Married Him At Your Engagement Party

My marriage to Holden had reached its bitter, inevitable end.

Despite the deep, bruising love we supposedly shared, we were forced to sign the papers. Yet, we had chosen a deeply toxic way to remain tethered to one anotherwe vacated the marriage, but we couldn't vacate each other's beds.

That afternoon, everything felt exactly the way it always did.

But just as the tangled heat between us settled, a frantic, violent pounding erupted at the front door.

A womans voice, high-pitched and laced with pure, venomous jealousy, pierced through the wood.

"Open the door, you homewrecking trash! You've been clinging to Holden day and nightdo you have absolutely no shame?"

Panic spiking in my chest, I blindly reached out for Holden in the tangled sheets, but my fingers met only cold, empty air.

He was already gone.

My hands shook as I grabbed my phone from the nightstand and dialed his number. It rang and rang, the hollow sound echoing in the quiet apartment, but no one picked up.

Just as the panic threatened to swallow me whole, a text message flashed across my screen.

It was from Holden. Four devastating words: Make yourself scarce. Now.

My stomach plummeted.

It was a poorly kept secret that the Prescott family had never deemed me worthy of their son. In the two years since our quiet divorce, his mother had paraded an endless assembly line of blue-blooded, trust-fund heiresses past him.

But this was the very first time Holden had ever sounded so frantic, so desperate for me to disappear.

The screaming in the hallway escalated into a hysterical pitch.

"The locksmith is already on his way! The second I get in there, I am going to rip your face off!"

Terror, raw and primal, hijacked my nervous system. I didn't even stop to grab my shoes. Barefoot, my heart hammering violently against my ribs, I bolted out onto the terrace.

These luxury high-rise condos were built practically on top of each other; the wrought-iron dividers between the balconies were separated by a mere two feet of open air.

Just as I pressed my back against the brick, gasping for air, I noticed a stranger standing on the adjacent terrace.

He was holding his phone out, the speakerphone volume turned all the way up. A sickly-sweet, overly dramatic female voice whined from the device.

"Oh, Beck, please open the door! I've missed you so, so much."

The man looked up. Our eyes locked over the dizzying drop of the city skyline.

In almost perfect, absurd unison, the two of us spoke.

I said, "Fifty grand if you come over here and pretend to be my boyfriend."

He said, "Fifty grand if you come over here and pretend to be my girlfriend."

01

The mans dark eyebrows arched in amusement. His tone was a lazy, arrogant drawl that left zero room for negotiation: "A hundred grand. Come here."

I hesitated, glancing at the terrifying gap between the buildings. But the sound of heavy boots and jingling tools echoing from my front door shattered my resolve.

My defenses crumbled. I lowered my voice to a desperate whisper.

"Help me."

A wicked, triumphant smirk touched the corner of his mouth.

He extended a long, muscular arm, his grip wrapping securely around my waist. With a terrifyingly effortless pull, and a slight push off the railing, he hauled me over the dizzying gap and straight into the hard wall of his chest.

A split second later, a deafening crash echoed as my apartment door was kicked open.

"Rowan! Get out here!"

The shrill voice detonated in the quiet afternoon air. Out of pure instinct, I tried to dart inside the stranger's condo, but his arm snapped around me again, pulling me flush against his body, burying my face into his shoulder.

Struggling was useless. I was trapped against the solid, warm expanse of him, so I surrendered, shrinking myself into his towering frame.

"Still scheming even after the divorce, always trying to climb your way up a ladder that doesn't belong to you. You cheap little parasite."

The vicious insults mixed with the sharp clicking of heels, marching straight toward my terrace.

My spine went rigid. I braced myself for the confrontation.

But in the next breath, the womans voice abruptly lost its venom, melting into something cloying and submissive.

"Oh... Mr. Harrington? What are you doing out here? And who is..."

They knew each other?

A jolt of shock went through me. I instinctively tried to pull away, but his grip only tightened, an immovable vice around my waist.

"My girlfriend," the man said smoothly, his voice a low rumble vibrating against my cheek. "We got a little too wild in bed earlier, and now shes throwing a tantrum."

