The Billionaire’s Fake Wife (Book 4): (Crystal Beach Resort Standalone Series)

by Hart, Hanna

  Yet, here he was, staring in the mirror and adjusting his bowtie for an over-the-top flapper wedding wherein he was the groom.

  Willow had gabbed away with his mother over the course of three intense weeks of wedding planning. This meant she was at his mother’s home nearly every night talking about table settings, eating mini cakes, and discussing themes.

  Oh, the themes.

  Many were discussed. An old Hollywood wedding, rustic, floral, bohemian.

  “What’s a flapper?” Ryder asked Willow when she insisted they have a flapper-themed wedding.

  Willow turned to him with such shock and awe that he almost burst out laughing.

  “What’s a flapper?” she repeated in mock shock. “Um. Only one of the most awesome generations in the entire world.”

  “Must not be,” he’d said casually, “because I’ve never heard of them.”

  “Flappers were these awesome women who had bobbed hair, um, hello!” she said, pointing to her own ‘lob’ hairstyle. “They listened to jazz and wore these awesome beaded dressed. They wore too much makeup, drove cars, and flouted social and sexual norms!”

  “Flouted, she says,” Ryder teased as he raised a brow to his mother.

  “Really, dear,” his mother said, “You’ve never heard of the Roaring Twenties?”

  Ryder shrugged. “So, what does it mean to have a flapper wedding?” he asked. “Do I have to wear a beaded dress?”

  Willow rolled her eyes and handed him her phone, encouraging him to scroll through a gallery of photos she had saved. By the end of the sixth photo, he got the gist.

  Girls in boxy beaded dresses with elaborate headpieces, bold black, white, and gold decorations, feathers and pearls, lots of play regarding prohibition and designing the bar like a speakeasy.

  Very… kitsch.

  Roy Edgars, his father’s campaign manager, had taken on a different hat in recent weeks and seemed far too eager to help plan the wedding. It was all part of the rejuvenation effort. He had insisted that the best way to make a splash with the wedding was to have it themed. Something fun and watchable.

  The sparkling glitz of the flapper era encouraged guests to dress up in period pieces. It also hooked the interest of tourism boards, wedding companies, and tabloids across the world.

  Ryder suggested that in order to get his father’s reputation back on track, perhaps they shouldn’t base the wedding around a time period known for illegal dealings with alcohol and the mafia, but his commentary was dismissed.

  As was the custom for a groom’s opinion, he supposed.

  Ryder shrugged as he stared down at the photos. It wasn’t until he had swiped out of the wedding photos that his interest piqued.

  He came across a selfie of Willow, cheek to cheek with a middle-aged blond man with enough facial scruff to make Ryder itch his chin.

  “Hey!” Willow said, taking the phone out of his hands.

  “Boyfriend?” he asked, raising both brows in a playful accusation.

  “No, of course not a boyfriend,” she said pointedly. “I am about to be a married woman, after all.”

  “Oh, leave her alone,” his mother laughed, separating the two.

  His mother had done this a lot in the course of the last three weeks. They bickered like kids and had dinner at his parents’ house frequently. In some ways, it was like the two were teenagers again.

  His parents had moved Willow and her various belongings to Nani Makai island and put her up in the resort temporarily until they were married.

  And then she would move in.

  This thought horrified him. He had only ever lived with Miranda before, and the idea of having to share his space with someone again made him feel itchy and claustrophobic.

  Now it was the day of the wedding. The stage was set.

  Initially, his mother had chosen the Crystal Beach Resort lagoon for the site of the ceremony. She didn’t know its significance to them or their past love. She didn’t know that the lagoon was the exact location where they had professed their love for one another so many years ago.

  Ryder had been about to protest the location, but Willow immediately bounded up with excitement. “It’s perfect!” she had announced. “’Cause remember we went there once?” she recalled. “Tabloids will eat that up!”

  Ryder frowned at her willingness to throw away their memory as magazine fodder. He shuffled Willow away from his mother’s listening ears and whispered, “We’re not sharing that story with anyone.”

