Accidentally Fiancé: An Accidental Marriage Romance

by Lauren Wood

  While I was worried about the board and my company, I was far more worried about Deirdre. She told me that she wasn't going to watch the taping of the first episode, but the fact was that she had disappeared, and I knew that wasn't going to come back. Something had happened, and I figured that it had to do with what was going on.

  I started to get even more filled with anxiety when I saw some of the newspapers and magazines that were running their own version of the story. Not only that, but they had gotten ahold of some of my exes and of course they were not very happy with me. The fact that they were my exes, meant that I had decided that I didn't want to be with them and obviously that did not go over well. I had never really dated, if the truth was told, but I guess in some of their eyes, we’d been together. I saw us as having some fun and they saw me moving on as me cheating on them.

  The picture that was painted of me was not a pretty one, though I wanted to believe that Deirdre would see through it. I had to believe that, because the alternative wasn't something I wanted to think about. I had just gotten her to finally act like my wife. Now it was all going to change. Going on to the gameshow had seemed like a good idea at the time. It had seemed like the only way I was going to get what I wanted, but now I was starting to understand that it was going to cause more problems than anything else.

  Since we didn't have as much household staff, it was harder to find out where Deirdre had gone. Before, I could just ask where she had taken off to or see where she had the driver drop her off. Now she’d taken off in her own car and I had no way of getting ahold of her. She wasn't answering her phone.

  I wanted to go track her down, but at the moment I had to go to a staff meeting with the board of directors. They wanted to be assured that I hadn't went off the deep end and I knew that one of the main reasons they were upset, was because of the participation in the show. It was obviously something I should have disclosed to them before I decided to do it, but I wasn't thinking. My brain wasn't thinking anyways. All my blood had rushed to my dick and my brain was depleted. Now it was all blowing up in my face.

  Trying to call Deirdre one more time before I went into the meeting, I left her a message. This was a third or fourth one that I had left in the last ten minutes. I had known that something was going to happen, and I wanted to keep her home with me, but I hadn't been able to. I wish more than anything, I'd been able to stop this but there was no stopping the news.

  This was turning into madness rather quickly and I had to think about what was best for everyone involved. Maybe the gameshow was the best thing that I could have done to secure my wife, but now it was going to take her away from me. She wasn't going to just let this go. After months of working to cultivate this perfect relationship, it was all going to go to shit now.

  I got into the room with the board members and looked around. A few of the people there couldn't even look me in the eyes and I had a feeling that this was going to be worse than I had anticipated. I was usually very prepared, but lately I'd been caught off guard several times. This is going to be one of those situations and all I wanted to do was figure out a solution, so I could get back to the real problem at hand, my wife.

  “So here we are. Dustin, you are the one who called this emergency meeting, so I guess you can start us off.”

  Dustin McClain had been with the board for a couple of years now and I knew for a fact that he wanted to change things. He didn't like that I ran the company and while most of them didn't like me personally or the fact that I didn't get every little thing passed by them first, they liked what happened at the end of the year when the pie was served. My results earned their livelihoods and Dustin was just going to have to learn like everyone else.

  “Well Sir, I think we need to talk about the big elephant in the room. No one is sorrier to bring you here considering the situation, but I feel like we have to.”

  He was saying all this for everyone else, more than he was for me. We both knew that he couldn’t stand me, and he wanted more than anything else, for me to step down and let them run the company. They wanted to run a company that I had made myself. They wouldn't have a job and they wouldn't have a board to meet in, if it wasn't for me.

  I tried not to let any of this get in my head and smiled at him. I was known for losing my temper and today I was going to try really hard to keep it together. I was of course, trying to convince them that I hadn’t lost my shit.

  “Of course, I am more than willing to hear your concerns, Dustin. Please go ahead.”

  My words bolstered him a little bit and I just kept the grin on my face. He really would never do well in business and should stay in boardrooms because he didn't seem to be able to read the room very well. He certainly wasn't reading me. He thought that I was giving him leeway to air his concerns, when really, I was just giving him enough rope to hang himself. It didn’t seem to be all that hard to do and he stood up, starting to move around the room.

  “Well we are very concerned about the fact that you got yourself into a gameshow that makes a mockery of marriage. Your customers are simple, hard-working people and we need to keep a wholesome image.”

  I wanted to laugh or yell, though I did neither. We made money off the backs of those hard-working people. The company that I was meeting for now, was not wholesome at all. He was reaching at best. Dustin should have been more concerned of the fact that I hadn’t told them about the contract, as per an agreement we had. This part he was playing was personal.

  “It is done. I should have come to the board, but it was last minute.”

  He stared at me and I knew that he wasn’t sure what to say. Most likely he thought I would argue, he seemed to have notes prepared.

  “Yes well, what are we going to do about it?”