The implication was so filthy, so outrageously intimate, that a flush of hot humiliation burned all the way to the tips of my ears. Furious, I opened my mouth and bit down hard on his collarbone through his shirt.

"Mmh... ah!"

A low, husky groan escaped his lips, instantly thickening the already suffocating sexual tension in the air.

Just as I was drowning in the sheer, unbearable awkwardness of it all, a voice I knew better than my own spoke up.

"Cam."

My hands curled into tight, trembling fists.

Holden was here.

"Cam, sweetheart, stop making a scene."

"She's just a nobody. It's not worth getting yourself worked up. I'd hate to see you ruin your health over nothing."

His tone was dripping with gentle indulgence.

Holden and I had loved each otheror at least shared a lifefor seven years. To the outside world, his demeanor toward me had always been one of professional admiration or quiet approval.

Never once had he spoken to me with such careful, delicate coddling.

I knew, with absolute, soul-crushing certainty, that if I had been the one throwing a hysterical tantrum, Holden would have coldly told me to get out of his sight.

That realization washed over me, leaving a hollow, freezing ache in the center of my chest.

"Hmph! Tell me right now, where did you hide that trash? Don't even try to lie to me, Holden. My friend saw her walk into this building with her own two eyes!"

"Baby, I swear to you. Ever since the divorce, I have had absolutely nothing to do with her."

I squeezed my eyes shut, biting down on my lower lip so hard I tasted copper.

Less than an hour ago, he was buried in my neck, calling me baby. Now, that word slipped off his tongue, perfectly tailored for another woman.

When we signed the divorce papers, he had looked me in the eye and told me it was just a piece of paper. A strategic move to pacify the conservative board members and his demanding family. I'm Holden Prescott, he had said. And for the rest of my life, the only woman I acknowledge is you.

I had believed him.

I had stripped away my pride, discarded my self-respect, and spent two years as his secret, shameful entanglement. And what did it buy me?

I have absolutely nothing to do with her.

Something massive and heavy lodged in my throat. I couldn't breathe.

Treasonous, pathetic tears spilled over my eyelashes.

"Then how do you explain all the women's things in there?" the girl pressed, refusing to back down.

"This condo is just a crash pad for when I work late. I'm only here when she isn't. Since the divorce, we keep things strictly professional. We have never crossed the line."

Holden explained it all so gently, without a shred of his usual impatience.

"You've seen my text logs, Cam. When I text her 'I'm at the apartment,' it's my way of telling her to stay away."

A choked, breathless laugh tore from my throat.

That was our code.

I'm at the apartment meant I needed to be there in an hour. It meant he wanted me.

And now, he was weaponizing our secret intimacy to prove his innocence to another woman.

In that quiet, suspended moment, the fog lifted. Everything I had been too blind, or too terrified, to see over the last seven years snapped into brutal, undeniable focus.

To Holden, I was never a partner. I was a multi-tool.

A ruthlessly efficient secretary in public, an eager, compliant body in private. Proper and polished during the day, fiercely devoted at night.

I had been nursing the delusion that I was "special" to him, using it as a drug to numb the pain of year after year of compromise and humiliation. I knew the arrangement was toxic, but I had willingly drowned in it.

I laughed again, louder this time. The sound was ragged and ugly.

The air on the adjacent balcony went dead silent.

Then

"Rowan?"

Holden's voice drifted over, laced with sudden, cautious dread.

The man holding me shifted his weight, angling his broad shoulders to completely shield me from their view.

02

"Holden, stop it!" Camilla intervened, her voice tight with panic.

"That's Beckett Harrington. The heir to the Harrington Group. He's not someone a nobody like Rowan could ever hook up with."

Holden froze for a long, heavy second, but his obsessive need for control wouldn't let it go.

"Mr. Harrington," Holden called out, his voice tight. "Would you mind letting me see her face? The woman in your arms bears a striking resemblance to my assistant. She's a naive girl, and I'd hate to see her make a mistake and attach herself to the wrong crowd."

