Page 5 of Ruined By a Devil

Who’s this man?

“Marry me instead.”

CHAPTER TWO

Jade

“You’re crazy.” Uncontrollable laughter escapes me. “I don’t even know you.”

“You don’t know Nolan either,” he says, offering a small, confident smile that forces me to break eye contact just to hold onto my train of thought.

“Not a good example,” I shake my head. “As I’m not going to marry Nolan.”

The mere thought of him makes my skin crawl. The way he corners me when no one is watching, the lingering, possessive touch of his hands on my waist or lower back… He’s constantly taking liberties he hasn’t earned and the boundary pushing is a dangerous warning of what life under his thumb would become. Aside from being incredibly distasteful.

“I repeat,” I look him directly in the eyes as I speak again. “You’re crazy. No one in their right mind proposes marriage a few minutes after meeting someone.”

“Look at it like this.” He leans his elbow on the counter, leaving the drink on its solid surface. “It’d be a mutual beneficial agreement, since I also need a bride. From the outside, it’d look like it’s a real marriage, our families and everyone would believe that we’re together…”

“That sounds a lot like how a real marriage works.”

“But in private,” he shakes his head. “We’d both know that it’s just a deal.”

“Meaning what exactly?” I raise my eyebrow, intrigued by his offer, but not wanting to get myself into bigger trouble than I already am. Though it’s tough to imagine anything worse than marrying Nolan at the moment.

I study him for a second, trying to figure out what the catch is, because there has to be one. Men don’t just walk up to a stranger at a party and offer her an escape route out of pure kindness. Especially not when they look this calm about it.

“And what exactly do you get out of this?”

His eyes flicker over my face, almost as if he was expecting me to ask him that. “A wife.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the one you’re getting for now.”

I narrow my eyes at him, not sure if I want to stare at him or hit him with a chair. There’s something deeply irritating about the way he says things. He never sounds rushed, or nervous, or even slightly worried that I might tell him to go to hell. It’s like he already knows where this conversation is going.

“You always talk to women like this?” I raise my eyebrow.

The corner of his mouth lifts as he speaks. “Only the ones who ask too many questions.”

Before I get to say anything else or ask another question, he proceeds to lay out his plan for our fake marriage, almost as if he thought this through long before he overheard my conversation with Papà. “We don’t share a room, we don’t pretend to be in love at home, and we don’t interfere in each other’s lives.”

“It sounds a little too good to be true,” I admit. “Why do you need a wife? And can’t you get a real one?”

I just can’t seem to be able to wrap my head around it. He might be one of the most good-looking guys I have ever seen, and he’s clearly bright. Maybe a little prone to risking his life, but the way he speaks shows he’s an educated, intelligent man. So why would a man like this need a fake wife?

“I can, but I prefer to focus on business,” he smirks. “Once you agree, you’ll have my full resources at your disposal, and that means financial security, complete protection, and everything you could possibly want. We can discuss all the details after you agree.”

I tilt my head, studying him, still unable to put my finger on what exactly it is about him that makes me react to his proximity. I’m supposed to get up from this chair and run after getting a marriage proposal from a guy I’ve never seen before, so why can’t I run away from him? What is it about him keeping me interested in hearing more about this proposal?

“So you want me to agree first and ask questions later?”

“I want you to understand that whatever this is, it doesn’t have to become complicated,” he responds, almost making me laugh. A marriage proposal from a stranger is already the definition of complicated.

“You know, normal people at least introduce themselves to one another before deciding to spend the rest of their lives together.”

“I don’t have time for normal,” he returns his focus to the glass but doesn’t take a sip. The action itself makes me stop smiling. Even though I’ve never had normal as an option in my life either, I’m not used to someone mentioning it out loud. It’s an unspoken rule, we don’t live a normal life but we never speak about normal either.