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Chapter Text

   "Time of death: 3:12 p.m."

   Standing next to the hospital bed, Rey clasped the deceased's hand one last time before letting go. She took a step back, took a deep breath, and wiped at the tears rolling down her cheeks with the back of her wrist. Then she closed her eyes and mechanically dusted off her black dress. "Thanks to you, I was able to experience an illusion of happiness." Those were the last words of the fifty-year-old man before he'd passed away. Those words touched her as much as they saddened her. Very quickly, the young woman felt the attention of all the medical staff gathered in the room focused on her.

  "My condolences, ma'am," said the chief physician sadly.

  In response, Rey offered him a melancholy smile. Instantly remembering her duty, she took a card out of her wallet and handed it to him. He took it, without understanding.

   "Please contact this person for further information. He's his next of kin. He will be able to take care of all the procedures and formalities."

   Perplexed, the doctor frowned.

   "But... wasn't that you?"

   Without losing her smile, the widow shook her head.

   "I can't stay. I'm no longer his wife."

   Later, when Rey went to the bathroom to splash some water on her face, she gazed at her beautiful silver, engraved wedding ring. Then, as if performing a ritual, she placed it on the edge of the sink, while an old feeling of bitterness gripped her heart, and left it there. With her husband deceased, it would be no more useful to her than her very first engagement ring. Anyway, at least this expensive jewel would bring happiness to the next person who went to wash their hands.

   For the rest of the day, Rey isolated herself in the heart of nature to go kayaking. After all the emotions and the end of her late husband's slow and painful agony, she needed to be alone on the lake and breathe some fresh air. Calm. Silence. Autumn was already beginning to color the leaves on the trees, and their red and ochre reflections shimmering on the surface of the water offered a most soothing sight. Rey could have stayed there forever. But in the evening, she had to go home. And no sooner had she stepped out of the shower than she received a notification from her agency. They were already offering her a new contract. She had been signing them without hesitation for five years. Now was not the time to ask for a vacation.

  The following afternoon, the young woman entered the huge white and gold building flanked by the W&L logo, the headquarters of Wedding & Life. She had once called on them to organize her very first wedding. Her only real wedding. And then shortly after her life had been turned upside down, Mrs. Phasma, head of the Marriage Experience agency, a subsidiary of W&L, had approached her, convinced that she would be perfect for the job she wanted to offer her.

   It was with her that Rey had an appointment today. She first made her way through a maze of corridors, passing newlyweds dressed in their finest attire and employees carrying large bouquets of immaculate flowers. The new arrival barely glanced at them, her face impassive, her eyes locked on her goal, her heels clicking on the marble floor.

   A colleague greeted her and asked how her last assignment had gone. A simple polite smile served as her answer. When Rey finally reached her superior's office, Gwen Phasma was finishing organizing the file of the client who had died the day before, and filling out the contract completion report. When she saw her visitor, she greeted her warmly and invited her to take a seat across from her. Very quickly, however, she asked with a hint of concern:

   "Are you sure you're ready for a new assignment?"

   "I'd rather be useful," Rey declared, her fingers intertwined on her lap. "I still don't feel I need any time off."

   Phasma smirked amusedly, then rose from her seat. She was a very tall, well-built woman, and elegantly dressed in a silver suit with carefully combed platinum hair. She walked over to retrieve a digital tablet, which she then placed on the coffee table between her and her employee.

   "To be honest, this new client isn't what you would call... a most compatible partner for you," she admitted, gritting her teeth, uncomfortable. "And it's very different from the kind of marriages you're usually assigned to. This time, it's not a dying man who wants to experience a semblance of happiness before he kicks the bucket, or a poor, closeted soul who wants to reassure his influential and intolerant family about his sexuality. The requestor specifically chose you for this job."

   At these words, Rey raised an intrigued eyebrow.

   "Why is that?”

   "She didn't say. She just stated, after reviewing the profiles of our wives, that despite everything, you would be perfect for the role."

   Although confused, the young woman shrugged and looked down at the tablet screen, which displayed the profile of a thirty-six-year-old client with a strong and intimidating stature, but whose puppy dog eyes betrayed the fact that he was far from at his best when the photo was taken. A certain Ben Solo.

***

   Ben Solo threw his head back in despair and banged it against the wall. A flash of pain shot through his skull. He didn't care. He had already suffered enough tonight. One more bruise... Big deal! Sitting on the floor of the club's bathroom, leaning against the toilet, he sighed, lost in dark thoughts, twirling the tube of pills between his fingers.

   Recently, he'd overheard two Skywalker Constructions employees discussing how their former boss could have fallen so low. In truth, Ben sometimes wondered the same thing. At his rock bottom, he rubbed his face, ran a hand through his messy mass of ebony hair, then removed the lid of the tube and slid four pills into the palm of his hand. He stared at them for a moment. He had to stop taking them. He knew that. But he needed them more than ever right now. So, after a long hesitation, Ben took a deep breath and swallowed the pills.

   The world began to swirl as he left the bathroom. The music vibrated in the speakers like a distant echo. The purple and blue neon lights whirled around him. Staggering, his head spinning, Ben sank into a sea of people, without fearing for a second that he might drown. So what if he did? Or maybe it would be better that way. He felt detached from his body. The noises. The laughter. The shouting. Everything was intensifying and receding at the same time. People were dancing, swaying to the rhythm, partying, and no one paid him any attention. Who would notice him anyway? He was a shadow of his former self. 

   Feeling dizzy, he suddenly stopped and bit his lip, then he heard a metallic clinking sound. His heart skipped a beat. His breath caught in his throat. His blood ran cold. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. A cold sweat broke out over his body. No. He looked up and saw a chandelier hanging from the ceiling. A chandelier? So luxurious and expensive? With such a complex design? In a nightclub? Had it been there all along? It looked strangely like the chandelier in his house. The chandelier he had always hated. Ben stared at it, lost, confused. The chandelier suddenly seemed to come to life. It shook its long, pointed-tipped pendants, keen as razors. A myriad of small crystal daggers clattered against each other in a deafening din.

   Ben grimaced. His eardrums could no longer bear the noise. But he stood there, like an idiot, hypnotized by the golden light reflecting off the crystal. Then the chandelier opened its jaws wide, revealing more of its pendants, like rows of sharp fangs. It now looked like a giant, hungry sandworm. It lunged at its prey. Facing his grim fate, Ben closed his eyes and let himself be swallowed up.

   When he opened his eyes again, he found himself in his bed, fully clothed, unable to remember how on earth he had gotten home. It didn't matter. He was suffering from a terrible migraine. It took him several long seconds to recover his senses. Then Ben sat up, knelt on his mattress, stretched with a painful groan, and sighed deeply. His first instinct was to check his phone. No missed calls. He quickly felt a twinge of sadness. Ben immediately tried to reach the woman who haunted his thoughts day and night.

   The contact "My Wife" remained on his screen for a long time as the phone rang. Then he got her voicemail, which only increased his despair. Without bothering to change clothes, the thirty-year-old left his bedroom and descended the wide spiral staircase leading to the ground floor. The staircase wound around that bloody chandelier that he'd always avoided looking at. As soon as he heard the pendants clinking, he flinched and pressed himself against the wall. The memory of his dream suddenly struck him. That memory and many others related to that horrible thing.

