Fake Marriage to Her TV Husband

According to the gospel of Lilith Parker, massage therapy could cure a lot of the world’s ills. That’s why she’d busted her butt to open her own spa. Lost that big account at work? Boyfriend acting like a jerk? Kids can’t find their rear end with a map? Relâcher was the answer. Except when the question was: why had four appointments in a row cancelled?

If she could figure that out, maybe she could stop her business from circling the drain. Too bad Lilith couldn’t spend an hour letting one of her staff magicians do a vanishing act on the knot at the base of her skull.

There was another woman somewhere who needed that, though, and Lilith would find her. Sitting around idle didn’t accomplish a darn thing, and worse, it gave her plenty of time to fixate on the sudden presto-chango that had brought her business to its knees. And if she started down that path, there was no coming back from the edge of panic. Hey, why worry about a little thing like a mortgage payment? It wasn’t due for another—Lilith glanced at the calendar on her phone and winced—thirteen days.

No problem. Maybe she’d become one of those people who could screech in under the wire on everything with nary a care. And maybe she’d spontaneously morph into a purple unicorn too.

Best place to scout for customers was the courtyard in the center of Vivo. Lilith pushed open the heavy cherry-wood door and stood just outside the entrance to Relâcher. Shame that the lovely A/C couldn’t be pushed outside somehow.

People teemed through the grassy area of the courtyard, as they always did on a sunny Saturday afternoon, because it was the best way to pass between the shops and restaurants that lined the first floor of the building. Not one of them headed toward Relâcher. Lilith aimed to change that.

“Fifty percent off your first facial,” she called to a lady carrying a divine Marc Jacobs bag, but she just shot Lilith one of those polite smiles that clearly said do not continue this conversation under threat of death.

Lilith held out a flyer. Flyers weren’t a conversation. The lady grabbed the glossy quarter-page coupon and stuffed it in her purse as she darted off toward Butterfly Palace. Fifty bucks said she’d toss the beautiful print job in the nearest receptacle. Lilith had almost cried the first time she’d spied a flyer she’d designed crushed into a trash bin between a paper coffee cup and something she’d rather not think about.

Now she hired a professional to do ad copy and stuck to all things beautification related, which was her wheelhouse. Relâcher was her baby. The only one she’d likely ever have, unless the stars realigned and men miraculously stopped being cheaters. Or they started growing babies under the toadstools that sprang up in the shady patch at the south end of Vivo’s public courtyard. She might take one that needed a good home.

Probably she should just get a dog instead and stop harboring secret dreams of having a faithful man who stuck by her side through all the ups and downs of parenting. Dogs knew a thing or two about loyalty, they devoured everything you fed them, even if it wasn’t haute cuisine, and no one raised an eyebrow if they visited more than one lady love.

If she really wanted to get crazy, she could respond to the emails she kept getting from something called Bride at First Sight, who had been bugging her to no end for a couple of weeks to “find the love of her life” and “take advantage of an exciting opportunity.” Sure. That all sounded really sane. Especially from an outfit that didn’t include an unsubscribe link at the bottom of their promotional emails.

A couple of women strolled past chatting at each other and finishing each other’s sentences. Lilith hated to interrupt what looked to be serious girl-talk, but she needed customers. “Relâcher specializes in detoxifying green clay masks. Buy one, get one free.”

She’d made that up on the spot, but if the situation fit…except both women glanced at her and then up at the Relâcher sign behind her, and then backed away like Lilith had suggested her spa specialized in bubonic plague.

Kind of like the first woman had hurried away. Lilith glanced behind her, but there was no quarantine notice on the door that she’d somehow forgotten about.

This was so weird.

“Best hot stone massages in Dallas,” she called out as a woman about her age wandered past with her gaze roving over the building as if looking for a specific sign to jump out at her. “Eighty bucks for an hour. You can’t beat that deal with a stick.”

The woman slowed, her long flowing skirt settling gracefully around her ankles, and cocked her head. “Can you actually beat a deal with a stick? Like, how would that even work?”

Lilith laughed—and she’d have sworn two seconds ago that little could amuse her. “Let’s find out. Free for you today only because I like you.”