  “Well like I said before, it’s done, so there is nothing to do about it. You can complain about it and tell me that I should have told you. I’ll save you the trouble, you’re right. So, is that all?”

  Dustin wasn’t too happy with me taking the wind out of his sails and that was almost worth the unnecessary meeting and drive down here. I could have been finding my wife and trying to convince her that this was all bullshit. It was. I wasn’t cheating on her, not in the least bit and I liked to think that something would be able to make this all better with her. But first, I had to get Dustin and the rest of the board out of my face. That was easier said than done apparently.

  “You’re going to have to quit. I’ve been told that you’re still taping and since we’ve all seen where this is going, the board thinks that you should move on and get out of it before it can get any worse.”

  That was not what I had in mind and I was taken off guard.

  “I don’t know if that is going to be an option. I signed a contract.”

  “Which we have looked over. You need to divorce your fake wife and get the company out of the papers.”

  “I thought all press was good press.”

  “Not when the stockholders are so nervous, and we have dividends and year-end reports coming out it isn’t. We have enough bad news to share, this is just icing on the cake.”

  I didn’t know what to say to him, I really didn’t. He was right. I had dragged the company through this, but divorcing Deirdre just wasn’t an option. Something else was going to have to do it.

  “I will think about it and get back with you. Good meeting Dustin, but I have some things I need to attend to. I will get back with you soon about how we are going to move forward.”

  “If you want to move forward as CEO Danny, you need to get rid of her. It wouldn’t hurt to do an interview to rebuke some of it as well.”

  I wasn’t going to do an interview, I knew that much. But I just nodded my head and left. The smile on my face was forced and painful. I wanted to believe that it would all work out, but I was starting to seriously question it now.

  Leaving the office, I tried to call Deirdre again. I waited for the voicemail to pick up and then decided that I was just going to have to go to
her house. I would track her down, one way or another and I was going to make this right. Screw the board. I wanted everything to be okay with my wife. I wasn’t going to give her up, not after everything I’d went through to get her.

  Deirdre

  The banging on the door was hard to block out. It woke me up with a jolt, but I had no desire to go towards it. I didn't have to get up and look through the peep hole, to know who it was. It was Danny. I'm sure he had a lot of things to say, and a lot of ways that he was going to explain everything. He always had an explanation for everything but I didn't want to hear it. I had heard enough today.

  If I didn't know it was Danny, than I would have known when he started hollering my name. I hated to think about what the neighbors thought of all this, but it still didn’t convince me that I needed to rise from the bed. I don't think anything was going to get me out of this bed.

  I’d fallen for the wrong guy and I was depressed, and it just seemed like the thing to do. The worst part was that the show had called several times trying to get a comment. Apparently, it wasn't enough that they were ruining my life, but they also wanted a sound bite to go with it.

  It was all just too much, and I closed my eyes and waited for Danny to leave. There was no way that I was going to be able to face him right now. I didn't know what to say to him. I didn't even know if I wanted to talk to him ever again. I don't know why I was so mad, but I just thought that things would be different. I never thought he would cheat on me. Not after everything that we’d been through and how much I loved the man.

  I hated the fact that I was in love with him, but I was. He had destroyed me, and I couldn’t trust that he wouldn’t do it again. Most likely, he was here to try and convince me that everything was just fine, even though it wasn't.

  The one part of it all that I didn't understand was the cheating. If the show knew that he was cheating on me, then they would have ended it. It was very clear in the contract. If we were caught cheating on each other, then it was grounds to be kicked off the show. I don't know why that hadn't happened yet. And I had many videos of him coming and going with women, but apparently there wasn't enough proof. If there was proof, I would’ve gotten the call from Runaway Bride, telling me that it was over. It was a long shot, but it still game me some type of hope to think about it that way.

  It was finally quiet outside and I thought that Danny had finally left. I was thankful, because the last thing I wanted to do was see him right now. I didn't know what to say to him and I didn't even know if it was worth it to keep going with it. If we were just going to get kicked off the show anyways, maybe there was no point to any of this. Maybe I should just end this farce that I've started. I really don't know what I was thinking of at the time.

  Then my phone started to ring, and I knew that it was Danny. I had many messages and I knew most likely that they were all from him. I wasn't strong enough to go through them to find out. I didn't even want to hear his voice for the second that it would take to delete the message. It was that bad.

  Finally, my phone stopped ringing and I was able to go back to sleep. I had many dreams and they all included my husband that seemed to have so many lovers. In the dream, everywhere we went we were surrounded by his past lovers. The women that had taken the interviews and then pictures for the magazines. All of those women. They were fancy, beautiful, sophisticated, everything that I wasn’t. What the hell had I been thinking? It was never meant to happen between the two of us.