   Andy was supposed to get rid of it. She loved what she called this splendid and complex work of art, as had Ben's grandfather, to whom this atrocity originally belonged. But now that she no longer lived here, she couldn't force the poor man to keep it. Not anymore. However, it was taking a long time, because, being a perfectionist, she was waiting to find a buyer willing to pay an amount commensurate with its value, as well as finding "something decent" to replace that damn chandelier. Otherwise, it might clash with the decor.

   Exasperated, Ben tried to reach her three times while pouring himself a glass of water. Still no answer. It was better to give up. He didn't want to seem like he was harassing her. Finally, the thirty-year-old went to his garage, got into his Porsche, started the engine, and drove off to work. On the way, he passed an old red Beetle before turning at an intersection, unaware that the car would soon be parked in front of his huge, grim house.

   Once at her destination, Rey made her way through the high gate, got out of her Beetle, smoothed her skirt, and headed for the porch. The gravel scattered across the path crunched under her heels. She climbed the steps, reached the door, and entered the code she had been given. The lock clicked open and she was able to go in. She knew that the client must have already left for work. Normally, he’d been notified of her arrival. And now, all she had to do was wait for him.

   The young woman took a few steps and gradually looked around. Good heavens, this house was immense. But how the hell could anyone live here alone? If she were Ben Solo, she would go completely mad. And although this residence emanated wealth and power, it also exuded emptiness. And the shades of gray and white that composed it gave it a rather austere, dull, dreary, cold aura. A deathly silence pervaded the surroundings.

  Rey also noticed the convoluted architecture. For sure, they had wanted to give it an avant-garde, surreal, strange, unique style. A crooked house in which the Crooked Man could live. This thought made her smile. The escort-girl also noticed the imposing chandelier sparkling with a thousand lights in the center of the spiral staircase leading to the upper floor. Without taking her eyes off it, she untied the belt of her coat and began to undress.

   She took off her shoes, unfastened her skirt, letting it slide down her thighs to her feet, removed her sweater, then her lace underwear, and went upstairs naked, without any embarrassment, stepping lightly on the mosaic decorating the steps of the staircase. Phasma had assured her that, for some reason, there were absolutely no surveillance cameras inside the house. She might as well take advantage of that while she was here alone. The young woman quickly found the spacious white marble bathroom. Throwing her brown hair back over her shoulder, Rey stepped into the large shower stall.

   The hot water ran pleasantly over her slender body. She closed her eyes, let out a long sigh of contentment, rubbed her skin, and even tried out different jets, temperatures, and other features that the old shower in her miserable apartment did not have. Once she was clean, Rey slipped on the first silk bathrobe she saw, wiping the fog from the large mirror, and caught the hazel glint of her reflection. Then she lowered her head and noticed a small red velvet box on the edge of the sink. Even before opening it, she already suspected what it contained.

   The brunette briefly admired the single-stone engagement ring and the gold wedding band, also encrusted with diamonds. She touched them lightly with her fingertips, then put them one after the other onto her left ring finger. Rey held her hand out in front of her and watched the two rings sparkle in the light of the bathroom lamps. Absolutely magnificent. Whoever had chosen them was a true connoisseur.

   Nevertheless, a certain weariness, followed by a distant feeling of bitterness, came over Rey. It was inevitable. As soon as she saw her finger adorned with this kind of flashy jewelry, she remembered the very first time someone had put a ring on it.

***

   Recommending Andromeda's Interior Design to his boss for the studio renovations wasn't such a good idea after all. Not that it was an incompetent company, far from it. But it also meant that Ben had to see her regularly at work. And that only served to rub salt into the wound. The moment he entered the building, he struggled to suppress the urge to run to her. No. He had to give her some space first. She must be busy discussing the plans for the work with Kaydel right now. And with any luck, she would reply to his message from the day before sometime today.

   "Ben?"

   As soon as he stepped out of the elevator, he turned to face Poe, his superior and best friend. His only friend. Because only he could put up with his bad temper, he boasted.

   "Wow," he exclaimed, looking him up and down. "Damn, you look like shit."

   "Nice to see you too," Ben grumbled.

   With that, he headed for the recording studio. Certainly, with his dark circles, his pale complexion, his messy hair, his black eye, his split lip, his scraped cheekbone, and his old, wrinkled clothes, he looked nothing like the wealthy man who drove a Porsche and lived in luxury. Anyone would have mistaken him for a homeless junkie.

   "What happened to you, seriously?" his friend asked, worried, trying to keep up with him despite his long strides. "Seems like something chewed you up and spit you out. You were on acid again yesterday, weren't you?”

   "I went to a seedy bar," Ben explained. "Some drunk guy picked a fight with me over something stupid. He pushed me. I hit him. We fought, then they threw me out. End of story."

   "Oh, okay. And then you went somewhere else to get wasted. Before gulping a bunch of sleeping pills, as usual."

   A disillusioned sigh.

   "No comment."

   "If this keeps up, you'll end up looking like a real zombie, bro," Poe lamented. "And listen, I know you're going through a really rough patch with your divorce and all that, but that's no reason to beat everyone up."

  Hearing this, Ben stopped dead in his tracks and tensed up. His jaw contracted. His fists clenched so tightly that his knuckles turned white.

   "Leave me alone. And besides, I already told you that it's not a divorce, strictly speaking. It's just... temporary."

   "From a civil standpoint, it's still a divorce, isn't it?" his interlocutor argued. "Signed and sealed. But if in your mind it's not really one, that's all the more reason not to take out your frustration on others. I still think it's the best thing that could have happened to you. You're finally free, man."

   Finally catching up with him, Poe approached him, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder, and gave him a smile. Ben bit his cheeks. Many acerbic retorts came to mind. However, he opted for sarcasm.

   "Not for much longer. I'm getting remarried soon, you know."

   Then he continued on his way, his friend close behind.

   "Yeah," the latter muttered. "But what the fuck is this crazy idea, anyway? Why are you getting involved in this insane plan? I don't get you."

   "It doesn't matter. I don't need you to understand. I agree with you on one point, though. It's completely insane."

  And this situation was already putting his nerves to the test. Ben slapped his forehead and let out a deep sigh. Poe then pointed out that he was bleeding. The cut above his left eyebrow had just reopened. He immediately invited him to accompany him to his office, where he washed the wound in the adjacent bathroom before applying a bandage. Frankly, although Ben didn't say it out loud, he was very touched by his friend's support. He was his only ally in the storm. Poe was still scolding him, exasperated to see him in such a state, but above all he was sincerely concerned. The unfortunate man thanked him and prepared to leave. However, he didn't get the chance, because a woman burst into the office.

   "Honey, honey, honey!" she said breathlessly. "I just spoke with Andy and... Is it true that Ben is getting married again? He's completely crazy! Well, yeah, Andy remarried too, but... They're moving fast. All this shit is really nonsense. I don't understand a thing. Do you know who Ben is going to marry? Andy is with a much younger guy. Barely twenty-eight, she told me. And he's quite a hottie, I must say. She's lucky. But I still feel really bad for Ben. I don't even understand why they're not together anymore. Do you think Andy left him because of his drug addiction or...?"

   Uncomfortable, Poe cleared his throat and pointed to a corner of the room. His partner looked up in that direction and paled, blinking dazedly. Ben was standing there, right in front of her, his lips pressed together, his hands buried in his pockets.

