The CEO's Contract Wife.

"Miss Susan, if the N2.3 million isn't paid by Saturday, we'll have no other choice than to discharge your mother from ICU." Susan Adebayo stared at the phone in her hand. The nurse's voice was calm, professional, but to Susan, it sounded like a death sentence. Discharge. In LUTH, discharge without treatment meant you go home to die. "Mother... Mama..." Susan whispered, her throat tight. "Please, just give me till Monday. I'm looking for money. Please don't remove her oxygen." "We have tried, Miss Susan. The bill is already two months overdue. Your mother needs the second surgery urgently. Without it, we might lose her." The line went dead. Susan stood in the middle of her small one-room apartment in Agege, her wrapper half-tied, hair scattered. The fan was blowing hot air, and the small window brought in the noise of the street — danfo horns, a woman shouting "pure water!", children playing. She opened her bank app with shaking hands. She already knew what she would see, but she hoped for a miracle. Account Balance: N5,320.00 Five thousand, three hundred and twenty naira. Not even enough to buy one day's drugs in ICU, talk less of N2.3 million. Tears pierced through her eyes. She sank to the floor, back against the cold wall. Her mother, Mama Bisi, who sold Ankara in Yaba market for twenty years to train her, who never missed church vigil, who cooked indomie with enough pepper just how Susan liked it — now lying in ICU with tubes in her nose because of heart failure. "What do I do? Where do I get N2.3 million before Saturday?" she cried into her hands. That was when her laptop pinged. New Email. She almost ignored it. Probably another rejection email from the jobs she applied to. But the subject line froze her blood. Subject: Urgent - Contracted Wife Needed. Pay: N50,000,000 Her hands shook violently as she clicked it. No company logo. No name. Just a black background and white text, like a secret. "Marry me for 3 months. You get the money, I get a temporary wife. Nothing more." Below it, a contract attached. Susan read it three times, thinking it was a scam, thinking it was yahoo boys trying to kidnap her. N50 million for 3 months? Who pays that much to marry? But then she scrolled down and saw the rules, typed in bold: Rule 1: No falling in love. Rule 2: When the three months are up, separation is a must. No extension. Rule 3: You will live in my house, attend events as my wife, and obey my family in public. In private, we are strangers. There was a catch. There is always a catch. She should delete it. Her finger went to the delete button immediately. Marry a total stranger? A man she doesn't know from Adam? It was crazy. It was dangerous. Her mother taught her better than to sell herself for money. But as her finger hovered over the delete button, her mother's face flashed in her mind. Mama Bisi's smiling face, before the sickness. Her fingers, rough from cutting Ankara. Her voice: "Susan, my daughter, God will make a way." Her phone buzzed again. LUTH Hospital, same number. She answered with her heart in her mouth. "Miss Susan, your mother's condition is getting worse. Her BP is dropping. Doctor says if something is not done soon, we might lose her tonight." Tears welled up in her eyes and fell hot on her cheeks. She couldn't lose her mother. She could not. That woman was her everything. Her father died when she was ten. Mama was father, mother, sister, friend. With shaking hands, she closed the delete option and clicked reply on the strange email. Her hands were sweating as she typed with tears blurring the screen. "Who are you?" One minute later, a reply came. Only three words and an address. "Richard King. King Tower, Victoria Island. Come tomorrow, 9am. Come alone." Richard King. Susan's blood ran cold. Everybody in Lagos knew that name. CEO of King Group. Billionaire at 32. The coldest, most handsome, most ruthless CEO in Nigeria. The man who never smiled in Forbes magazine. The man who fired 50 people in one day for coming late. Why would a man like that need a contracted wife? She looked at her bank balance again. N5,320. She looked at the hospital number. She looked at the email offering N50 million. She closed her eyes and whispered, "Mama, forgive me." Then she typed her final reply: "I accept."