The woman smiled, drawing up her cheekbones in a way that seemed vaguely familiar, like they’d met before, except Lilith couldn’t place her.

“That’s really sweet of you. I’ll have to take a rain check though. I’m trying to find my brother. He’s at someplace called Vivo Community Desk? Which is nowhere to be found, of course. ‘It’s easy,’ he says. Right across from the management office. Guess what?”

“You can’t find the office either.” The pieces fell into place and Lilith stuck out her hand with a return grin. “You must be Ivan’s sister. Don’t worry, I won’t hold it against you. Lilith Parker.”

She didn’t look exactly like Ivan Anderson, the man who was dating Lilith’s friend Katie, but they had the same dirty blond hair and similar mannerisms.

“You know Ivan?” she asked as she shook Lilith’s hand. “Little sister in the worst sense. Can’t take a step without the long shadow of Ivan the Terrible throwing his weight around and growling at anyone male who glances in my direction. I’m Shiloh, by the way.”

“Everyone knows everyone here. Part of the charm of living and working in close quarters.”

Vivo prided itself in being self-contained, with a gym and a pool on site to serve the residents who owned the condos stacked four stories high above the shops and restaurants. Lilith hadn’t lived here that long, just over a year, but it was definitely home. More like home plus, since she’d never really had a community before.

“That does sound lovely,” Shiloh agreed. “I’m meeting Ivan so we can look at a vacant condo together. Hopefully they’ll take my offer and then we’ll be neighbors.”

Lilith jerked her head at the entrance behind her with the deep red cherrywood door that promised luxury and relaxation. Or at least it was supposed to anyway. For all she knew, the feng shui had shifted and the door now gave off more of a Gothic torture chamber vibe. “I’m serious about the freebie. Since you’re practically family.”

“Maybe later?”

Lilith nodded and texted Eliza, her partner who ran the salon side of Relâcher, that she was running out for a minute, and then escorted Shiloh to the community shared workspace where several of the residents who didn’t have to go into an office rented desks. The interior of Vivo was a welcome respite from the heat, and besides, Ivan sat on the row with some of Lilith’s friends, which meant she could likely recruit a few volunteers since handling out coupons had been a bust.

“Look who I found,” she said to Ivan as she breezed into the shared workspace area.

He glanced up from his laptop, a tender smile splitting his face when he caught sight of his sister. Okay, Lilith wouldn’t rib him as hard as she’d planned to over the cruddy directions he’d given Shiloh for finding his office. But still. There weren’t any signs in the courtyard to show the way to this area.

“I was just about to text you,” Ivan said with a pointed no-no finger at his sister and nodded at Lilith. “Thanks. She didn’t look for the management office like I told her to. Did you?”

Shiloh scowled as his attention swiveled to her. “Maybe we could skip the part where you’re a jerk and just go.”

Katie whacked him on the arm. Her multi-colored nails were orange and fuchsia today.

“Forgive him,” she said to Shiloh, whom she’d obviously met before. “He still hasn’t learned how to mix with civilized company. Shiloh, this is Carolina.”

Katie handled the introductions to the other women on their row, filling in for her boyfriend who was still glowering as advertised despite the distinct lack of other males. Finally, Ivan seemed to have had enough girly chitchat and shuffled off his sister for their condo-viewing appointment.

“Geez. Overbearing much?” Carolina commented without looking up from her screen where she was likely perusing the questions of viewers who watched her uber popular relationship advice show on YouTube called Ask Carolina. “I hope he doesn’t treat you that way.”

Katie wrinkled her nose. “Please. He’d draw back a bloody stump the first time he shoved that finger in my direction.”

“Good girl,” Carolina murmured and tapped out a few letters on her laptop. “Poor thing, though. If I was her, I wouldn’t move to the same building as him.”

“Well it’s nice that she has someone looking out for her,” Lilith said and shifted back and forth on her stilettos, which she wouldn’t have worn if she’d known she’d be trekking all over creation today scouting for someone to darken her doors. “Men are mostly creeps anyway. No big loss if Ivan scares them all away. So, on that note, who’s in the mood for an experimental ginger-sea salt body scrub? On the house.”

“It’s Saturday.” Carolina raised her brows, the laptop losing her attention for once. “Don’t you have customers?”