   "Oh," she laughed nervously, tucking a blonde strand of hair behind her ear. "Hi, Ben. What's up? You know, it's okay. I do pills too. Well, birth control pills, so it's not really the same, but... but I also take meds, though. Sometimes. From the doctor. But..."

   The drug addict forced a smile and bowed his head.

   "Thanks, Kaydel," he whispered. "See you later."

   With that, he turned on his heel and left the office. Mortified, Kaydel sighed and buried her face in her hands.

   "I'm a fucking idiot..."

   "Don't worry," Poe reassured her tenderly. "I love you just the way you are, honey. You and your legendary tact."

***

"Sorry I didn't answer. I'm really busy. But otherwise, it's good. Let's have dinner together tonight. Meet me at Nobu at 7 p.m."

   This text message was a ray of hope in what had been a hellish day for Ben. However, he didn't have time to go home and change before the long-awaited rendezvous. Although the hostess seemed perplexed by his scruffy appearance, she didn't say a word after he proved his identity and led him to his reserved table. He had an important name, after all. Heir to equally important people.

   Ben sat down as if nothing had happened, despite his disheveled appearance, dusted off his jacket, and waited impatiently, listening distractedly to the jazz music playing throughout the luxurious restaurant. He was a little early. At seven o'clock sharp, Andy made her entrance. As soon as he saw her, Ben felt a wave of heat suffocate him. His lungs compressed. His heart pounding, he locked his gaze on his wife.

His wife, with her cold and captivating beauty. His wife, so magnificent with her jet-black, perfectly smooth hair, her golden skin, and almond-shaped eyes. She was so elegant in her purple sheath dress. But for some time now, she had no longer been his wife. She was his tormentor. The worst of torturers. And she would not accept him back until he had completed the cruel punishment she wished to inflict on him.

   "Your guest is already here, madam," the hostess informed Andy when she came to ask her.

   As soon as he felt his wife's dark irises—or ex-wife, whatever—on him, Ben swallowed and shook his head to pull himself together. He straightened up, briefly neatened his hair with his fingertips, removed the bandage above his eyebrow, and put it in his pocket. Andy didn't give him the slightest smile as she crossed the distance between them. She sat down opposite him as if it were a mundane business dinner. Not a candlelit one, as they used to have here. Unsettled by this realization, Ben opened his mouth, but nothing came out. Yet he had so much to say to her. His hands were getting sweaty. His blood was pounding in his temples. He was struggling to breathe.

   "Um... It's been a long time," he stammered.

   "Not really," Andy replied indifferently. "We've been seeing each other at your work lately."

   "Yes, but we should see each other every day. At home. We should..."

   The interior designer moistened her lips.

   "We shouldn't, Ben. It would be rather... inappropriate, don't you think? We're divorced now, and what's more, I've remarried. And you're going to remarry too, for that matter."

   These words sank like poisonous thorns into Ben's heart. Overcome with distress, he wanted to reply, but then a waitress arrived to give them the wine list. Completely ignoring her partner, Andy asked for advice on what to drink. While the waitress answered her, Ben remained absorbed in the rings shining on his beloved's finger. She had kept her wedding ring. And the ring he had given her for their engagement.

   But the wave of hope that overwhelmed him quickly turned to bitterness. Did it really mean anything? Or had she simply recycled these rings for this second "union" because the escort-boy she had "married" in a mock wedding was too stingy to offer her the most beautiful thing there was? Slowly, Ben slid his fingers along the tablecloth, seeking to touch hers. To caress her skin. Take her hand. However, Andy abruptly pulled her hand away and returned the wine list to the waitress, dictating her order.

   "Perfect. And for the gentleman?"

   "Oh, he'll have the same as me," she said. "Thank you."

   Confused by the authority in her voice, the waitress looked questioningly at Ben. Equally confused, he simply nodded. He hadn't even heard what Andy had ordered. Never mind. She always knew what was best for him, as she often liked to proclaim. Even if he had serious doubts about this crazy idea she had had for their relationship. Andy began to consult the menu.

   "Hmm... I should avoid steak; you'll complain about the smell again," she lamented. "It's a shame to have to deprive myself again. But hey, since you're here..."

   At least she hadn't made that remark in front of the waitress. Ben then thought about what he had brought her. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a box decorated with a pretty gold ribbon.

   "Here, it's... I... I didn't just buy them, okay?" he said awkwardly as he handed them to her. "Don't worry. I've had them in my pocket for over two weeks."

   His gift seemed to intrigue his beloved. A hint of a smile appeared on her painted lips. She lifted the lid and gazed at the white gold earrings set with sapphires.

   "They're pretty," she said simply before closing the box.

   "You... You're not going to try them on?"

   "It can wait."

   Andy put the precious gift in her Gucci handbag and turned her attention back to the menu.

   "This marriage will suit you perfectly. Trust me. It will give you time to put things into perspective."

   This time, Ben couldn't contain his pain. His tone hardened.

   "I don't even know why you're putting me through this."

   The woman looked him straight in the eye. Her face darkened.

   "You know why. Besides, it's only for a year. You'll survive."

   "Maybe not," her ex-husband told her desperately. "Andy... I can't live without you. We've known each other forever. I could have studied abroad, I had a great future ahead of me, and I gave it all up to stay by your side. You know perfectly well that I can't function normally when you're away. I feel like everything is falling apart when you're not here."

   Such lamentations brought a small grin to her face.

   "It sounds like the lyrics from a depressing love song. If you start quoting Adele's, I'll shoot myself."

   For Ben, this statement was like a slap across the face. A lump formed in his throat. His chest tightened. Damn it, she shouldn't joke about that. He sighed, lowered his head, and pinched the bridge of his nose.

   "Andromeda..."

   "How do you know you can't live without me, exactly?" she asked with a hint of contempt. "You've never tried. We've been together forever."

   "Exactly!" the unfortunate man exclaimed indignantly. "A temporary marriage, even a fake one, that will keep us apart for a year, where I'll have to play the perfect husband to someone else... Are you serious? Do you want me dead or something?"

   "Your death won't be necessary. Besides, you've already signed."

   "Yes, because otherwise I would never have seen you again! You were very clear on that point. I completely understand that you're trying to punish me. I deserve your resentment and your desire to see me suffer as much as you have suffered. But now you're going too far."

   Instantly, Andy dropped the menu, which fell onto her plate with a thud, and glared at him.

   "Are you kidding me right now? I'm punishing you, you say? Seriously? On the contrary, I'm trying to save our relationship. Anyway, the only one being punished here is me. The simple fact that I'm still alive and sitting here in front of you is the worst punishment of all."

  Her voice didn't tremble. No cracks fractured her cold, austere façade. No apparent sadness. Only anger and resentment. Ben swallowed, fighting back tears. It was as if a red-hot poker pierced his chest. Dreadful memories flashed through his mind. The crossroads. The collision. The blood. The hospital. His wife was about to die on a stretcher. The horror. The loss. His heart was bleeding again.

   "Things aren't going to work themselves out, Ben," Andy asserted. "We need this break to get our heads together. It's a test we have to pass to see if we still have a chance. And if you refuse to go along with the plan, well... In that case, just forget about me. Quite simple. Is that clear?"

   Gathering his courage, Ben tried to breathe calmly. Then he nodded obediently.

   "Crystal, sweetheart."

   "Don't call me that anymore," his ex-wife warned. "Just do as I say. That's all."