  “Why not?” she asked. “I think it’s sweet.”

  “Yeah, it was sweet. But that was our lives, Willow. Our moment. It’s not some plucky story that I want to see scattered across the newspaper.”

  “What does it matter?” she asked curiously, cocking a thick brow. “We’ve been broken up for a long time now.”

  “It matters to me,” he said.

  Willow gently pushed his shoulder and whispered, “Why, Ryder Prescott, you’re a sentimental one.”

  Ryder rolled his eyes. “You’re the first person I ever said ‘I love you’ to. Forgive me if I don’t want that memory ruined by a bunch of fake bull so that my ma can paint a happy family picture for the public.”

  Willow thought about it for no more than thirty seconds before she nodded at Ryder and said, “Okay, Prescott. No storytelling and we won’t get married at the lagoon.”

  “Thank you,” he nodded.

  Instead, they would be married in one of the lavish ballrooms supplied by Crystal Beach resorts.

  His parents had booked Ryder and the entire bridal party rooms in the resort. Being the President of the island gave Tag a hefty discount on the luxury price tag of the island resort, which was good considering they had flown nearly all of Willow’s friends and family out for the occasion.

  Ryder’s parents lived in a mansion on the island that was certainly big enough to host a lavish wedding. But of course, that wouldn’t generate as much buzz as Crystal Beach would. They were known worldwide for their spectacular weddings.

  “You almost ready to go, man?” came the raspy voice of Ashton Fletcher—Ryder’s best man at both of his weddings now.

  “Almost,” Ryder said, staring into the mirror at the hollow image of himself.

  Although his mind knew this marriage was a farce—a wedding of convenience, as his mother liked to remind him—his heart couldn’t help but grow nervous and wary. He had so much about himself to fix before he could be a good husband to anyone. There was so much he wished he was better at. So many qualities he wished he didn’t have.

  Even at a fake wedding, he couldn’t help but reflect on his marriage to Miranda. How happy he had been and then how quickly that love left him.

  Did love mean so little to him now that he was willing to marry someone for show?

  “I can’t believe you’re doing this again,” Mark, a groomsman, said, resting a cold hand on Ryder’s shoulder. “I’m genuinely surprised.”

  “I’m not,” Ashton said with a smug laugh as he poured everyone in the room a celebratory scotch.

  “What do you mean?” Ryder asked, spinning around in his chair before declining the drink.

  “Yeah, what do you mean?” Mark piped up. “The whole thing with Miranda is a disaster. Still is!” Mark looked at Ryder. “No offense.”

  “Do you not hear the way he talks about this girl?” Ashton said, speaking about Willow.

  “Yeah, so?” Mark asked.

  “I’ve been waiting for these guys to get back together since high school,” Ashton said. “You didn’t know Ry at the time, but I’m tellin’ you, it was all Willow and Ryder. You didn’t invite one somewhere without expecting the other. I’ve never seen him so freaking happy before.”

  “Really?” Ryder asked.

  “Yeah, really,” Ashton said with a laugh.

  His best man knew Ryder and Willow back when they’d first met. He was all for the relationship. He never seemed put out by the fact that Willow would tag along on their adventu
res. Probably because Willow often was the adventure.

  Ashton was one of the few people from Ryder’s childhood that he was still incredibly close to. Best friends with, actually. He was also one of the only ones he’d ever come close to telling why he and Willow broke up.

  He also hadn’t been able to tell him that this marriage was a sham. He just couldn’t bring himself to say the words.

  So, instead of being outraged or bursting into laughter, Ashton’s reaction to his sudden nuptials had been genuine happiness.

  “To be honest,” Ashton continued after taking another sip off his glass, “when you married Miranda, I was kind of shocked. For some reason, I always just assumed you and Willow would patch up whatever it was that sent you both into such a spiral.”

  Ryder blinked in surprise. “I didn’t know that.”

  “Yeah, well, guess who’s, always right?” Ashton laughed.

