Name: Royce Devlin

Age: 21

Job: Singer/Songwriter for Guarderobe

Facebook: 10,987,698

Instagram: 63,495,605

Snapchat: 48,000,847

College Degree: maybe later

Long Term Relationships: 0

Future fake wives: 1

I’m losing it. Because it’s my wedding day. My fake wedding day.

Because I’m not prepared to have a fake wedding day, and that’s because I’m only twenty-one and too young to be getting married--even if it is, all for show.

But, damn-me, if speeding along in a dark limo crammed in next to your silent, dressed-up family, your best friends, and the breathtakingly beautiful girl who is about to sacrifice her life and freedom, all because you’re a complete screw-up, makes one hell of a no-going-back impression.

I figure a wedding day could make anyone feel queasy—feel like bolting—feel like they might be doing the wrong thing. I also wonder if Robin Love, the girl who’s squished in next to me right now and trembling slightly—the girl who is my fiancé as of one hour ago—I wonder if she’s losing her shit underneath her passive expression as well?

Of course she is. She’s heading to her fake wedding, too.

Because…Robin? She’s just eighteen. Today’s her birthday!

So, if twenty-one is too young to get married, then getting married at eighteen is fucking unheard of, considering this is not Medieval times nor is it the backwoods where this kind of shit might still go down, right?

Hell, aside from the kiss that ruined our lives and the kiss that sealed this engagement, we haven’t even officially dated.

Oh, and worse, my fake-bride just graduated high school a few weeks ago.

High school. That’s right. Meaning still knows her locker combination by heart, was in the school musical last month, prom just happened, high-school!

Which is why I’m going straight to hell.

Because no one should be marrying an innocent girl who’s fresh-out-of-high-school, right?

I try to tell myself this could be worse. Like she could be pregnant and her daddy could have a shotgun pointed at my head. So, yeah, at least it’s not that kind of wedding.

Though…shit again!

I’m sure the press is going to speculate that Robin is pregnant.

My eyes flick wild glances at my bandmates Adam Marcus and Hunter Kennedy, and then to my grandmother, the esteemed Mrs. Greta Felix, then to my uncle Gregory.

None of them will meet my gaze. They’re avoiding it on purpose.

A situation that is fine by me for now, because if I catch any of their gazes, they’re going to read my mind. Or, I’m going to read theirs. We will all have to acknowledge that we’ve hit sheer insanity with this new plan.

But crap again. And again!

Quickly, I take out my phone and type into the group message that my uncle set up: Has anyone thought about the ramifications of the ‘Robin-being-pregnant’ rumor that’s going to fly once we say our ‘I-do’ lines? It’s going to take months of paparazzi stalking, along with published photos of Robin’s flat stomach to disprove that rumor. Months! Poor Robin.

I wait and watch Adam and Hunter read my message, then instead of replying, they pocket the phones and turn their faces farther away from mine like there’s nothing they can do. Because…yeah, there’s nothing they can do about my worries.

As for Robin’s dad holding a shotgun at my head? Hell. I actually wish the guy could be here to do that right now. If he knew what I’d done to his sweet daughter’s reputation, he probably would shoot me. And…maybe I’d welcome that. If he could only poof, miraculously appear and put a smile on Robin’s pale face. But he can’t. He’s some sort of Army, Special Forces trainer who has been missing in action for over a year.

He won’t be at this wedding.

Worse, my uncle Gregory, a man who’s retired Special Forces himself, told me that it’s possible I may never get to meet Robin’s father. Ever. Because SF soldiers never go missing for this long.

Not if they’re alive.

That’s a fact Robin and I have never spoken about, maybe because we don’t know each other well enough to talk about things that hurt. Or maybe because that topic is unthinkable. Unspeakable. Yeah. I’ll go for the latter.

My head grows lead-weight-heavy with guilt, sadness and fear, as I ponder how much Robin and Sage have been through since their father went missing before we met. I also can’t help but think how they’re about to go through so much more—because we met.

Because my grandmother and uncle never should have hired her as a nanny in the first place, and because I kissed her when I should have left her alone.

It’s so overwhelming. Robin’s past and our colliding insta-future as a ‘married couple’ is supposed to help her. But, hell. What she’s about to enter into with me, could actually crush her. So much so, that I’m finding it hard to breathe, because it’s up to me to make sure that doesn’t happen. Only… I don’t know if I have what it takes to pull it off—to keep her safe how she deserves.