   The next moment, she stood up and picked up her bag and coat.

   "I think we're done here. I'll have dinner at my place. My new husband's expecting me. I'd better get going."

   A broad smile punctuated this sentence and the poor man couldn't help but see it as a provocation. For sure, she hadn't finished making him suffer. His ordeal had only just begun. Ben watched Andy leave the restaurant. Then he leapt from his chair and hurried to catch up with her, before the astonished eyes of the waitress who was bringing them their wine. On the sidewalk, the thirty-year-old saw his beloved get into her car on the passenger side. Her new husband had been waiting for her all this time. Ben realized that, in other words, she had never really intended to have dinner with him. She'd only come to set the record straight.

   But the poor man wasn't inclined to give up. He jumped into his Porsche, got behind the wheel and followed Andy's car to her residence. He parked nearby and observed the scene. A red-haired man emerged from the car, about as tall as him, with a lean, muscular build and a slim figure. He gallantly opened the door for his passenger. She took his hand, joining him outside, then smiled fondly and caressed his cheek. The couple disappeared inside the house. Ben's fingers closed like talons on his steering wheel.

   Andy spoke of a test to be passed in order to consolidate their dying union. But mostly, she obviously wanted to enjoy another marriage, albeit a false one, with a pretty boy. To give herself an idea of what her life might have been like without him. What the hell was she playing at? Had she decided to impose a contractual marriage on him, too, to make herself feel less guilty about cheating on him? In any case, if she was trying to drive him mad with pain and jealousy, she'd succeeded.

   Without really knowing why, Ben got out of his car and headed for his ex's. His ex was still identified as "My Wife" in his contacts. Curious, he glanced within the vehicle. On the other side of the window, on the back seat, he recognized the box with the golden ribbon, abandoned there. This simple vision marked the end of the stupid hope that had been running through him today. Andy didn't care about him. Didn't care about his presents. He felt so ridiculous, suddenly. So pathetic. How could he have believed for a second that...?

   Sighing a despondent expletive, Ben pulled out his phone and, reflexively, called his beloved. Perhaps it had just been an oversight. It rang and rang. Then it went to voicemail. So the poor man called again. After barely one ring, it went to voicemail again. She'd seen his call and promptly ignored it. She was probably too busy with her handsome redhead to answer. Ben was enraged at the idea.

   He waited a moment, beset by grim and sad thoughts. Then, responding to an impulse, he picked up a stone from the ground and smashed it with all his might against the door window. Shattering glass. A deafening alarm. And then, police sirens. A patrol car was nearby. He really wasn't lucky. Ben could have grabbed the earrings and run, but he didn't move. It wouldn't do any good. Except to make things worse for himself.

   Twenty minutes later, he'd ended up in police custody. A nice way to conclude a very bad day. The police officer who had arrested him tried to question him, to find out who he was, but he wouldn't say anything. In any case, without proof, he wouldn't believe him if he told him his name. And Ben had left his identity cards in his Porsche. Now he just appeared like a wretched car thief caught red-handed. He certainly looked the part.

   "Were we able to contact the owner of the car?" Officer Wexley soon asked.

   The colleague he was addressing shrugged.

   "We've called countless times; they're not picking up."

   Don't bother her, she's probably consummating her new marriage right now, Ben mused bitterly. His heart sank at the thought. Damn it, he was sure that was the only reason for the radio silence. It was making him sick. How could she do this to him?

   "You'd better cooperate, sir," the police officer sighed.

   Indifferent to his fate, the suspect shrugged.

   "I have the right to remain silent, don't I?"

   "In principle, you do. But refusing to tell us anything won't do you any good. Trust me. Would you rather spend the night at the station?"

   To be perfectly honest, Ben would have much preferred to go home, collapse into bed, and disappear underground. However, admitting to this officer that he just wanted to get back the expensive gift he had given his ex-wife, who didn't even want it, seemed impossible. Even if they believed him. It was better to keep quiet than to admit that he was nothing but a pathetic fool. At least in this mysterious silence, he retained a residue of pride. After a few minutes, Ben heard footsteps approaching. He soon sensed a presence to his left.

   "Excuse me, can I help you, ma'am?" Officer Wexley inquired in surprise.

   "Good evening," a crystal-clear voice greeted him. "I am Mr. Ben Solo's wife."

  At once, the aforementioned man's features fell. He turned his head and looked up in bewilderment at the person now standing beside him. She was a woman with a low brown bun, dressed all in white, wearing loose pants and a sleeveless top with a collar that rose to the base of her neck. She stood there, back straight, hands resting on her stomach as if she were about to make a flight attendant's speech, a big Colgate smile on her lips.

   "Snap!" Wexley's colleague suddenly exclaimed, a phone pressed to his ear. "I have the owner of the car on the line. It wasn't theft. She claims she lost her keys and asked him to use force to unlock the doors."

   Stunned by this revelation, the officer stared at his suspect and raised a skeptical eyebrow.

   "Uh... What? Is that true? She asked you to break a window in her car?"

   "She says she was fully aware of what was happening and won't be pressing charges," the other policeman explained, equally taken aback.

   "Can we go now, Officer?" the brunette asked.

   At first, the officer was so stunned that he couldn't get a word out. He was clearly also distracted by the charm of the innocent suspect's wife. Finally, he stammered that Ben Solo was free to go. The man in question, meanwhile, was struggling to keep up with events. Everything was happening so fast. The woman who had come to his rescue thanked Wexley warmly, then bowed her head toward the one she called her husband and stared into his amber eyes.

   From this angle, the neon lights on the ceiling formed a halo around her. And with her immaculate outfit, she appeared to Ben like an angel who had come to save him from this hell. He didn't know if it was only seconds or minutes, but he found himself unable to look away from her. Then something sparkling caught his attention. The rings the stranger was wearing on her finger. They were the ones he had bought her. So she was really telling the truth. Well... from a certain point of view. The young woman's smile became compassionate. Reassuring.

   "So?" she asked. "Shall we go, sweetheart?"

Chapter Text

   The "new wife" his ex had chosen for him was about twenty-eight years old, like Andy's "new husband". Ben watched her silently as he followed her obediently through the corridors of the police station, leaving the open-plan office and ending up in the large hall. He felt a certain awkwardness coming over him. He didn't really know what to say to her.

   "So, you're..."

   "My name is Rey," she informed him. "I'm the escort-girl sent by M.E."

   Ben frowned.

   "Who's Emmy?"

   "No," the woman named Rey corrected.  "M.E. As in Marriage Experience."

   "Agh," her client sighed. "Yes, of course..."

   He never would have believed that such an agency existed. Apparently, wedding planning wasn't profitable enough for Wedding & Life. So they had invested in this masquerade. Ben had already heard of Girlfriend Experience, or Boyfriend Experience. It was still in the realm of escorting, but it wasn't just about paid sex. Sometimes, in fact, there was no sex at all. It was mainly a kind of role-playing game to create the illusion of being in a relationship. With intimacy, sweet words, hugs, and tenderness.

   However, Ben had never imagined that this concept could be taken even further. Offering fake contractual marriages on top of that! Whereas basically, the GFE emphasized a simulated couple relationship without the drawbacks. Without the commitment. It's hard to get more committed than marriage. Especially since this kind of arrangement turns out to be much longer in duration. A whole year in his case. Wasn't that a bit excessive for a mere role-playing game?