Beckett Harrington looked down at me, his eyes dark and unreadable, before throwing a freezing glare across the balcony.

"Mr. Prescott. If you're divorced, you need to learn to stay divorced. Using your ex-wife as a stepping stone so you can marry into the Beaumont family's money... it's not exactly what I'd call gentlemanly behavior."

I could almost hear Holden's jaw clench. He forced out a breathless, furious laugh. "My domestic affairs are none of your concern, Mr. Harrington."

"Agreed. And my girlfriend is none of yours. Don't cross the line, Prescott."

The silence that followed was suffocating.

"Holden!" Camilla tugged at his arm. "Your mother is still waiting downstairs. Let's not keep her waiting."

With a final, violent tug, she dragged him back inside.

Slam.

My front door violently shut, rattling the windowpanes.

I took a shaky breath, pushing against the solid wall of Beckett's chest, my voice barely a whisper. "Where is the girl who was bothering you? Tell me what you need me to do."

Beckett flashed a lazy, devilish grin, his eyes dancing with mischief. "Don't worry about it. She's not the brightest. She was banging on the wrong door."

He pulled out his phone, tapping the screen. "Give me your number. I'll Venmo you the money."

I waved him off, suddenly exhausted down to my marrow. "Keep it. I didn't actually do anything."

Before he could reach for me again, I turned, unlocked his front door, and walked out without looking back.

I looped around the floor, slipped back into my wrecked apartment, shoved a few essentials into a tote bag, and took the service elevator down to the alley behind the building.

My hand had just touched the heavy metal push-bar of the exit door when someone grabbed a fistful of my hair.

My head was violently yanked back. A second later, a sharp, stinging slap cracked across my cheek.

"You cheap, classless little tramp. You're divorced, and you're still crawling back to my son's bed."

I slowly lifted my eyes. It had been two years since I last saw Margaret Prescott, but her aristocratic sneer hadn't aged a day.

"Tsk... Look at that pathetic, victimized face. You're exactly like your trailer-trash mother. A social-climbing parasite with absolutely no shame."

Her shrill, vicious voice began drawing the stares of passing pedestrians on the sidewalk.

I closed my eyes. A tidal wave of wretched memories crashed over me.

The sneers when Holden first brought me home. The relentless emotional torture after we married. The cold, indifferent remarks after I miscarried... twice.

It's because your blood is cheap, she had said, sipping her tea. Trash like you could never hold onto a child with our pedigree.

Those words were branded into my soul.

And the divorce? The grand finale of our tragic love story? That had been her masterpiece.

I opened my eyes. The old, terrified girl who used to shrink under her gaze was gone.

"Mrs. Prescott," I said, my voice eerily calm. "Instead of coming after me, you should really have a talk with your son. When we signed those papers, he was the one on his knees, begging me not to leave. He asked for two years. He promised me that in two years, he would marry me again, the right way."

"Youyou lying bitch! Holden was completely blind to ever let a snake like you bewitch him!" Margaret shrieked, her composure shattering.

Camilla stepped out from the shadows, wrapping a manicured hand around Margaret's arm. She murmured something soothing to the older woman, then strutted toward me, her heels clicking on the pavement. Slowly, deliberately, she pulled a heavy, embossed envelope from her designer bag.

"The twenty-seventh of this month," Camilla said, her lips curling into a cruel smile. "Holden and I are having our engagement gala."

She held the invitation out to me. "It's at the penthouse of the Plaza. I believe that was the venue you always begged him for when you got married?"

My fingers went numb.

Just last month, Holden had specifically instructed me to pull every string I had to secure that exact ballroom. He told me he needed it for a "milestone ceremony."

I had foolishly believed my two-year sentence was up. I thought he was finally going to claim me in the light of day.

But I was just the hired help, booking the venue for the woman he actually wanted to show off to the world.

It felt like a giant, invisible hand had reached into my chest and was squeezing my heart until it bruised.

I stared at the thick, cream-colored cardstock, my fingers trembling ever so slightly as I took it from her.

I looked up and offered her a tired, broken smile.

