Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 122506 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 613(@200wpm)___ 490(@250wpm)___ 408(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122506 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 613(@200wpm)___ 490(@250wpm)___ 408(@300wpm)
“So I’ve heard,” I mutter. Maybe he really doesn’t know her.
“I guess some people will do or say anything for publicity.”
Publicity.
Pub-li-city. The exact thing I demanded (nicely) from Oliver as part of our deal. My name in a few choice publications, with the aim of drawing in business—drawing in brides, if not ones from Oliver and Evie’s circle, then those who aspire to live the high life.
I suppose I was so annoyed (and secretly jealous) reading that article, that drivel, that I failed to see the bigger picture. I didn’t want anyone to know Fin and I were married, or to learn the story behind it. I wanted to claim success on my own terms.
But what’s done is done, and the genie is out of the bottle, so I may as well put him to work! Because, as it turns out, being married to Fin might not be so bad after all.
Women—brides—whether wealthy or professional, social media influencer or social climber: come one, come all. Don’t just book me to plan and implement the wedding of your dreams—aspire to be lucky in love, just like me. The wife of London’s most popular bachelor.
Until our amicable split, I guess.
“That was a big sigh.” Fin takes my hand. “You’re convinced being married to me is going to be to the detriment of your business, aren’t you?”
“No, actually.” I don’t sound happy about it. Mainly because I don’t want him to gloat. “Being married to you might just be the making of it.”
“The bigger picture, huh?” His mouth hooks up in one corner as though pulled by an invisible piece of string.
“There’s no need to be smug.”
“Moi, smug?” He presses a hand to his chest a touch theatrically. “The man who’s fucked half of London? The man who the other half of London would just love to fuck?”
“I’m sure I didn’t say that.”
“Maybe you didn’t, but the press? They make shit up. I know you were worried about people finding out, and I know you’re stressing about your fee. But you met your part of the bargain, and Oliver will meet his. If he knows what’s good for him,” he adds in a mutter.
“I’m not going to come between you and your friends. And I didn’t want people to know, because they’ll assume I’ve married you for your money!”
“So let them. There’s no such thing as bad publicity. There’s just the way you spin it.”
I’d like to spin him sometimes. On the end of my foot.
“You mustn’t have spent much time on social media,” I retort. “Oh, I forgot.” I give a superior sniff. “You’re old.”
“Old enough to know better and not give a fuck. Mila, I don’t care if you climb out of this plane and announce to the world you only married me for access to my cock—”
“Shush!” I hiss, my gaze sliding to the galley, where Agata is likely to be.
“—because it won’t stop people thinking what they want. Or what’s most entertaining to them. And Agata has worked for us for years. She’s a good woman who signed a watertight NDA.”
“Fine,” I mutter. “Thank you.” My lips draw together like the strings of a purse.
“You’re welcome,” he replies, making a flourish like he’s Aladdin’s Jafar. “Oh, suspicious one.”
“This is all a joke to you, isn’t it?”
“On the contrary,” he says, reaching for my hand again. “I might be the only one of us taking this marriage seriously.”
I pull from his hold, biting my tongue against asking what he means. “I’ve been in this business for almost ten years. I know what people are like. I’ve spent most of those years bending over backward to cater to people’s whims.” Ten years of anticipating my Monday-morning emails—I swear the process has aged me. Monitoring the comments on my social media accounts. More often than not, it’s praise I receive, but when the complaints come in, people can be really savage.
“Maybe from today you won’t have to worry about that anymore.”
“Yes, I’m sure people will stop complaining once they hear I’m married to a legendary cock.”
“For better or for worse,” he says, purposefully misinterpreting the insult.
“You just couldn’t resist sticking that in, could you?”
“I suppose you’re gonna tell me that wasn’t a Freudian slip?” he all but purrs.
“Let’s go with worse,” I retort, folding my arms. Mainly because his tone feels like the brush of his thumb across my nipples. How can he simultaneously annoy me and make me hot? But I haven’t fought this hard for this long to watch my business get flushed down the pan.
“Nah, not when your profile will increase with me on your arm.”
“Oh, listen.” I hold up my finger—hush. Then I turn my head as though straining to catch something. “Did you hear that?”
“It’s just engine noise.”
“No, I’m pretty sure that was Emmeline Pankhurst turning in her grave.”