   "Well, um... Should I thank you, or... are you going to tell me you're just doing your job?"

   A crystal-clear laugh rang out. The brunette glanced amusedly at her companion.

  "Don't thank me yet. You know... In five years on the job, this is the first time I've met a client at the police station."

   "Hilarious, indeed," the man grumbled, rolling his eyes. "How did you know where I was?"

   "Mrs. Snoke warned me. She saw her broken window, then your car next to it, with no sign of you, so she quickly figured out what had happened."

   At the mention of Andy, Ben clenched his jaws. She had gotten him out of a hell of a mess by covering for him with the police, and he was more than grateful to her for that. But she had taken her time before coming to his aid. He probably deserved it, though. He had broken her window, driven by a simple impulse in his pain and distress.

   "All she had to do was answer her phone," he growled before stopping short, suddenly realizing something. "Damn it, yeah, my car's still over there. I guess I'll have to take a taxi now."

   Discouraged, he groaned and buried his face in his large hand. Then he heard a small metallic clinking sound that made him flinch. It had nothing to do with that chandelier, though. Rey was just showing him her car keys.

   "I'll be your taxi, yes," she smiled. "Shall we go?"

   With that, she headed back toward the exit. He let her go first, waiting a few seconds before following her, still frustrated by the whole situation, and thoughtfully observing the escort-girl. It was then that he noticed, despite himself, how her canvas pants hugged the curve of her shapely buttocks. Ben blinked, then immediately looked away. Shit. The agency hadn't sent him the ugliest one. Far from it. On the other hand, he suspected that when you were employed in this line of work, it was better to have an attractive body.

   Once outside, Rey walked straight to an old red Beetle parked a little further away, opened the door, and got behind the wheel. Ben approached, perplexed. On the one hand, this car was surprisingly familiar to him. Had he seen it somewhere before? On the other hand, given his size, he seriously doubted he could fit into this tin can. Exasperated, the thirty-year-old pouted doubtfully.

   "Are you serious? Do you really think I'll be able to fit in there?"

   "Oh, you know, with a little willpower, anything is possible," Rey promised him. "And worst-case scenario, we'll use a shoehorn and some Vaseline."

   A mischievous wink punctuated her sentence. Ben licked his lips and had a brief moment of absent thought. A few seconds later, he pulled himself together and cleared his throat.

   "Unless you'd rather walk home, of course," the escort-girl concluded.

   With no other choice, her client gave in, walked around the Beetle, and contorted himself as best he could, despite his long legs, to sit in the passenger seat. Rey told him to fasten his seatbelt and started the engine. At first, silence filled the car. The young woman remained focused on the road. Ben glanced at her discreetly, then looked away as if nothing had happened. He hated this situation, which made him more than uncomfortable, but he also felt intrigued by Rey. Curious about her strange job.

   He gazed briefly at the solitaire ring she wore on her ring finger. He still remembered the jeweler's bewildered expression at his cynical attitude and cruel lack of enthusiasm when he bought them. As she handed him the rings and offered advice, he abruptly interrupted her. "It's okay, don't bother, this isn't my first time." Then, realizing he had sounded a little too gruff, he'd tried to be a little friendlier, saying only, "Um. I'll take them. Thank you."

   "So, your job is to get married," Ben muttered, in a clumsy attempt at conversation. "Do you like it?"

   His question seemed to surprise Rey. But she regained her smile in a split second.

   "Well... It depends," she said, shrugging. "It's well-paid, anyway."

   "I guess so."

   Ben thought back to his interview with Gwen Phasma, the agency's CEO, while Andy began the procedures for their contract marriages. The woman had spent an hour trying to convince him and listing the benefits of her business. She had only succeeded in persuading him that this whole mess was not for him. Yet he had to comply. Or he could say goodbye to the one he loved. Forever.

   As soon as they got home, Ben bypassed Rey, trotted over to his refrigerator, took out a cold can of beer, and took a big swig. The alcohol burned his tongue, but it felt good. God knows he needed a pick-me-up after everything he'd just been through. Even if his ordeal was far from over. Rey coughed to remind him of her presence. He turned back to her. She was standing there, back straight, hands on her stomach, in her cheerful hostess pose. Then she gestured gracefully toward the table.

   "I've prepared some raw vegetables for you. I assume you haven't eaten."

   For a moment, Ben thought he was looking at an android. It was as if he had just bought himself a sophisticated robot, which looked like a beautiful woman, to take care of him by, among other things, cooking for him. The thought amused him. He raised his eyebrows and noticed the salad on the plate sitting alone on the table. Lettuce, croutons, vinaigrette, tomatoes, and eggs. It looked tasty. And the gesture was touching, even if Rey was just doing her job. But at this point, Ben preferred to stick with his beer. He took a second sip, this time holding the young woman's gaze, as if to provoke her. She didn't react. Her grin refused to disappear.

   "I've settled into a room on the first floor. Let me know if you mind and I'll take another one."

   A sigh was his only response. His house had so many rooms that Ben didn't care where she had put her things. What he wanted was for this girl not to be here at all. For her to leave him to mope alone in his big empty house.

   "So, I have to call you my wife now, is that right?"

   "Actually, I'm not technically your 'wife' yet," Rey explained. "It's only after a brief adjustment period, when you're sure I'm to your liking, that we'll sign the contract at the wedding ceremony. And then our union will be official."

   "Stop it, there's nothing official about this 'union'," the man said angrily.

   "Official for a year, I mean. From a marital contract standpoint. Sorry, I was just saying that for the sake of immersion. Out of pure habit. I know your case is more... special."

   Ben nearly choked on his beer, so furious was he. And an adjustment period? To make sure this girl was to his liking? She never would be. Not her, or anyone else. God. He didn't want her here. He wanted Andromeda. His queen, his star, his universe. But Rey would be all he would have. And in his mind, he could imagine his beloved telling him that he'd have to be content with just Rey for a whole year.

   "Okay, so how does your bullshit work, anyway?" the unfortunate man asked impatiently. "I'm not sure what I can and can't do in this kind of situation for example."

   Not that he planned to do anything. He just wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible. For today.

   "Every detail is in the manual," Rey pointed out. "Haven't you consulted it?"

   Oh, fuck, that damn manual, Ben despaired inwardly. He had barely leafed through it. It must have been a few thousand pages long. Proof that everything in this agency was strictly regulated. Fortunately for their employees. But still. Why bother reading all that when he didn't want any of the services Rey could offer him?

   "Well," Rey finally said. "Now I'm going to bed. Good night, sweetheart."

   Without waiting for a response, Rey turned around, walked away, and went upstairs. Ben didn't climb the stairs until an hour later. He first spent nearly forty-five minutes in the shower, lost in thought, letting the very hot water purify his naked, bruised body. Then he swallowed some sleeping pills and went to bed. He would need them more than ever tonight to get any sleep.

   During the night, dark dreams came to haunt him. He dreamed that Rey was sleepwalking and wreaking havoc in his house. Opening the fridge and greedily devouring everything in it. Like a starving wild animal. Then she was grabbing a kitchen knife. No. It wasn't Rey. It was Padmé. His grandmother. And she was now heading towards the bed where his grandfather was lying, ready to stab him in his sleep.