"You aren't having your engagement party on the twenty-seventh."

03

Camillas smug expression faltered.

"I pulled personal favors to secure that space," I said, my voice steadying. "If you want to party there, Camilla, I suggest you go make your own reservation."

Camilla's face flushed a furious, ugly shade of red.

"Rowan Sinclair! You"

Margaret lunged forward, raising her hand to strike me again.

This time, my hand shot out. I clamped my fingers around her frail wrist and shoved her back hard.

The older woman stumbled, her expensive heels catching on the pavement as she nearly went down.

"Mrs. Prescott, I am no longer your daughter-in-law," I said, my tone laced with ice. "I strongly suggest you learn how to speak to me. I let you hit me once. Try it again, and I won't hesitate to hit you back."

"You!"

"And one more thing," I interrupted, staring dead into her terrified eyes. "My mother is dead. Keep talking about her like that, and she might just drag you down to hell with her."

Margarets lips trembled. She pointed a shaking finger at me, stuttering for a long moment before finally spitting out, "Stay away from my son!"

She turned and practically fled down the street, Camilla trailing anxiously behind her.

A moment later, my phone buzzed in my hand.

Holden.

I stared at the glowing name for three long seconds before swiping to answer.

"Rowan? Where are you? Are you okay?"

His voice was laced with a careful, probing caution.

I looked at the small crowd of strangers who had stopped to watch my humiliation, and a dry laugh escaped my lips.

"Checking in to admire your handiwork, Holden?"

"In the middle of the street, I was publicly humiliated by your fiance and your mother. I was called a whore, a parasite, a homewrecker, and told to drop dead. Tell me, are you satisfied with these results?"

The silence on the line fractured into panic. "No, Rowan, it's not like that. They were just running hot. They needed to blow off steam. Just... just endure it for a little while. Let it blow over."

Just endure it...

As the words hit my ear, a profound, chilling numbness spread through my veins.

"Camilla Beaumont..." I murmured to the empty street. "She was the legacy match your mother always wanted for you, wasn't she? The old-money girl you've secretly kept on a pedestal all these years."

Dead silence on the other end.

A sharp, physical pain pierced my chest, radiating outward into a dull, heavy ache.

The man I had spent my entire adult life looking up to had spent his life looking up to someone else.

I thought that if I worked hard enough, if I made myself indispensable enough, I would finally be worthy of him. I didn't realize that from the very beginning, he had his eyes on a better prize.

I was just the placeholder. The convenient, eager stepping stone.

I pulled my lips into a bitter smile. "You're the golden boy of the New York tech scene now, Holden. A perfect, high-society match. Congratulations."

"Rowan, stop! That's not what this is!" Holden's voice grew frantic, shedding its usual polished control. "You have to believe me, what we have... no one can ever replace you. Just give me two more years. Just two years, and then"

"Holden."

I cut him off. My own voice sounded so hollow, so alien to my own ears.

"There are no more years left."

"My resignation"

Click.

He hung up on me.

A second later, a text message pushed through:

You are being completely irrational right now. We need to take some time and cool off.

Cool off.

The silent treatment. His favorite weapon. Whenever he couldn't manipulate his way out of a corner, he would freeze me out. He would leave me alone in the dark to overthink, internalize the guilt, and eventually come crawling back, begging for a peace he never earned.

I stared at the glowing text bubble, entirely consumed by disgust.

What gave him the right?

What gave him the right to constantly rip my heart out and expect me to apologize for bleeding?

Why dangle a future in front of my face only to snatch it away the second I reached for it? He knew the hell I grew up in at the Sinclair house. He knew more than anyone that all I ever wanted was a home...

"Ahhhh!"

A feral scream tore from my throat, and I hurled my phone as hard as I could at the pavement.

The glass shattered into a hundred glittering pieces. The few remaining onlookers jumped back in shock.

I stood there, gasping for air, the edges of my vision blurred with angry, burning tears.

"Well, well. Look who finally found her spine."

A lazy, amused voice drifted from the brick wall behind me.

