Chapter Five
“W-what did you just say?” Haley finally managed to spit out several minutes later.
“I asked you to marry me.”
“That’s what I thought you said but…uh…I don’t understand. You can’t be serious about this. I only just met you yesterday for all of five minutes.”
“I am serious. Look, what I’m about to tell you has to stay between us. You can’t tell anyone; not my Mom or Karen and especially not Brooke. The last thing I need is for the whole town to find out about this.”
Tilting her head to one side, she looked at him curiously. “Uh, okay. I’m not sure anyone would believe me anyway but I promise not to say a word.”
“Thanks.” Nathan took a few deep breaths before starting to tell her the story. “As you know, my Dad died recently and, as you also know, we didn’t get on. Some days were better than others but on the whole our relationship was very strained. He never forgave me for turning my back on a professional basketball career and felt that I did it out of spite.”
“Did you?” she couldn’t resist asking.
“No. As a kid I always dreamed of a career in the NBA but as I got older, it just didn’t seem as important as it once was. Anyway, once I’d made up my mind about doing something else, that was it for our relationship.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I tried to make peace with him on a several occasions but he wouldn’t have it. After he’d gotten sick though, I thought we’d begun to form some kind of a relationship but it would seem he was waiting to have the last laugh.”
“I-I don’t understand. What do you mean?”
“His lawyer came to see me the other day and handed me a copy of his Will. In it it states that I’ll only receive my inheritance if I’m married by the time I’m thirty which is in just three months time. If I’m not married by then all I’ll get is the house I grew up in and the same will be true if the marriage lasts for less than three years.”
“Oh! So that’s why you proposed.”
“Yeah. You’re probably wondering why I haven’t just asked someone I already know, right?”
Haley nodded. “That was gonna be my next question.”
He gave her a half-smirk. “Ha, I beat you to it. I don’t know how much you know about me from what my Mom, Lucas or Brooke might have said, but I don’t really do relationships. I pretty much just…um…”
“Screw?” she offered.
“Uh, to put it bluntly, yes. Seeing the wreck that was my parents marriage put me off for life and my Dad knew that. This stipulation is just his evil way of getting his own back on me for not doing everything he wanted me to.”
Haley blew out a puff of air as everything he told her sunk in. “Do you mind me asking how much money we’re talking about?”
“Two hundred and fifty million dollars.”
Her mouth dropped open in shock. Never in a million years had she been expecting him to say that. “Ohmigod! And to think I was just about to tell you that money isn’t everything.”
Nathan laughed. “You’re right, it isn’t everything. I’m successful in my own right and I’ve got more than enough money to live comfortably but it’s the principle of the matter. He really made me suffer as a kid and I think I’m entitled to that money. There’s so much good that could come of it, you know.”
“You mean like giving it away to charities and stuff?”
“Yeah as well as sharing it out amongst the rest of the family. If I don’t do this, then the money will go to the charities of his choice but I just know that the money won’t reach people that really need it. They’ll go to people he was friendly with from big corporations who are probably as corrupt as he was.”
“He was corrupt?”
“No, not really,” he said shaking his head before adding, “but he did have some shady business dealings.”
“So you don’t feel like proposing to one of your…um…dates and getting them to help you with this instead of me.”
“Got it in one. If they got wind of how much money we’re talking about, I’d be tied down for life and…”
“And that’s not what you want?”
Looking into her wide eyes and seeing the way she was watching him, he realised that his answer to that question was no longer ‘yes’. If he was married to her, he had a feeling he wouldn’t mind spending the rest of his life with her. As he seemed to relax at the idea, a warmth spread throughout his body and he found his lips curling up into a smile.
“I’m not so sure anymore,” he finally replied. “I do know that I wouldn’t want to be tied down to one of my dates, as you so eloquently put it, for the rest of my life. I’d sooner live on the streets,” he joked.
“Well, we can’t have that, can we?”
“What does that mean?” he asked curiously.
“Just give a second to get this straight. If I agree to do this, what exactly do you have in mind?”
He bit his bottom lip to stop himself smiling. “Okay, firstly we’d have to get married. Like I said, my birthday is in three months time and I need to be married before then. The marriage would be, um, one of convenience and…”
“You mean, in name only?”
“Right.” As he said the words, he felt a weight settle in his chest at the thought of them being together but not really being [i]together[/i].
“Okay. Anything else?”
The weight felt even heavier when he realised that that didn’t seem to bother her. “We’d have to stay married for three years, probably a little longer than that to make it look convincing to everyone. It’s only fair that you get something out of giving up three years of your life for me so I’d pay you five million dollars—half after the wedding and then the rest after the three years were up.”
Haley’s jaw dropped open yet again at hearing what he had just said and she quickly began shaking her head from side to side. “No, no way. I-I couldn’t take that amount of money from you. It wouldn’t be right and…”
“You’d deserve it, Haley. If you agree to marry me, it’s only fair that you get something out of it. For the time that we’re together, we can’t risk anyone finding out that the marriage isn’t real so neither of us is going to be able to date anyone else and so it’s only right that you’re compensated.”
She huffed for a moment but then finally said, “Okay fine, but I’m not letting you give me that much.”
“How about two million then – one now and then one after the three years have come to an end? Just think of how you’ll be able to help your family and you’d be able to go back to school. You could do anything you wanted.”
“It still seems like too much, Nathan.”
He smiled as he realised she was absolutely the right person for the job. Money wasn’t something that seemed important to her and it was refreshing to meet someone like her after all the gold-diggers he usually came into contact with.
“Well it doesn’t seem enough to me.” He had every intention of putting five million in an account for her regardless of what she said.
“How are we going to convince people that we’re in love and want to get married? I mean, we’ve literally only just met.”
“Haven’t you ever heard of love at first sight?”
She scoffed. “Yeah right, I’ve got a feeling you believe in that about as much as I do.”
He joined in her laughter. “Okay, you got me. But I’m pretty sure we can convince them if we put our minds to it.”
“There’s so much to think about and…”
Taking her hand in his, he rubbed his thumb back and forth over her knuckles. “We can figure it out together but first I need to know, are you prepared to help me?”
Pausing for a moment, Haley composed herself as she made what she knew would be the biggest decision of her life. Looking into his clear blue eyes, she smiled softly. “Yes Nathan, I’ll marry you.”