Accidentally Married

“What do you possibly mean by that?” Jessica asked. She had been arguing over the phone in front of the courthouse for the last ten minutes.

Today was her wedding day. She and her high school sweetheart, Burke, were supposed to meet up there by ten thirty a.m. to have their wedding.

“Burke, it is ten forty-five a.m., where are you?” she asked, her voice shaky.

“Jessica, I won’t be coming today,” Burke said.

“What do you mean by that? We are supposed to get married today,” she said again. This time, she felt something trickling down her face. She sniffled to stop the tears so her makeup wouldn’t get ruined.

“Jessica, I don’t think I love you enough to want to marry you and live together in the same house,” he said. She felt her heart sink.

They had been planning the wedding together ever since he popped the question. He knew about her dream of getting married and living in a house with a yard for the kids to play in. He didn’t own a house with a yard, but they planned to get one.

“I won’t force you to get a house with a yard,” she said. She thought the financial burden was probably becoming too much for him. The reason for the low-key wedding was finances. Neither of them was rich, but if they joined hands, they could live comfortably.

Because they were both orphans, they had no one to invite to the private wedding. They planned to have a private wedding and tell their friends later.

“Burke, honey, aren’t you going to join me?” a voice echoed from inside the room. Jessica knew the voice sounded familiar, but she just couldn’t place it at the moment.

“Who is that?” Jessica asked in a muffled scream.

“Are you beginning to hear things?” Burke asked her.

Jessica knew quite well that she had heard a familiar voice. She knew that voice. That was her best friend’s voice.

“Is that Emma?” she asked this time, tears falling from her other eye.

“Why would Emma be here?” Burke asked.

Jessica had always been suspicious of her friend and her boyfriend, and finally, those suspicions were proving true.

“Jessica, go home, and I will come to meet you tonight,” he said.

“I would wait here until you get here,” Jessica said. Her voice was pleading. “I would forgive you even if you cheated on me. Please just come over. Don’t embarrass me,” she added, begging.

“Okay, yes, Emma is here, and you know what, Jessica? It’s over between us. I can’t marry you or stay with you. Let’s just break up here,” he said.

“No, please,” Jessica begged, her face now drenched with tears. Her pleas were met with empty silence. Burke had cut off the call.

Jessica pulled the phone away from her ear and decided to call again, but she discovered the call wasn’t going through. Burke had blocked her number.

She squatted right in front of the courthouse. She did not care if people were watching her. Her heart had just been ripped out, shattered into several pieces, and handed back to her.

She cried her eyes out, but couldn’t help overhearing the conversation of the man standing near her. “I thought you said she would be here on time?” Xavier shouted over the phone to his assistant, Brian.

The doctors had told him that his grandfather had barely two weeks left. Xavier had lied to his grandfather about having a girlfriend.

His grandfather had said that his girlfriend must be wedded and presented to him before he died so he could transfer the company from a management specialist to Xavier’s name.

His grandfather knew what a responsible man Xavier was. Still, he feared that if he left the world, Xavier would end up all alone, and eventually the company would leave the Delgado household.

Dawson, Xavier’s grandfather, decided that rather than Xavier giving up the company in the long run, he would rather leave it in the hands of people who could manage it.

It would make him roll in his grave if Xavier gave up all his hard work and sweat. He would rather do it himself.

Xavier knew he owed it to his grandfather. When his parents died in a ghastly motor accident that claimed their lives, he went to live with his grandfather, who did everything to take care of him.

He wanted the business to remain within the household, which led him to marriage. His assistant, Brian, had told him about a contract marriage service where you paid to have a wife for a set period.

He had gone ahead and signed a contract with a random woman from the service for a year. She was supposed to marry him with no strings attached and then divorce him amicably after a year.

He was standing in front of the courthouse, but the random woman was nowhere to be found. He was confused and pissed off by the wasted time. He needed to take his new wife to his grandfather today. He looked at his watch and sighed in annoyance.

“I’m sorry, sir. Let me try to reach her again,” Brian said, ending the call.

“What a waste of my precious time,” Xavier sighed aloud, annoyed. He hated time-wasters, and he couldn’t believe the girl had gone MIA after receiving a partial payment for the contract.

The phone rang again, and he picked it up immediately.

“And?” he barked at his secretary.

“Her company still can’t get a hold of her,” Brian replied.

“She’s currently unreachable. Why don’t you come back so we can reschedule with the agency? They can send someone else,” Brian suggested. He was lucky he already had a good working relationship with his boss; otherwise, he would’ve peed himself from fear by now.

“I’m not leaving this place without a marriage certificate,” Xavier replied coldly. He wasn’t intentionally putting pressure on his assistant. He simply needed results immediately.

“I’ll marry you.”