For Robin’s sake, though, and because Sage, Robin’s thirteen-year-old brother, is sitting across from me, smiling at me like I’m some sort of hero-guy to him already, I pull in a slow and steady breath, and toss the kid a small smile.

Because…I’m going to try my best.

And because, God-help-us-all, the damn kid is the only one in this limo who thinks all of this is actually real. We’d all decided he couldn’t handle the truth—and even if he could he’s so young he’d probably mess up in front of of the press, so we need to keep him believing that Robin and are are truly a couple and madly in love.

Which is why we’re all so quiet, and why none of us can talk about the plans we need to go through, or rehearse how any of this fake-wedding shit is going to go, and why texts are blowing up my phone non-stop, instead.

If Robin’s holding steady and my own Grandmother is contemplating the Orlando skyline as it zooms past us while sporting a little smile that matches the Mona Lisa’s, then I’ve got zero right to freak out about, no matter how badly I want to, and no matter how badly my insides feel like I’m about to puke-up six-hundred live snakes as we get closer and closer to the sports arena where it’s all going to happen.

We’re going to do this. We’re having a wedding after our concert.

The plan is already in play, and once we cross this threshold there is going to be no going back. For a long, long time.

It’s a wedding in name only, not the first and not the last of its kind.

And my girl, Robin? If I can even call her that—because I’m pretty sure I’ve got no real right to do so—she’s the exact girl anyone would dream of marrying, even fake-marrying. The press is going to pick up on that straight away and fall in love with her.

She’s smart, all about family, not any sort of gold digger, that’s for damn sure. I’ve met enough of those girls in my life to know the difference, too. Robin’s the real deal. The genuine girl-next-door that any guy would be proud to take home to Mom.

If you had a mom. Which I don’t. Just how she doesn’t have a father…

Robin’s also a way better person than I am. A creative artist in her own right, too. Not as a musician like I am, but as a fine artist. Painting, drawing. Told me once she wants to be a sculptor.

She has such talent that what I’ve seen of her stuff blows my mind. She also has a great career ahead. At our first press conference tonight I need to remember to mention how she’s an artist. I think it will be interesting to the paparazzi, as well. They will love to hear how Robin has a legit scholarship to the best art school in NYC. That she means to start attending there in September, too. Once all of this newlywed-attention blows over.

If the press will ever let this story blow over, that is. But I try not to think about that, or about how crazy the press is going to be once this wedding is going off, because every time I do, the swirling-stomach-snakes crawl right up my throat and make me want to choke.

My PR guys swear that once we’re married, we will turn into old news fast. They say as long as there’s not cheating going on, no one gives a crap about married people.

Hell…until today, I sure didn’t give a crap about married people. So it must be true.

I swallow hard, thinking…praying: please. Please…let it be true.

All I want is for the press and the fans to eat up the story of how our band met these two near-orphans, Robin and Sage. For them to record things like how we are now trying to save them from being separated. The goal is for the world to become our allies and worry over their missing father, just how we do.

We want Robin to be reported on as the brave girl who took care of her little brother at all costs. We want the story of how she ran away to Orlando so she wouldn’t be separated from him, to really come out. Above all, I hope they see how she’s generous, brave, kind, and incredibly strong.

The PR guys think this surprise wedding will hit the internet and world news networks by storm. It will cause utter mayhem for a while, which is just what we we are trying to create.

Curated mayhem. Mayhem and that’s full of rumors and lies that we create and control—instead of the bad rumors that were started about Robin yesterday that, even now threaten to jeopardize her future.

Those rumors? They were started because I kissed her—hell made out with her—and then popped off at the mouth in front of this insane groupie person who’d witnessed some of our kissing. That girl blabbed all that she’d seen and heard to the press. Stories and lies which had Robin branded some sort of groupie prostitute who worked privately for our band. As a live-in, groupie prostitute.

And all of that was my fault. The kiss, the damn groupie misinterpreting shit, hell…the part where I couldn’t keep my hands or my curiosity about what it would feel like to kiss a sweet girl like Robin Love… just once.

My fault.

My responsibility to fix it.

Our plan today, is that this insane wedding will create a full tsunami of new, good clean legit stories about Robin and I being in love. It should easily erase the rumors flying around about Guarderobe, especially the ones stating that we hired, and kept in-house, live-in, paid prostitutes up in our Orlando top floor penthouse where, Robin Love, was written about as our ‘best employee’!

