The Wall of Winnipeg and Me

Was that the truth? I nodded, thinking of Diana, and how I had told her everything already. “Yeah. I have to tell my friend. She would know something was going on. I can get away with not telling anyone else.” I’d thought about it, and I was fairly certain I could embellish Aiden trying to win me over to come back as some sort of love story. At least, that’s what I hoped. Not being super close to anyone, including my little brother who had his own busy life, obviously helped in this situation.

Aiden nodded, practical and understanding.

But… I raised both of my shoulders. “What about everyone else?” Everyone else. Literally. Everyone in the world. Just thinking about it made me want to puke. Any idea or hope of possibly being able to hide a possible marriage had gotten flushed down the toilet when I remembered an article on Aiden years ago, when he’d been spotted eating dinner with a woman—a woman who turned out to be a rep for a company that was trying to endorse him. Who cared? I’d originally thought.

Then it had hit me. Some people did. And too many people cared about all things involving Aiden Graves. He couldn’t cut his hair without someone posting about it. Someone in the world would find out we’d gotten married at some point. There would be no hiding it.

And that made me feel uneasy. I hadn’t even liked the attention I’d gotten from people when they found out I worked for him. Getting hitched to him would be an entirely different ballpark.

I had to swallow the saliva in my mouth to keep from gagging.

“We could keep it quiet for a while—” the big guy started to say. I gave him a look that he just returned with a blink. “—but someone will find out eventually. We can get married without making a big deal over it, and divorce the same way. What happens on the field is for my fans, everything else isn’t their business.” The way he stated that didn’t give me room to doubt him.

I would be living the rest of my life as Aiden Graves’s ex-wife.

The thought almost made me cross my eyes at how absurd it was. Then immediately afterward, I wanted to put my head between my knees and pant.

Instead of doing any of those things, I made myself process his words, and then nod. His idea made sense. Obviously, someone in the world would eventually find out, but Aiden was intensely private with the people he knew, and so much more with folks he didn’t. It wouldn’t look strange if we kept it a secret as long as possible.

The thought had just entered my head when I asked myself, what the hell had I gotten myself into?

“We wouldn’t be able to sign an agreement that says you get a house and your loan paid off, but I hope you trust me enough to know I wouldn’t back out on you.” Those dark eyes seemed to laser a message on my forehead. “I would trust you enough not to sign a prenup.”

No prenup? Uh….

“I won’t begin a relationship while the marriage is intact,” he continued out of the blue. “You can’t either.”

That had me raising my gaze. My relationship status wasn’t going to be changing any time soon. It hadn’t in years, and I didn’t foresee it doing so any time soon, but my conversation with Diana seemed to haunt me. Even as a fake wife with a paper marriage, I wouldn’t want to look like an idiot. “Are you sure you can promise that? Because you might meet—”

“No. I won’t. I’ve only loved three people in my entire life. I don’t plan on loving anyone else in the next five,” he cut me off. “I have other things to worry about. That’s why I’m asking you to do this, and not finding somebody else.” What he wasn’t saying in that moment was that he was in the prime of his career, but I’d heard him say those exact words countless times in the past.

I wanted to cry horseshit, but I kept it to myself. I also wanted to ask who the only three people he’d ever loved were, but I figured this wasn’t the time. Leslie had to be one of them, I imagined. “If you say so.”

From the way his throat bobbed, he wanted to make a comment, but instead he kept going. “I’ll help you pay off your loan over the next three years.”

And negotiations suddenly came to a screeching halt. For a moment.

Then I made myself think about it. Taking a few years to pay off the loan would look an awful lot less sneaky than if it was done in one or two big payments. If I made a few payments here and there, that would look a lot better too, wouldn’t it? Like if we waited a few months until after we signed the papers and everything? I had to think so.

“Okay.” I nodded. “That works for me.”

“My lease on this house is ending in March. We can rent another house afterward or sign another lease here. When my residency comes through, I’ll buy one that you can keep afterward. ”

Afterward was the second thing I paid attention to.

The main thing I didn’t miss was the beginning of his statement and the ‘we’ in the following sentence.

“I’d have to move in with you?” I asked slow, slow, slowly.

That big, handsome face went a bit squinty. “I’m not moving in with you.” I couldn’t even find it in me to be offended; I was too busy processing whether he’d made a joke or not. “You’re the one worried about making it believable. Someone is going to check our licenses.”

He had a point. Of course he had a point. But… but…

Breathe. Loans and a house. Loans and house.

“Okay. All right. That makes sense.” My stuff. What was I going to do with it? My apartment with all my things that I’d collected over the years….