The Billionaires Temporary Wife

*TITLE: The Billionaire's Temporary Wife* *CHAPTER 1 The hospital smelled like antiseptic and bad coffee. The kind of smell that sticks to your clothes. "Miss Cole? Madison Cole?" I looked up from the cracked plastic chair. Dr. Evans was holding a clipboard. He wasn't smiling. Doctors never smile when they have good news. "Your mother, Helen Cole. Her congestive heart failure has worsened. Her heart is only pumping at fifteen percent. We need to get her into surgery tonight. Right now." I swallowed. My mouth was dry. "Okay. So let's do it. Let's do the surgery." He hesitated. He looked at the chart, then at me. At my faded waitress uniform from Rosie's Diner. At my scuffed sneakers. "The surgery costs fifty thousand dollars, Madison. We need a fifty percent deposit before we wheel her in. Twenty-five thousand. Right now. The hospital policy is very strict." My phone buzzed in my hand. I already knew what it was. Chase Alert: Your balance is $38.52. Thirty-eight dollars and fifty-two cents. That was my entire life. "I... I don't have it right now. Can I have a few days? I can get it. I swear, I can get it." Dr. Evans shook his head, his face softening a little. "I'm sorry. We have twelve hours at most. After that, it might be too late." Twelve hours to find twenty-five thousand dollars. I walked out of the ICU, past my mother who was sleeping with an oxygen mask on her pale face. She was only fifty-two but she looked seventy. She raised me alone after my dad left. She worked two jobs to put me through community college. And now I couldn't even save her. I needed to call Jake. My boyfriend of two years. He said he loved me. He said we were a team. He didn't pick up. I called three times. On the fourth, Tiffany picked up. My roommate. My best friend since high school. "Hello?" She sounded out of breath. Giggling. "Tiffany? Where is Jake? I need to speak to him, it's an emergency. My mom—" "Oh, Madison," she said, and I could hear the smile in her voice. "Jake is a little busy right now. We're kind of in the middle of something." And then I heard him. Jake. In the background. "Who is it, babe?" Babe. I didn't say anything. I just ended the call. My hand was shaking so badly I almost dropped the phone. I ran. I didn't know where I was running to. I ran past the nurses' station, past the elevator, straight into the main lobby of Mount Sinai. I wasn't looking. My eyes were full of tears. And then I slammed into a wall. Except it wasn't a wall. It was a man. A very tall, very solid man in a perfectly tailored navy suit. His coffee went everywhere. All over his white shirt. All over his expensive suit. All over my shoes. "Jesus! Are you blind?" His voice was deep, furious, with a New York accent. Cold and sharp. I looked up, ready to apologize, and forgot how to breathe. He was not just a man. He was the kind of man they put on the cover of Forbes. Dark brown hair, perfectly styled. A jawline that could cut glass. Blue eyes, but not warm blue. Winter blue. Cold, calculating blue. He looked to be in his early thirties, and he looked like he owned the entire hospital. Which, for all I knew, he might. "I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry," I stammered, trying to wipe his shirt with the sleeve of my uniform. My tears were now falling freely. "I'm sorry, I didn't see you, my mom—" He grabbed my wrist. Not roughly, but firmly. His hand was warm. His grip stopped me. "Stop," he said. He looked at my face. Really looked at me. At the tears, at the uniform, at the panic in my eyes. Something in his expression shifted, just a fraction. The anger faded into something else. Curiosity. "What's your name?" he asked. "Madison," I whispered. "Madison Cole." "And why is Madison Cole running through a hospital lobby crying and destroying five-thousand-dollar suits?" "Because my mother is dying and I need twenty-five thousand dollars in twelve hours and I have thirty-eight dollars and I just found out my boyfriend is sleeping with my best friend." The words came out in one rush. I didn't mean to tell a stranger. But I was broken. He stared at me for a long time. Then he let go of my wrist and reached into his inner pocket. He pulled out a crisp white handkerchief and handed it to me. "I am Ethan Blackwood," he said. The name hit me. Even I knew that name. Blackwood Hotels. Blackwood Tower on Park Avenue. The billionaire CEO who was on every business news channel. The man worth almost two billion dollars at thirty-two. "I know who you are," I said, wiping my eyes. "Good. Then this will be faster." He pulled out his phone, typed something, then looked at me again. "I have a problem. You have a problem. We can solve each other's problem." I frowned. "What?" "My grandfather died six months ago. He left a will. In that will, it says I must be legally married before my thirty-third birthday, which is in six days, or I lose controlling shares of Blackwood Hotels to my cousin. My cousin is an i***t who will run the company into the ground." He said it like he was talking about the weather. "I need a wife. For six months. A temporary wife. Someone who needs money, who is not part of this social circle, who will sign a contract and then disappear quietly with a divorce." He looked me up and down. "You need twenty-five thousand dollars today. I will give you one hundred thousand dollars. Twenty-five thousand today for your mother's surgery, wired in the next ten minutes. Seventy-five thousand at the end of six months. Plus, I will cover all your living expenses in my penthouse." My mouth was open. "You want to... marry me? You don't even know me." "I don't need to know you. I need a signature. And you need a miracle. This is business, Miss Cole. Not romance." He took out a black business card with gold lettering and pressed it into my palm. It was heavy. Expensive. BLACKWOOD HOTELS - Ethan Blackwood, Chief Executive Officer. "You have one hour to decide. Call the number on the card. If you say yes, your mother goes into surgery tonight. If you say no, I find someone else in the lobby." He turned and walked away, his expensive shoes clicking on the marble floor, leaving me standing there with coffee on my sneakers, a handkerchief in one hand, and a business card that was worth one hundred thousand dollars in the other. One hour to decide whether to sell six months of my life to a stranger. I looked back at the ICU, where my mother was dying. I already knew my answer.