"I thought that when they dragged you into the city and forced you to take the Sinclair name, they completely erased that beautiful, violent little spark of yours."

My breath hitched. I whipped around.

Beckett Harrington was leaning casually against the alley wall, flipping a silver Zippo lighter open and closed, the rhythmic clink echoing in the quiet space.

I stared at him, my brow furrowing. "Who the hell are you?"

He pushed off the wall and closed the distance between us, his long strides agonizingly slow. His dark eyes were locked onto mine, a soft, affectionate smile playing on his lips.

"You seriously don't remember my name?"

He leaned down, bringing his mouth agonizingly close to my ear. His voice dropped to a low, intimate murmur, enunciating every single syllable.

"I'm Ruby's number one follower."

I froze. The blood roared in my ears. My pupils dilated.

Ruby.

Nobody had called me by that name in a very, very long time.

04

Before I turned ten, I lived in a dilapidated trailer park in upstate New York with my mother. I went by her maiden name. I was Ruby.

Back then, I was a feral, fearless little girl, always running wild with a pack of neighborhood boys trailing behind me.

And little Beck...

A violent, shrill ringing dragged me out of the dream and back into consciousness.

My head was pounding, a vicious, throbbing hangover splitting my skull. I kept my eyes squeezed shut as my hand blindly slapped around the nightstand for my new phone. I swiped the screen, and a wall of fury blasted through the speaker.

"Rowan! The investors have been waiting in the conference room for thirty minutes! Where the hell are you?!"

Holden.

Always the consummate professional, my dear ex-husband.

I swallowed the bile rising in my throat and forced my voice into a flat, corporate monotone. "Mr. Prescott. My formal resignation has been filed. All handover documents and project briefs were emailed to the respective department heads last night. Please review them at your convenience."

I could hear his teeth grinding through the phone. "Do not bring your personal tantrums into the workplace, Rowan. That is a fundamental rule. Besides"

"I apologize, Mr. Prescott," I cut him off, my voice laced with frost. "For three years, I have bled for that company. I am officially cashing out my accumulated PTO. Do not contact me again."

I ended the call and tossed the phone onto the bed. I slowly opened my eyes, letting them adjust to the unfamiliar sunlight pouring into the room.

My gaze drifted back to the nightstand, and the breath was instantly knocked out of my lungs.

A velvet ring box? Wedding invitations? Thick, cream-colored envelopes?

My hands shook as I reached over and flipped open the top invitation. The elegant gold foil script screamed at me.

The Harrington Family requests the honor of your presence at the marriage of their son, Beckett Harrington, to Ms. Rowan Sinclair.

I dropped the paper as if it burned me, pressing the heels of my hands against my temples. Blank. My memory of last night was completely, terrifyingly blank.

Right on cue, my phone lit up again. I tapped the screen.

"Morning, Mrs. Harrington. How's the head?"

I scrambled for words, my voice a panicked squeak. "Beckett? I... we... did we...?"

A low, rich chuckle rumbled through the speaker, sending a traitorous shiver down my spine. "Do you remember practically dragging me to that dive bar after we reunited in the alley?"

I nodded dumbly at the wall.

"Do you remember getting absolutely obliterated, leaning across the table, and telling me you've been secretly obsessed with me since childhood? Do you remember physically dragging me to a 24-hour printing press to order invitations because you already had the Plaza booked for the twenty-seventh, and you demanded I be your groom?"

I shook my head violently. "Me? Obsessed with you? There's no way!"

"You were very persuasive. I couldn't say no. But I'm an old-fashioned guy, Ruby. My family has standards. I told you I wasn't doing the ceremony unless we went to City Hall and got the license first."

Panic seized my chest. "Beck, you have to listen to me, I was black-out drunk! You can't hold me to that, it doesn't count"

Before I could finish the sentence, he hung up.

A second later, a text popped up on my screen.

Be a good girl for me. Your husband is walking into a board meeting. Get some rest. I'm taking you home for family dinner tonight.

Before my brain could even process that, another text bubbled up from a different number. Holden.

I'm at the apartment.