“You’d think,” Lilith said breezily because panic wasn’t the new black yet. It might be soon though if the day got much worse. “I had a cancellation, so it’s someone’s lucky day. Come on, I’m dying to try out this new blend that I created myself.”

“I can’t,” Katie said with disappointed frown. “I have to run to the grocery store while Ivan’s with Shiloh. I’m not really in the office today. Ivan’s the workaholic with his ninety hours a week on the app he’s developing. If I want to see him, I follow him down to his desk, even on a Saturday.”

Carolina smirked. “I’m working. Or at least I was, until I got interrupted with all the shenanigans.”

“You know you want to take a break,” Lilith teased. Carolina had a lot of bark but seldom did she bite. At least not her friends. “All those people’s relationship problems put you in a cranky mood and you need a nice relaxing session in my hands. It’s Saturday. Let Lilith take care of you.”

“Sure. Free is always in the budget.” Carolina closed her laptop with a click and climbed to her feet. In stark contrast to Lilith, she had on lime-green Converse, a staple in Carolina’s much more casual closet. To Katie, she said, “You’re going to make me do this by myself?”

Katie grinned. “You make it sound like a trip to the dentist instead of a beauty treatment.”

“Well, I’m not sure there’s much in the world that can enhance this, but okay.” Carolina pointed at her face like there was something wrong with it, when in reality, she was a pretty woman who never wore cosmetics because she didn’t have to.

“You’re both beautiful, so stop,” Lilith interjected quickly before her gesture devolved into something it wasn’t. “The freebie offer is not because I think either of you need help. It’s because something weird is going on.”

She should have kept that to herself. At least until she talked to Eliza about it. They were partners first, friends second, and fiercely loyal to their brain child, conceived almost moments after they’d met each other in cosmetology school.

“Weird like how?” Katie perked up, her shopping trip forgotten as her natural curiosity got the better of her. “Spoiled ingredients? They won’t mix right?”

If only her proprietary exfoliation formula was the problem, she’d spill it in a hot minute and hope Katie had written an article on ginger-sea salt scrub blends in her job as a freelance writer. The woman could research a topic like no one’s business. “Not weird with my products. Weird with my business. Lots of cancellations. Four today alone, but it’s been happening for about a week.”

Saying it out loud made it real. Something was wrong, something she had no control over. Her business was in trouble.

Lilith grabbed the back of Ivan’s vacant chair to steady herself as the weight of it settled across her shoulders. She had employees. Eliza. People needed her. She and Eliza had both worked their tails off in other people’s shops until they could pool enough money to open their own unique spa-salon combo that catered to oversaturated, overtaxed women who needed “me” time. This ship would not go down on her watch.

“Okay,” Katie said, drawing out the syllables as if that would jog something loose in her brain. “Sounds like a pattern. We can work with that. Brainstorm with me, people. What might cause someone to suddenly change their mind about an appointment?”

“Zombie apocalypse?” Lilith guessed because if she had any clues, she wouldn’t be having this conversation.

“Negative reviews,” Carolina threw out with a definitive nod. “When people bash me, it always scores Ask Carolina more views, but I don’t think it works like that when the place in question is subject to health regulations.”

Plopping unceremoniously into Ivan’s empty chair between her two friends, Lilith groaned. “Negative reviews? How many could there possibly be to cause this much of an impact?”

“Let’s find out.” Fuchsia and orange fingernails flying, Katie typed on her keyboard then narrowed her gaze at the screen. “Wow. Have you googled Relâcher lately?”

Lilith’s stomach did the can-can as she mentally counted back to the last time she’d thought about checking. It had been a while. “No. Why? Is it bad?”

“Just, you know. Lots of hits on bridal sites. Comments from users.”

Her friend’s non-committal tone put her hackles up. Pushing into Katie’s space, Lilith read over her shoulder, the knot at the base of her skull starting to throb. “Poor use of mood music coupled with dirty equipment? That’s not even true! And there are tons of comments like that.”

“Of course it’s not true,” Carolina said calmly and skootched around Lilith to read over Katie’s other shoulder and point to the screen. “That’s the same person using a fake name. See how each comment is worded very similar and the names all have the same initials. Roberta Keen. Rachel Koda. It’s a troll.”