I shake my head, wishing I could unsee what I’d read about Robin online. Wishing I could turn off the whole damn Internet or at least delete every damn photo ever taken of her entering and exiting our private elevator to ‘work’. Wishing I could turn back the clock and have never gone in for that kiss.

But…I can’t. I can’t do any of that looking back. So, going forward, the wedding has to create a new storm like no one has ever created. Inside of which, the whole band, and my grandmother and uncle will take the time to clarify the real truth to the press.

I run both hands through my hair, almost laughing at that, while thinking…clarify the new fake truth, that is. The new pack of mega-lies.

Once we’re done, we’ll simply step back and wait to see if it works. And if it does, we ride it out, then wait for the spotlight to go off of us and onto some bigger and brighter star with a better story than ours.

That always happens, eventually. We just need to be patient.

The current plan has us heading to NYC once our ‘in-residence’ Orlando parks concerts here are completed. There’s the legal crap we’re going to have to wade through to make sure Sage’s custody is settled. We’re also going to have to navigate through the part where Robin was a teen runaway, one who took her little brother across state lines, which is now being called kidnapping.

Once all that goes through, then there will be stuff like how I just found out that if I marry Robin, then I will also need to have a judge’s permission to leave the state. Our entire band and my close family might need background checks done, too. My attorneys assured me and my grandmother that all of that will sort itself out, but possibly not before it nearly exhausts us all, that is.

Our legal team has been on this project for almost twenty-four hours straight. They’re the best, and with them, my finances and my Grandmother’s finances, plus her reputation and legal team backing us as well, it shouldn’t take long to get it—us—our new married lives straight. Most importantly to get it all legalized where everyone is safe and happy.

After that, Robin and Sage will spend the summer getting settled into my penthouse apartment in NYC. Once autumn sets in, she will get to start her classes, on time, as a freshman university student. How she’d planned—dreamed about—long before she was forced to run away—forced to fake-marry me.

We think Sage will begin a day prep school that my grandmother has found nearby the penthouse. He’ll have to test and interview to get in, of course. but the kid is smart and we think that won’t be a problem. It’s a school that will get him into any college he wants, and we’ve written in the contracts between Robin and myself, that Sage’s school will be paid for, for the entire four years as part of this marriage deal—whether it works, or not—the kid will be set.

I even heard talk that my grandmother and Uncle will offer to serve as additional guardians to Sage along with Robin should her father not be found soon. This will help to prove to the courts that Robin has all the family, financial, and emotional support she needs to keep her brother by her side. Despite her young age, and the mistakes she made while trying to run away and parent him, we should be able to collectively show that she has the support needed to raise her teen brother just fine.

Robin and Sage will be settling in to NYC, all while the band and I have begun the Asia portion of our world tour. Provided we can stay on schedule. As the time passes, we’ve also promised Robin that we will help her search for her father’s whereabouts.

I lie to myself. And yeah—all should work out just—fine. Overwhelmed by the huge tasks ahead, I shake my head and swallow down a hard lump, lying to myself again: This should go off just fine. On time. And all…of this…will be very easy.

We aren’t sure yet how long Robin and I will have to ‘stay married’. That’s all up to the press and fan attention, but once it wanes, she and I will create some sort of quiet reason for a divorce. My guess? It will be sometime next spring. And my other guess is that I will fake-cheat on her so that it all looks like the split is my fault. Because she doesn’t deserve any hate from the split, and because I am, after all Guarderobe’s resident bad-boy, after all. I’m sure it won’t surprise anyone that I can’t keep a wife…not at my age, that’s for damn sure.

Enter the lawyers and the paperwork again. Add in some new plans for Robin and I. Layer on some scheduled appearances where she and I appear to hate each other, stage some press conferences or a tantrum on a red carpet somewhere where one of says, ‘I’m done.’ And then she and I should be good to go on with our normal lives.

If any of us can remain even one-bit normal after this mad scheme plays out.

If the fans buy into this bullshit wedding.

If everything stays on track with the legal team as planned.

If not…well, shit…not much I can do about any of the above, but at least we tried, right?

At this point, none of us will let Robin and Sage face the possibility of being orphans alone. We owe them at least that. If it doesn’t work out, we create a back-up plan that will be supported and funded by us.