   Frightened, Ben grabbed her wrist to stop her and begged her to wake up. He wasn't afraid she would kill the sleeping old man. He was just afraid she would end up in prison. Padmé slowly turned her head toward him. And as soon as her eyes met his, her dead gaze, devoid of any glimmer of life, made his blood run cold. His grandmother opened her mouth, murmured his name, then her neck twisted suddenly with a terrible crack.

   Ben woke up with a start, trembling with terror. A weight was pressing down on his chest. It felt like a heavy stone constantly crushing his rib cage. His pajamas, soaked with sweat, clung to his skin. His damp hair stuck to his forehead and the back of his neck. It took him what seemed like an eternity to calm down. He lay perfectly still for a moment, clutching his pillow as if his life depended on it, his eyes on a spot at the other end of his room.

   When Ben finally got up, his first instinct was to run to the bathroom. He opened the medicine cabinet, grabbed one of the many pills it contained, twisted off the cap, and... nothing. It was empty. Ben tried shaking it anyway, as if a pill would magically come out. Still nothing. Shit. Shit, shit, shit! He growled, annoyed, and threw the tube against the wall with all his might.

   "You got up earlier than I thought you would."

   Rey was already standing in the kitchen preparing scrambled eggs when the poor man finally came downstairs, showered, dressed, and more or less ready to endure another day. As soon as he saw her, he sighed in despair. She hadn't disappeared overnight. Sadly. In any case, a delicious smell of bacon was wafting through the ground floor. And the table was already set for two. But Ben deliberately ignored the rumblings of his stomach.

   "I never eat breakfast," he declared.

   "You should."

   "What I mean is, there's no need to cook anything for me to eat."

   "I'm just trying to please you," Rey argued.

   Once again, she graced him with her dazzling smile. She shone like the sun in his vast, colorless house and her light irritated his eyes. The brunette then turned off the stove, transferred the scrambled eggs from the pan to a plate, and returned to the table. Damn, just like yesterday, it all looked mouth-watering.

   "Come on, sit down. It's our first day together. You like eggs, don't you?"

In response, Ben shrugged, adjusted the strap of his bag, and headed for the front door. Concerned, Rey grabbed a glass and handed it to him.

   "At least have some orange juice. It's full of vitamins."

   Her companion stopped, let out a deep sigh, and replied without looking at her:

   "That's nice, but I'll eat later."

   Then he left, leaving Rey alone in the dining room. The smile on her face slowly faded. She put down the glass, sighed in turn, sat down at the table, and took a bite of scrambled eggs.

***

   In the elevator taking him to his studio floor, Ben pressed his forehead against the wall, gripping it with his hands, overcome by terrible shivers. He forced himself to breathe through his mouth. He hated the surveillance camera flashing red in the corner of the ceiling. And it was worse when he found himself alone in the elevator cabin, when he felt like he was being watched. It was worse when he ran out of anxiety medication, like today.

   He had always hated cameras like this. The camera was the eye of the chandelier, and the chandelier was the monster of his nightmares. He struggled to make out his surroundings. The lights blinded him. Frustrated by the impending anxiety attack, Ben punched the wall so that the pain would help him pull himself together. Then he pulled at the collar of his shirt. He was suffocating. He was going crazy. It was completely ridiculous to panic like this over a mere camera.

   Nothing special happened at work. It was a day as monotonous as any other, although Ben tried to focus on his music to forget the endless chaos that was his life. But at the end of the afternoon, he couldn't take it anymore and decided to join Andy in the office where she had been working since the renovations began. So he crossed the construction site, trampled on the tarpaulin covering the floor, passed a few workers, and entered the room where his beloved was working.

   As soon as he saw her there, sitting on her desk with her legs elegantly crossed, he swallowed hard and admired her for a moment as she sorted through her papers. Then he knocked on the open door. Andy looked up at him, gave him a sober smile, then concentrated on her task again as if nothing had happened. As if he were a completely insignificant person to her. That being said, she must still be angry with him for the damage he had caused to her car. And rightly so.

  "Um... Thanks a lot for... covering for me with the cops yesterday," Ben stammered.

   He took a cautious step toward his ex-wife. She shrugged.

   "Of course."

   "No," he despaired. "I really lost it. It was insane! I saw the earrings on the back seat of your car and then I just... I'm sorry. It's..."

   In response, Andy tilted her head to one side and casually tucked a few strands of black hair behind her ear, revealing the white gold earring set with sapphires that adorned her lobe. Ben's eyes widened in amazement. "Oh..." was all he could say. And once the surprise had passed, his heart started beating again.

   "I told you they were pretty. I thought these were my gift, not the box."

   Now the unfortunate man felt even more stupid. Andy had kept his gift. She had only left the box in the car when she left. Unless she had actually left the earrings on the back seat, only to retrieve them when she saw how upset he was when he realized she hadn't taken his gift. This doubt discouraged Ben even more. He wasn't going to get anywhere if he continued to torture himself with all these questions. Andy was proudly wearing the earrings he had given her. And that was all that mattered.

   "I'll buy you another car," he sighed sheepishly.

   "Ben, come on," his beloved chuckled. "I'm not going to replace a beautiful new car just because of a broken window. Just pay for the repairs instead."

   Ben nodded distractedly, still berating himself inwardly. What an idiot he had been!

   "So?" the decorator asked him suddenly. "How was your first night?"

   Lost in his thoughts, he stared at her for a moment before realizing what she was talking about.

   "Oh, um... Pretty good," he replied awkwardly, shoving his hands in his pockets.

   "Great."

   Silence.

   "Mm-hmm."

   A laugh.

   "Why are you making that face? She's pretty, isn't she?"

   "Huh? Oh, yes. Um... Very pretty, yes."

   "Wonderful! What are you complaining about, then?"

   Andy's cheerful tone threw him off balance. He now looked at her with pain in his eyes. How could she act as if knowing that he had spent the night with another woman under his roof didn't affect her? Did it really not bother her? Because personally, Ben felt like throwing up when he imagined what his ex-partner might have done yesterday with the handsome escort-boy she had "married".

   "She's not as pretty as me, though?" Andy whispered. "That's flattering. Come on. Don't be too hard on the poor girl. She's just doing her best to satisfy you."

   A few minutes later, the couple waited for the elevator together, then stepped into the cabin as soon as the sliding doors opened. The woman pressed the button for the parking garage. The doors closed and Ben once again felt trapped. However, Andromeda's presence managed to calm him down slightly. Sweating profusely, he tried to regulate his breathing, panting. If only he could rip out that fucking camera.

   "Did you take a sedative this morning?” his beloved inquired.

   Her concern for him was a relief to him. She wasn't as indifferent as she seemed to be about his recent emotional state.

   "I don't have any left. Actually, the truth is, I'm feeling some withdrawal."

   "Do you want me to get you some more?" she offered.

   Ben laughed nervously.

   "That's nice of you. I think I'm just really anxious right now. It's because of all this mess. I..."

   "Hey..."

   Andy placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder and encouraged him to face her.

   "It'll pass quickly, okay?" she said softly. "Don't forget why you're doing this."

   God, how could he forget? He was putting himself through this nightmare in the sole hope of saving his real marriage. So he could one day get back together with his real wife.

   "Oh, shit," she sighed. "I think I left my keys on the d..."

   She never got to finish her sentence. Ben rushed over to her and hugged her tightly, shaking with spasms, breathing heavily. He sniffed. Tears stung his eyes. Andy stiffened in shock, raising her hands helplessly. She didn't hug him back. Her ex-husband buried his face in her neck, intoxicated by her scent. He missed her so much.