  Before Ryder had the chance to ask his friend for any other wise foretelling of the future, there was a knock at the door.

  “Knock, knock!” came Willow’s familiar voice as she burst through the door to his room.

  He turned to look at his faux bride-to-be and was stunned as he caught sight of her.

  “Hey,” he said dumbly.

  “Hey,” Willow said with a wide, toothy grin before she caught sight of Ashton and, in a more exuberant voice, she said, “Hey!” and ran over to the man, embracing him in a warm, tight hug.

  “Hey, look at you!” Ashton said happily, craning his neck back to look at the woman. “What a stunner!”

  “Thanks,” Willow smiled did a little spin for the boys.

  “I was just telling Ryder here how I knew you guys were always going to get back together,” Ashton said, and Ryder could feel his face getting hot.

  “Is that right?” Willow asked flirtatiously, narrowing her eyes across the room at Ryder.

  “Yeah. When you guys broke up, none of the old group thought it would last. And look who was right,” Ashton said.

  “Looks like that’s you, big boy,” she teased. “Hey, you think I could get a moment alone with my groom?”

  “Sure thing,” Ashton said before leaving the room with Mark and the bottle of scotch.

  Ryder bit his lip and looked over his ex-girlfriend. She wore a short silk dress that came up above her knees. Over top the plain silk dress was a long, intricately beaded gold cover with crystals and a long, beaded fringe at the bottom, almost like a delicate chainmail designed just for her body.

  He wanted to tell her how absolutely beautiful she looked. Instead, all he could muster was, “Are you supposed to be here?”

  “Relax,” she giggled and sat on the chair next to his. “I’m not really your bride, remember? It’s not like we’re jinxing the wedding.” Then she mocked, “Oh no, he’s seen the bride before the wedding! Now they’ll probably get divorced, or something.”

  “I’m estimating in about one year’s time,” he said in his best nineteen-twenties’ detective drawl.

  “And a one-year separation after that!” she added, trying to mimic his old newsboy accent.

  Ryder laughed and ran his hand through his freshly buzzed hair. “Ah… Willow. My life has become a ridiculous hoax.”

  “Could be worse,” she said.

  “Could it?” he asked. “Do you have any idea how humiliating all of this is for me?”

  “’Course,” she grinned. “But, that’s life.”

  “That’s my life,” he complained. “I’m pretty sure other people don’t have these problems. I’m just sorry you got dragged into it.”

  “What’s going on,” she said softly. “Talk to me.”

  “I’m sure you’ve read the papers,” he said. “My wife left me.”

  “And started dating your brother,” she finished. “Now he’s running up against your dad for president. Right?”

  “That’s pretty much it,” he said.

  “Did your dad not get along with Isaac before this? Did something happen between them?”

  Ryder shook his head. He tried to think, but he couldn’t remember anything that would have started World War III like this. “No,” he said. “I mean, he’s always been interested in politics, I guess. He always worked with my father but, he never expressed interest in taking his role.”

  “That’s so weird,” she added. “Yeah, I remember they always used to get along. You think he’d be any good at it? Presidency, I mean?”

  Ryder mused to himself. “Yes, actually,” he admitted. “Probably better than our father. And you know what the funny thing is?”

  “What?” she asked.

  “If he had just told my father he was interested in getting into politics to this extent, I think he would have helped Isaac do it. Maybe not in Nani Makai, but somewhere else for sure.”

  “That sounds like your dad,” she mused fondly. “You think this is all Miranda’s doing?”

  “Oh, for sure,” he rolled his eyes. “She was always trying to push me into it, but I couldn’t care less.”

  “And what about all these rumors? Just fueled by your ex or should we be worried?” Willow asked.

  Ryder sighed. “That’s an interesting question.”

  “Sorry,” she laughed in a breath. “That’s the journalist in me, I guess. I can’t turn off my endless questions.”

  “We’ve gone from being a well-respected family to being given side eyes in our own community,” he said.