She and Sage have a kind family here in Orlando, the Perino family, who are waiting for them. Should all of this blow up in our faces and we’re exposed as frauds tonight, then Robin and Sage will probably go back there—though that will cause a new wave of problems we will have to wade through.

It’s a family who befriended Robin and Sage a week ago, too. Actually, on the same day we all met Robin. It’s a family who also now love them and treat them just like they could be their own family. Robin and Sage were thinking about starting their Orlando life with them before things—the rumors went out of control up in our penthouse. The Perinos even had a little furnished cottage in the back to rent out to Robin and Sage long term. And Robin had this plan of becoming a waitress after her nanny job was over. But once the rumors I’d accidentally created were all over the news and the Internet, the Perino option became instantly impossible.

This awesome family was in jeopardy of being flayed alive by the press, possibly even worse than Robin was because ten years ago, Angel Perino, Robin’s friend killed the man who murdered his sister and put a second kid in a wheelchair. It was all for self defense, but it took a decade to get Angel off the news, and off of crime shows who’d made a ton of money featuring Angel’s and his mother’s sad story. They couldn’t afford any negative limelight, because one glimmer that Robin was living with this very infamous family would have dragged out all of the old stories that they’ve worked so hard to forget. No one, especially Robin, because she loves this family, wanted the Perino’s to be hurt, simply because they’d sheltered her while she was in her darkest hour of being a runaway.

That last fact, and the Perino family being fragile, is partly why Robin agreed to the plan to marry me so quickly. She’d wanted to pull the looming bright lights and attention as far away from this amazing family as she could. It’s also why the Perinos aren’t even attending the wedding with us tonight, and why my uncle is pissed off at me, because he’s fallen in love with this Mrs. Perino woman! Seriously, the old guy told me he’s in love.

Now he’s got to wait a couple of months to formally start officially courting her. His words. Not mine. More annoying, he’s actually pouting about this inconvenience. Like I should feel sorry for him right now because he has to date her over video chat now. But I won’t—can’t! Because the only one I’m going to feel sorry for is Robin. She’s the one who signed on to our—check-in-anytime-you-want-but-never-leave—Hotel California life, and who has no clue what that means.

She’s the one who needs us all to feel sorry her.

We all got Robin involved with Guarderobe’s crazy—and so all of us, including my uncle who is responsible for hiring Robin in the first place after I told him not to do it, he can just help me suck it up and do what’s right.

* * *

My lungs tighten as I drag my thoughts away from my own worries and I notice the way Robin’s got her eyes closed too tight. Her breathing seems shallow and her hands are also fisted golf-ball-solid into her lap. This makes the ring I’ve placed on her left hand flash like a mini-warning light as we pass each street lamp.

I stare at it, unable to look away as a prickle of sweat breaks out on the edge of my forehead. The words my grandmother spoke to me as she’d handed over that ring come flooding in: “In my day, Royce Devlin, when a wealthy, well-appointed man ruined a young lady’s reputation, he would do the right thing and marry her. Most of the work will fall on you, dear boy, but I feel we have no other choice but to encourage you to make this right. This plan saves everyone, and darling Robin won’t survive should she be forced to lose her little brother. And imagine the consequences to Sage if he’s taken from Robin and placed with strangers? There’s no other choice.”

No. Other. Choice.

The heartbeats slamming through my temples must have pounded bruises into the sides of my head from the inside out by now.

That’s when I realize Robin’s heart is beating just as fast as mine is, because I can visibly track her pulse right through the thin skin on her wrists.

My swirling thoughts won’t quit: Do the right thing. Save the girl. Save the band.

No other choice.

Dress. A dress she’s expected to wear but that she’s never even seen! Isn’t the wedding dress supposed to be an extra important choice for a bride?

Ring. An engagement ring given to this girl only an hour ago and a second ring, the wedding band, hiding in my pocket.

Bride. My bride.

No. Other. Choice.

I tear my eyes off the ring, deciding to catch up on ‘the plans developments’ which are still pouring in as texts. Adam and Hunter, and even my uncle and grandmother, seem to be breaking out of their stupors and doing the same.

I gently bump shoulders with Robin, and when she opens her eyes I place the phone low in my lap, signaling that she should read along with me.

The first one is from the stage manager that says how some sort of fancy, bleached, beach wood —whatever the hell that means—gazebo has been delivered. And that it’s gorgeous. Another text reports it is now successfully set up with lights and silk fabric strung all over it.