  That seemed to be my battle cry for the next few hours. It was the first time that we had stayed away from each other and the first time that we hadn’t slept together in the same bed. I woke up many times in the night and I knew that it wasn't just because of the dreams that I was having. A lot more of it had to do with the fact that Danny wasn't next to me in the bed. I couldn't feel his heat next to me and it threw me off. Whether it was right or wrong, it was hard for me to wake up without him next to me and that just pissed me off even more.

  When I realized that I wasn't going to get anymore sleep, I decided to get up and start a pot of coffee. It was strange waking up not just alone, but in my apartment. I hadn’t been here in a long time and even then, it was filled with memories of me and Danny.

  Ignoring everything that needed to be done and the phone that was beeping away, I put all of my energy into getting the apartment back to snuff. Everything needed to be wiped down and the bathroom needed to be cleaned. Even though I wasn't staying there too much, there was still some maintenance that had to be done. I decluttered a little bit of my creative rooms and I thought about all of the things that I was supposed to do. I was supposed to bring some more supplies over to Danny’s house. I thought about it as my house for months now, but all that changed in the blink of an eye.

  I was just about to open the front door and take the trash out, when there was a knock on it. My hand was literally on the knob, and before I think about it, I turned it and opened it. Of course, I shouldn't have because I knew already who was going to be. It could have been any one of my friends but with my luck, I knew that it was going to be Danny on the other side of it.

  He pushed his way in before he said a word. Most likely he knew that I was going to allow him and then he would have to stand outside to say what he wanted to say. But now he was behind me and I was shutting the door and turning towards and bracing myself for what was next.

  “I've been calling you all night. I came by last night and you wouldn’t open the door. I know you were here. You need to come home. The gameshow has been calling and they know that you were gone last night.”

  “You don't care about the show So what does it matter?”

  “You care about the show, so that's why it matters. I never wanted to have anything to do with the show. Neither one of us wanted all the notoriety that we are getting from it. But you want to finish this. You told me more than once. And I'm going to help you do it, so you need to get back and call the show. If we spend one more night apart, that's it. You will lose the money that you’re so determined to get.”

  “Or if they find out that you cheated on me and there's proof, I guess that's it too. Why don't you just tell me now, if we are wasting our time here. Are they about to throw us out of the running, because of your infidelity?”

  “You know that everything that aired on the first show and the stories in the paper are all crap. I have not cheated you Deirdre. You should know that you’re all that I want. Besides, the gameshow would have jumped on the chance to kick us off. They almost never pay out and my lawyer told me that he doubts they could this year with the currents assets on their books.”

  He was moving closer like he was going to hug me or touch me in some way and I moved back quickly like he may be carrying the plague. The last thing I needed to do was to let him get his hands on me. It wouldn’t be good. I knew that much, if nothing else. I had the feeling that I wouldn’t be able to abstain from falling back under his spell. There really was nothing to be done and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go on living with him, waking up next to the man I loved, but I couldn’t ever have.

  “I don’t know anything anymore. I don’t know what to believe and I feel like saying the hell with all of it Danny. Is this really worth it and what do you get out of it? It’s not like you need the money.”

  “It’s never been about the money Deirdre, It’s always been about you.”

  “I can’t do this right now Danny. I don’t know what to say to you and I don’t want to see you.”

  “Well, you need to come home or all of this will be for nothing. I thought you wanted to see it through.”

  “It’s pointless if that means that you’re not to keep your hands off of other women. You agreed to stay faithful, but I guess that was too hard for you.”

  “I did nothing Deirdre. You have to believe me.”

  I wanted to believe him, but there was too many questions that I couldn’t be sure about. I knew that I wanted him to care what was going to happen next, I
really did, but at the same time, I wanted to forget about it all. The last thing I wanted to do was go back home to him. It wasn’t my home. It was his house. I had to remind myself of that. I had to somehow pull the emotions away or I was never going to get through this.

  “It doesn’t matter what I believe Danny, but you’re right. I need to figure something out about that show. But for now, I want you to leave. I can’t do this right now.”

  “Are you coming back home?”

  I didn’t answer him right away, because I didn’t have one to give him. While I liked to believe that I knew exactly what was going on, the truth was that I had no clue. I was going to have to figure something out though and quick. Like my husband said, I had a few more hours to do it and if I was going to keep this going, I had to go back to his place for bed.

  He waited for me to tell him something, but I finally just told him that I would see him later if I was going to keep this charade up. I could tell that he didn’t like what I called it, but what else could it be, but a charade?

  Danny

  I left Deirdre’s apartment and I can't say that I felt any better. I wanted everything to work out and she would understand and believe everything that I said. Of course, it hadn't happened though. And she had pulled herself way back and I knew that she was debating it all. She was debating me and what we had together. She even called it a charade. Nothing that was going on was a charade.