  Willow nodded and tried to look understanding, though he knew she probably thought he was being a spoiled brat.

  He looked at her and was once again taken aback by her beauty. Her hair was curled and she wore a gilded headband. Like the rest of her outfit, the headpiece had hand-sewn hanging beads that went down the center parting of her hair and hung around the crown of her head. At the back of her headband stood a large feather plume.

  “Nice peacock,” he said, nodding toward the feather.

  “His name is Harold, and thank you,” she winked.

  “Harold, huh? Shame he won’t be here for the wedding,” he teased.

  Willow smiled at this and said, “Well, Harold had to take one for the team.”

  “He’s a loyal bird,” he said.

  “Oh,” she pressed her hand hard against her heart and said, “He would do anything for fashion.”

  And so, the two made their way down the aisle together. The spoke their vows to one another and their friends, family, and three hundred other ‘close friends’ gave them their well-wishes.

  They moved from the lavish ceremony into an onslaught of reporters with their massive cameras to do photos for public consumption.

  As night fell, they were brought into a grand ballroom with a domed glass ceiling and black and white tiled floors. The room looked like an explosion of glitter and gold.

  Another jazz band, his mother’s favorite, played old swing music and classics like After You’ve Gone and Minnie the Moocher—periodically wrong songs, his mother had told him, but Willow liked the fifties and wanted songs that were fun to dance to and sing along with, on top of the rhythmic jazz.

  Most of the women wore beaded flapper dresses or other gowns in a vintage style while the men accessorized their suits with top hats, pocket watches, or simply wore vests instead of suit jackets.

  After their first dance as husband and wife, Ryder and Willow actually got a chance to talk.

  He wanted to get to know her better. He’d spent three weeks with her now and knew practically nothing except she may have an older blond boyfriend and that she worked for the newspaper.

  Willow had a fantastic way of avoiding serious conversation. Even after their dance, when they finally got the opportunity to sit at their head table and eat their dinner, all she wanted to talk about was the ‘plan.’

  “I have a five-point plan for you, my friend,” she said.

  “Shh,” he said, pushing a finger to her lips. “I’m tired of plans and contracts and all of my parents’ nonsense.”<
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  “You don’t have time for my nonsense?” she asked with a smile, trying to move her lips against his finger.

  “Something tells me I’m in for a whole year of that,” he teased. “How about tonight, we just go somewhere and talk?”

  “Like where?” she asked.

  “Anywhere,” he said.

  Chapter Eight

  Willow

  The five-point plan that Ryder had been so reluctant to hear was brilliant, if Willow said so herself. Step one would be the public wedding. Check.

  Step two would be an over-the-top honeymoon that papers would have to rave out. But, in order to rave about it, it would have to be memorable and charitable. Push the goodie-goodie angle.

  Step four would be to field the hard questions about his father. Publicly stand behind Tag Prescott and, step five, denounce Miranda and Isaac’s behavior. Throw some dirt their way.

  “What’s step five?” Ryder had asked.

  “Oh, step five is my absolute favorite step,” Willow grinned at this and leaned into his ear as she whispered, “Win.”

  And now, four days after the wedding and after Willow had awkwardly moved into Ryder’s ridiculous penthouse suite on the islands, it was time for Ryder to invoke step two.

  AKA, the over-the-top honeymoon stage.

  Now living on Nani Makai full-time, Willow was made one of the lead reporters at the Bayfield Gazette—Nani Makai’s most prominent news network. Not only did they have a weekly paper as coveted as the Sunday Times, but they also had breaking online news and live news anchors for their streaming video pieces online.

  Because her boss, Richard, knew the real deal with Willow’s marital arrangement, she was allowed full access to whatever she needed. Paparazzi, private cars, a spending allowance on the company dollar. Not that she needed most of these things now that she was married to Ryder.

  The marriage itself didn’t feel real. Sure, she had a moment—a fleeting, teeny, tiny moment—in the lagoon where she felt a tinge of emotion resurfacing for Ryder, but it was all for the sake of believability.