“A troll who’s ruining my business.” And then her gaze stumbled over the one name that wasn’t fake.

Rohina Kaplan. Lilith’s half sister.

A coincidence. But then…how many people were named Rohina? Maybe a lot in India but what were the odds that a troll would randomly pick the same name as Lilith’s half sister? Who hated her for no other reason than because their father had picked Lilith and her mother over Rohina and hers.

If Rohina would bother to have an actual conversation with Lilith that didn’t involve a lot of cursing and false accusations, she’d tell her half sister she could have the worthless cheater who had sired them both.

Maybe this wasn’t what it looked like. Maybe it really wasn’t these reviews that had put a virtual target on Relâcher. And maybe pigs could eat at Buckingham Palace with forks and knives clutched in their little cloven hooves.

After all, this wasn’t the first time Rohina had stuck her nose in Lilith’s business with cataclysmic results. There was the mysterious prom date cancellation. And the undiagnosed stomach ailment that had landed Rohina in the hospital oh-so-coincidentally at the same time as Lilith’s graduation from high school—the little faker had miscalculated that one because Lilith couldn’t have cared less whether her father had been in the auditorium watching the ceremony or at his other daughter’s bedside.

But the real icing had been a few years later when Lilith had walked in on her then-boyfriend locked in a torrid embrace with another woman. The smirk on Rohina’s face as she’d pretended to be shocked and embarrassed to find out the man she was “seeing” had been taken—it was emblazoned on Lilith’s brain. She’d never forget it. Or that men couldn’t be trusted.

People didn’t change. She’d learned that one the hard way.

“That...witch.” Lilith breathed through her nose and centered herself before something a little more colorful came out.

“You know who’s behind this, I assume?” Carolina guessed, though it probably wasn’t a guess since she made her living by instantly figuring out what made people tick. “Do I need to help hide the body?”

“I’m in too.” Katie linked arms with Lilith in a show of solidarity that put a sting in the corners of her eyes. “I can find a shovel, no prob.”

It was almost a lovely thought, but of course they didn’t mean that literally. Right?

“You guys are great, but no. I can’t go after her.” That wasn’t Lilith’s style at all.

Honestly, she didn’t have a style when it came to combating the lies Rohina had apparently spread wide enough to cut into Relâcher’s customer base. Lilith considered herself a nice person who tried hard to be friendly to everyone she met. The idea that someone out there hated her made her throat tight, and she’d been living with it for twelve years, ever since all the lies her father had told had come crashing down on Lilith’s sixteenth birthday.

This was on her to fix, whether it made rational sense to be in this position or not.

“If you’re not going to go after her, what can we do instead?” Katie asked immediately.

“Brainstorm,” Lilith suggested with a grin that wasn’t even faked. Her friends had her back.

Rohina’s problem stemmed from jealousy, not hatred. There was a huge difference and Lilith would do well to remember that. Didn’t make any of this any more forgivable. Lilith’s forgiveness muscle had atrophied when she’d been a teenager, and she didn’t intend to grow it back anytime soon.

Carolina shook her head. “There’s nothing to brainstorm. Obviously Lilith needs a husband to fix this.”

While Lilith’s mouth dropped open, Katie just laughed. “Is that going to be your solution to everything now? Just because it worked for me doesn’t mean it will work for everyone. It didn’t for Nomi and Malone.”

“That’s totally false.” Carolina smoothed back her sleek blond hair with a smug smile. “They’re married, aren’t they?”

“Yeah, but the fake marriage was supposed to fix her problems with her political campaign, and instead, she dropped out of the race,” Lilith reminded Carolina, a bit desperate to get off this subject because holy cow. Marriage was so far out of left field as a solution to her problems that she almost couldn’t protest hard enough.

Also, marriage? That was number four hundred and eighty-seven on Lilith’s priority list, and it was only on the list because she couldn’t quite kill that tiny little hope that she might find someone someday who wasn’t a big loser. How that spark hung on, she had no idea. Not dating probably helped—she had no possibility of being proven wrong.

“Please.” Carolina shot Lilith a withering glance. “The fake marriage was to help Nomi figure out what she really wanted and it did. Exactly like I intended. This is not my first rodeo.”

