingly.

“Jeez… how can you even breathe in here?” he asked, grimacing as he looked around my tiny space.

I narrowed my eyes at him. “I open the window and the air gets in.” “Oh, so the windows here actually open!” he exclaimed, and I couldn’t miss the sarcasm overflowing from that statement.

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“Are you that surprised to see people living in apartments that have less than two hundred square feet?” I smirked, crossing my arms over my chest.

“No. I’m surprised that you call THAT an apartment…” He sighed as he made his way to my

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couch.

His remarks didn’t insult me, or rather didn’t surprise me. I was well aware that the place / lived in wasn’t exactly livable. I would go insane if our workshop looked like my apartment. I hadn’t gone mad only because I merely used a bed to sleep in and a bathroom to shower in. “I would offer a something to drink, but I don’t have anything in here,” I said, making sure my annoyance surfaced.

“That’s OK.” Mr. Edmond obviously chose to ignore my tone and focused on evaluating things that were inside my room. “Do you want to move all of your stuff to Mr. Lan’s penthouse, or do you wish to get rid of some right now?” He looked at me, demandingly.

“I-I don’t know…”‘I smiled nervously, going through the list of objects I possessed.

It wasn’t much. There were a few worn clothes, mainly jeans and T-shirts, some documents, and old photos of Grandma and my Mom when she was a kid. The only expensive thing that I possessed was my laptop, which was temporarily in Liam’s possession. I remembered that I had been practically starving for six months to buy it. The few pieces of furniture that I had to buy when I moved in had cost me less than one-third of that compi

ost me less than one-third of that computer. Looking at the place, I had to admit that for me there was nothing aside from photos that held any value. “So… do you have something to pack?” Mr. Edmond urged. I smiled nervously. “I need the documents and photos from the cabinet, a few cosmetics from the bathroom, and my clothes…” Mr. Edmond stood up, walked to the closet, and opened it wide.

“Hey!” I frowned at his impertinence and stepped between him and my poor clothes. “What do you think you’re doing?!”

He smirked, raising his hands in surrender. “I assure you that you don’t need any of these. You need to look like a million dollars, not fifty cents.” He chuckled.

“I’m not saying that I would wear jeans to a party, but I still need comfortable clothes so I can work in the workshop,” I hissed.

Mr. Edmond sighed, “Very well… I will send a team to get the things you’ve mentioned. They will also get rid of the rest. I will settle the termination of your rental contract.”

I nodded, slowly realizing that I was probably seeing this place for the last time. I didn’t think that I would miss it, but at the same time, I felt as if I was losing my independence.

Mr. Edmond clapped his hands. “All right, let’s go.”

“Go… where?” I asked hesitantly.

“To the bar.” His response came.

“It’s 10 AM.”

“Yes, it is,” he said casually, and walked out the door, leaving it open for me to follow him.

I stared at him in disbelief, but then I figured that perhaps drinking before noon fit the whole crazy situation I was currently in…