   In his distress, in desperate need of love and comfort, he pulled away from her, cupped her cheeks, and tried to kiss her. But Andy pushed him away. And as soon as Ben regained his senses, he was overcome with a tremendous sense of shame. His heart was racing. The woman he loved was gritting her teeth and refusing to look him in the eye. Was she angry with him? Or just upset? Probably both. He felt terribly guilty now.

   Ever since they had broken up, the poor man had felt like a dog separated from its master. Poe would describe this thought as a huge red flag. But he didn't care what Poe thought. He would crawl to her if she asked him to. He would beg her on his knees. She was everything to him. This whole situation was so absurd! Didn't she see that he understood his mistakes? That he had changed? Why didn't she want to come back so they could forget it all and start over?

   "I'm sorry," he whispered, looking pitiful. "It's anxiety. I shouldn't have..."

   Andy shook her head.

   "It's nothing," she replied coldly. "Goodbye."

   The elevator reached the parking level. The woman motioned for her former companion to get out. Ben obeyed, his heart heavy. However, he gave her one last look. In Andromeda's dark irises, he detected not the slightest emotion. Then the sliding doors closed, separating them for good.

   The road leading to his home seemed to go on forever. And once he’d parked in front of his house, Ben preferred to stay inside his car, overwhelmed by his grim thoughts. He had no desire to see the robot sent by the Marriage Experience agency again. His interactions with Andy today kept running through his head.

   What was her main goal in this abject farce? Did she simply want to see if he really cared about her? More than anything else? And if she liked the result, so much the better, and if not, at least they would have divorced already? Damn it, wasn't everything he had done so far by now sufficient proof of his unconditional love for her, in her eyes? Suddenly, the vibration of his phone startled Ben. Feverishly, he checked the screen but was quickly disappointed. It was an unknown number. Nevertheless, he answered it automatically.

   "Yes, hello?" he mumbled, rubbing his face.

   "There's no point in moping around in your Porsche all night, you know."

   Hearing this, the man paled, then turned his head toward his house. Rey was standing there on the porch, phone in hand. She waved at him and gave him her iconic smile. Ben let out a long sigh.

   "Did you make dinner?"

   "Yes, it's ready."

   "Okay," he finally gave in, exhausted. "Are you a good cook, at least?"

   "Well... There's only one way to find out."

   As she chirped these words, she winked mischievously at him again, then turned on her heel and went back into the house. With no other real option, Ben got out of his Porsche and followed her inside. Rey led him to the kitchen and cheerfully pointed to the set table, very proud of herself. She definitely had a sparkling personality. Unless it was just a role she played with her "husbands".

   Ben stared at her silently. She certainly was pretty. She certainly had a beautiful smile. She had adorable dimples at the corners of her pink lips when she grinned. But why did she have to smile all the time? To annoy him? To contrast with the expressionless facade of the woman he considered his real wife?

   For dinner, Rey had prepared risotto. Ben sat down across from her and tasted her dish, without much enthusiasm. Then his features froze. A multitude of flavors exploded on his tongue. He widened his eyes, then slowly nodded his head in surprise. Lately, he had become accustomed to bland meals. This one certainly wasn't bland.

   "It's... not bad," he admitted.

   "Of course," the young woman replied. "What, did you think I wanted to poison you?"

   She laughed. Ben pouted before concentrating on his plate, eating with appetite.

   "You know, I never wanted a housewife. That said, you're less of a housewife than a housekeeper who's likely to cost me a fortune over the course of the year."

   Although he remained a little grumpy, it didn't manage to dampen Rey's constant joyful expression. She shrugged.

   "I have other assets besides cooking."

   "Oh, really?" Ben asked, raising an eyebrow. "What, is sex part of the contract?"

   The escort-girl almost choked on her sip of water. She swallowed conscientiously, then fluttered her eyelids. But if his question had shocked her, she quickly hid it, stifling a small ironic laugh.

   "You're getting straight to business, Mr. Solo," she teased him before taking another bite of her risotto.

   An exasperated sigh escaped Ben. He gave her an annoyed look.

   "It's a real question. Not something I'd be interested in."

   So Rey cleared her throat, leaned on the table, interlaced her fingers, and replied very seriously:

   "In case you didn't know, paying for sexual services is illegal in this country and punishable by a fine. However, I'm not gonna lie; it does happen that couples formed by the agency get it on. But it's not part of the contract. In principle. It's strongly discouraged, of course, but it's tolerated. My superiors tend to turn a blind eye to it as long as it's perfectly consensual on both sides and the client pays well."

   This confirmed Ben's worst fears. Now he was 99.9% sure that Andy was cheating on him with that redhead. And the hollow in his chest grew even larger. His heart continued to tear itself to pieces until there was nothing left.

   "Personally, I don't do that," Rey emphasized. "Never. On the other hand, I do kiss. Only chaste kisses. And I give hugs if necessary."

   Ben snorted cynically.

   "Oh, I won't kiss you," he said wearily, crossing his arms. "And that's nice of you, but I'm not in need of hugs."

   "No?" the escort-girl said, surprised.

   Her client glared at her. He didn't know if she was asking innocently or making fun of him. But either way, her response had irritated him. Then he adopted a nonchalant attitude.

   "I may cheat on you regularly, by the way. I have an insatiable sexual appetite."

   Rey raised her eyebrows.

   "Tell me about it," she whispered with an amused smile, clearly unconvinced.

   Nothing seemed capable of unsettling her. But Ben wasn't going to give up anytime soon.

   "Since it's a fake marriage, it doesn't really count as infidelity. I assume you don't mind, right?"

   "Do as you see fit. Are you sure this is what you want, though?"

   God, this girl annoyed him. She was too perfect. Way too perfect. Maybe she really was an android, deep down. In fact, Ben realized he'd need to provoke her to get a reaction out of her. Any reaction. With a little luck, he would manage to scare her away and the torture would end immediately. The agency would complain to Andy, who would be forced to give up this absurd idea of a twisted "couples therapy".

   So the man decided to go even further. He stood up, walked around the table, and stood behind Rey. With one hand, he leaned on the back of her chair. His fingers brushed her shoulder blades. The young woman remained impassive, staring straight ahead. Slowly, Ben reached out and traced the line of her jaw with his index finger, almost caressing her skin. This time, he saw her shudder.

   "Is it inappropriate?" he asked in a hoarse voice. "I can do that, can't I?"

   He then placed his hand onto the back of her neck, entwining his fingers in her brown hair. He leaned toward the young woman and whispered, his full lips brushing her ear:

   "We're married, after all."

   He hoped more than anything that Rey would think him too pushy and pull away abruptly. Instead, after a long silence, she tensed and replied in the same tone:

   "We can do whatever we want, Mr. Solo..."

   She turned her head toward him. Their noses almost touched.

   "...as long as both parties agree."

   There she was, reciting the manual again. Like a real robot. But Ben realized that now her mouth was only an inch away from his. Her warm breath swept across his lips. Caught in his own game, the man blushed violently and straightened up quickly as if a snake had bitten him. His heart panicked. He swallowed, moved away, then tried to act as if nothing had happened.

   "I'm exhausted," he concluded. "Thanks for dinner. Um... Sorry, I don't know if that's how I should address you. I admit I haven't read that stupid manual yet."