“Okay, genius. I’ll bite,” Lilith said with a bemused twist of her mouth. “How will a fake marriage help me get the troll to stop badmouthing my business?”

“Oh, it won’t,” she replied as if Lilith had lost her mind. “You just said you didn’t want to go after her. So we come at it from another angle. You don’t really need the husband, per se. But you need a fake wedding for sure, one that you can play up with Relâcher as a backdrop. Bridal services are huge. Shoot a commercial with you as the star. People love to see the face behind the signage. Show them who Relâcher is. A woman who is passionate about skin care. So much so, that she’s in a wedding dress showing you how it’s done.”

That almost made sense. Much more so than an actual husband. She could hire an actor. Pay him to be her fake husband and move on. Of course, that might cost as much as her mortgage and the funds were not rolling in at the moment.

Actually…she might not have to pay anyone. What if someone would pay her?

Pulling out her phone, she swiped into her deleted mail and pulled up the invitation from Bride at First Sight, then flipped it around to show Katie and Carolina. “Ever heard of this?”

“Sure,” Carolina said with a shrug. “It’s one of those reality shows where they marry two complete strangers and follow them around for thirty days to capture all the hijinks. I think the expectation is lots of drama and for the couple to fight, not for anyone to actually fall in love.”

“But there’s a wedding?” Lilith could do anything for thirty days if it would feature her business in a positive light. Better still if she didn’t have to go anywhere. What if she could convince them to film at Vivo? That would help every shop owner as well as Relâcher. Win-win.

Carolina waggled her brows. “Now you see how the genius part applies.”

“Yes, you win the prize for smartest person in the room,” Lilith said. “Except you had no idea they’ve been hounding me to audition for the show. Explain that.”

“Marriage is just my solution to everything. Like Katie said,” Carolina admitted with a grin that wasn’t at all contrite. “Call me a romantic.”

“You tell viewers to get out of Dodge on a daily basis,” Katie protested a millisecond before Lilith could say the same thing. “Whenever anyone asks for advice, you tell them to drop that relationship like a bad habit. You hate men.”

That was something Lilith and Carolina had always had in common, something she’d frankly clung to because everyone else in their circle seemed to be on the find-the-love-of-their-lives express. Carolina didn’t date either and they’d often found themselves watching a Sandra Bullock movie on a Saturday night together.

“I don’t hate men. I hate the way they treat the women they are supposed to be in love with,” Carolina corrected easily with a snort. “And by the time they call me, they’re looking for validation of the decision they’ve already made, not advice. There’s a difference. Leave this to the professionals, honey, and let’s get Lilith married.”

Blinking, Lilith flinched as both women swung their attention back in her direction. “I haven’t even replied to the email yet. They may not accept me onto the show.”

“Stack the deck. Give them exactly what they’re looking for and land it.” Carolina could not be swayed and it bolstered Lilith’s confidence in this plan. A little.

What if this didn’t work? She’d have lost thirty days to something as ridiculous as a reality show.

But what if it did work? How could it hurt to have Relâcher featured on a TV show?

“Reply to the email,” Katie suggested in her usual calm fashion. “What’s the worst that can happen?”

“Isn’t it lying, though?” That was the part she struggled with. It was fake.

She hated anything that smacked of falsehood. After catching Nick with Rohina, she’d started questioning her own ability to sniff out cheaters and simply quit the dating scene. She could control herself, and no matter how painful, she told the absolute truth in every circumstance. She was not the friend you asked if those pants made you look fat. But anyone who wanted an honest opinion came to her first.

“It’s reality TV. No one thinks it’s real.” Carolina’s eye roll was nearly audible. “Anyone who does deserves to be disillusioned.”

There was the cynicism Lilith had long grown used to hearing from her friend. Whew. They could keep their All Men Are Losers club together. With her world somewhat righted, she tapped out a quick reply to the email. At least she was in the driver’s seat. They’d been the ones contacting her on a daily basis. Now they could play a part in helping her get out from under the Rohina cloud that had settled over Relâcher.

“Hey, I was promised a full body scrub like thirty minutes ago,” Carolina reminded her. “What does a girl have to do to get a spa treatment around here?”