A third confirms that the gazebo-tests worked, and it’s ready to rise through the trapdoor we use under the stage for Adam and his drums. People will be in place to swap them out.

The next, informs us that we have enough dry ice and have added extra smoke machines to fog out the stage more than we ever have done. This fog should serve to hide some sort of red carpet they will lay down for us to walk on, and that the whole mess will stay hidden until they blow the fans. But that I’m to give the signal for all to go off when I’m ready.

I try not to roll my eyes at that last one, or stop breathing, because who in the hell thinks I’m going to be ready?

Another text says 40,000 LED, auto-light-up sticks and 40,000 color-changing LED wrist bands are ready to pass out to each audience member. Some will get to have both. These devices are always sold during the concert to accent our various songs with different auto-change colors. Tonight we are giving them all away.

We control them backstage, by network and it’s a very cool effect when we can turn an entire stadium blue, or pink, or flash rainbow colors, all to the beat of Adam’s drums whenever we want. With all of them passed out to fans for free, the effect will be huge, like a sea of stars going off when we decide to turn them into bright-wedding-white.

The next text says: This white-light change will happen during Royce’s speech. Which is why we will not use white for the entire concert so it will come on as a surprise—while Royce is saying what he needs to say.

I almost choke and the head pounding increases. Speech. Speech? WTF do I need to say? These people are expecting too much from me.

We next read how the wardrobe and stylists are set up to get the girls and my grandmother ready first. The bridal party. Then, there’s a back-up crew in place who will shove the rest of us—the grooms and groomsmen—into tuxes when we’re done preforming.

But shit…even with all that pre-beta-data, I can’t picture any of this.

I glance up at Adam, who at least looks apologetic, and quickly I text a quick reply to the group message, letting Robin read my response that says: Awesome. Thanks for the rally, and thank the crew and roadies. So excited for you and them to meet my new wife.

Then, I pull the phone away so Robin can’t read my next text.

It’s directed only to Adam, Hunter, my grandmother and my uncle: Has anyone thought about what the hell I’m supposed to say at this ‘speech’ and what is going to happen tomorrow, or the next day? Shit. Guys. Gazebo and tux’s aside. We are not ready to execute, are we? Are we?

Adam shrugs, but at least has the grace to look even more apologetic, because he knows this situation is all his fault, as he replies to my text: We will be, dude. We will be ready.

I want to reply more. Remind them that they’re not the ones getting hitched, and that maybe we should just murder Adam instead of having a wedding. Only, killing him would not help fix any of this, it would simply create more scandal.

I start to text questions like: Has anyone but me thought of what in the hell is going to happen when I step on stage and rocks fall off my tongue instead of words? Forget about the speech that is supposed to come out of my ass, what if I can’t remember even one of our hit singles when it’s time to sing?

What about that?

Instead of hitting send, I slowly delete each and every word, while I flick a dark glare at each of their perfect poker faces. I want to shout: Have any of you worried about any of this bigger stuff?

But I know the answer.

No. No they haven’t worried about any of it.

Because enthusiasm, sappiness distracting the press and creating epic lying, smoke-screens are Adam’s strengths, and cool-collected straight faced bullshit, despite huge inner turmoil, is Hunter’s strength, my strength is worrying and fixing everything everyone else didn’t think about.

I’m the one who deals during emergencies while the others cover for me and act like perfect rockstars while I’m dealing. I’m the one responsible for always righting the Guarderobe boat before it flips. That’s why no one seems worried right now. I’m the groom. The one who is literally and figuratively driving this wedding boat right now, and they’re just counting on me like they always do.

Which is why I’m going stop panicking from this point forward, and do what I do best.

Deal. Deal. And deal some more.

Everyone believes in me—from the band, to my family, to a thirteen-year-old boy who thinks everything is awesome right now, all the way to Robin whom—when we got engaged—I begged for her to trust me. I told this girl, straight to her face, that this was all going to work out fine.

Because, it will.

Over my dead body will I flip another boat when Robin Love is sitting inside of it—and she’s more than inside of this boat. She’s the bride. My copilot.

I already single-handedly sank this girl to the bottom of a very scary sea, all because of one selfish kiss. Now, I’m committed to dragging her back out of the deep. I will do all it takes to fix how I’ve ruined her good name, even if it means I have to lend her mine, and even if I’m the one who drowns while doing it.

Her result, her future…it’s all up to me.

And, no matter what, I will not hurt her again.