   His words were spoken with the utmost couldn't-care-less tone. Pressing her chin against her fist, Rey kept her eyes on him, tilting her head, smiling teasingly, amused and even slightly softened.

   "Honestly?" she chuckled. "I would've been surprised if you had."

   Ben held her gaze. Soon, the corners of his lips stretched, gradually forming the emergence of a smile. A smile he suppressed the next second. Against all odds, Rey's grin was contagious, even for him. No. She wouldn't get it that easily. Out of the question.

   Later, the thirty-year-old tossed and turned in bed, lying on the quilt, unable to sleep as was often the case. Then, noises that seemed to be coming from the kitchen made him jump. A cold shiver ran down his spine. His pulse immediately raced. Was he dreaming? Would he find his grandmother rummaging through the refrigerator, sleepwalking, if he went downstairs?

   Finally, Ben sat up on his mattress and looked at the clock on the wall. Two o'clock in the morning. He waited a moment. Then, when he was sure he was awake, he gathered his courage and decided to get up. Taking extra care, he left his room and tiptoed toward the living room, where he could hear distant echoes. To his immense relief, it was not his grandmother's ghost he found in the room. Rey was sitting on the sofa, a can of beer in her hand, watching a baseball game on the giant television.

   "Sorry if I woke you up," she said without looking at him, as if she could sense his presence. "I couldn't sleep. I guess you couldn't either, though."

   Her brown hair was loose, falling beautifully over her shoulders, and she was wearing blue light blocking glasses, which she pushed up to the top of her thin, pointed nose. Ben thought that this studious look suited her well, but quickly dismissed the thought, giving way to his discontent.

   "Yes, because I'm an insomniac. It's in my file, probably. I thought you would have read it."

   "I did read it, actually. I know you're stuffing yourself with pills because of it."

   "In that case, all the more reason not to make it even harder for me to sleep with all this noise!"

   Finally, the young woman turned her attention to him, then shrugged.

   "They always say that the best thing to do when you can't sleep is to keep yourself busy. Just stay with me, Benny. If you hate baseball, it'll annoy you so much that you'll fall asleep."

   With one hand, she patted the seat next to her on the sofa. Ben frowned.

   "Are we on first-name terms now?" he said indignantly.

   "We're not going to spend a whole year getting bogged down in courtesy exchanges, are we?"

   Sigh. The insomniac closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.

   "I see... Listen, miss, um..."

   "Yes, boo?"

   He blushed. Rey smiled at him. Again. With that playful gleam in her eye that was unique to her.

   "Would you like a beer?" she asked, getting up from the sofa. "I'll bring you one."

   Grabbing the remote control, she turned off the TV, walked around her companion, and headed for the stairs. Ben grimaced and rubbed his head. A new migraine was gnawing at him. He grunted, then started to follow Rey downstairs. But he stopped halfway down the stairs. The chandelier was lit again. Its menacing pendants clanged together, like a warning. The poor man froze in terror and leaned against the wall to keep from collapsing, breathless. His hand tightened on his T-shirt, at chest level. The light burned his retinas. The rattling sound hurt his ears. He grabbed his hair with one hand and hit his temple to bring himself back to his senses.

   "Hey! Catch it!"

   As soon as he looked up, he saw Rey below him. She threw him a can of beer, which he caught reflexively, without thinking too much about it. Goodness, was she crazy? One should never shake a can! The beer was likely to explode in his face now. The brunette didn't seem to care. She laughed and applauded him.

   "Bravo! See? You could play baseball!"

   "Couldn't you just go live somewhere else?" Ben asked impatiently, once he had regained his composure.

   Taken aback by this sudden request, Rey pursed her lips and blinked, confused.

   "Does my presence here bother you that much?"

   "I won't say anything to the agency," he promised her. "You'll be paid as agreed, and if you don't have a place to live, at the worst, I can rent you an apartment, a hotel room, whatever. But please go away. Right now, I'd like you to leave me alone. It's just that..."

   "Ben Solo," the escort-girl interrupted. "Calm down. I'm not asking you to be in love."

   Faced with her mocking expression, her client turned pale and licked his lips. He felt his cheeks burning.

   "Look, what I've been told is that your ex-wife didn't like the idea of leaving you alone in your big, sad house, given your... emotional state," she continued sympathetically. "One of the reasons she called on our services was so that someone caring could look after you."

   "Damn it... I see," Ben said, offended. "So basically, she paid a fortune to get me a babysitter. Great."

   The young woman shook her head. Her eyes became concerned.

   "What I mean is that you tend to neglect your health. I've seen that clearly in the last twenty-four hours."

  Then she gave him a reassuring smile.

  "You don't need to act tough, you know. Just relax. It'll do you good. I'll always say that with me, you can be yourself. Without fear of judgment."

   "Oh, really?" Ben challenged her sharply. "Even if I collect dead kittens' heads?"

   That beautiful crystal-clear laugh that got on his nerves again.

   "Especially if you collect dead kittens' heads," Rey said ironically.

   Silence. Then the clinking of pendants. Rage took hold of Ben. Responding to an impulse, he angrily threw his drink at the horrible chandelier. The can hit it with a loud clang before crashing to the floor, pierced, causing an eruption of foam. Rey was startled and cried out. Sprays of beer splashed the marble floor. The pendants swayed in all directions, clattering together even more loudly. Their long shadows jostled each other on the walls.

   His heart pounding, Ben sighed, then glanced at his companion. She had instinctively curled up, afraid of being hit by the projectile, protecting her head with her arms. And in her reaction, for a moment, the man thought he saw his grandmother again. The reflexes his grandmother had whenever his grandfather started to get aggressive.

   In shock, Ben looked down and examined his trembling hand. A feeling of fear, distress, and shame overwhelmed him. It was nothing against Rey. She had nothing to do with this mess. She was just trying to justify her salary by doing the work she was asked to do. His bitterness toward her was unfair.

   Anyway, she wasn't even the target when he threw the beer can. It was just the chandelier. He wanted that damn chandelier to stop making noise, to stop pissing him off. He hadn't been able to suppress that impulse. That violence. The thought horrified him. No. He wasn't like that. He refused to be like that. But it was in his veins. His blood. Could he escape it? God, poor Rey must be terrified now. Ben didn't dare look up to meet her gaze.

   Pitifully, he finally finished descending the stairs to clean up his mess. He heard Rey breathing calmly. He felt her hazel eyes locked on him. As if they could reduce him to ashes on the spot. His throat was dry, his mouth pasty, and his lungs were constricting. With slumped shoulders, he let out a sigh and reached for the almost empty can. That's when the rattling sounded again.

   Ben looked up. He had broken the chandelier in his foolishness. A large piece was coming loose. About to crash down on his head. The giant sandworm would make short work of him. It seemed that his dream from the other night had been prophetic after all. He had dreamed of his death. He was going to die right then and there, devoured by this monstrous chandelier. He only hoped that it would all be over quickly. That it would at least have the merit of delivering him from this ridiculous existence. So Ben closed his eyes resolutely, ready to accept his fate.

   "Ben!"

   At the last moment, someone rushed towards him and pushed him out of the path of the debris. A bundle of sharp pendants, along with a tiny part of the structure, crashed to the ground. The crystals shattered into a thousand pieces. Dazed, Ben took a long second to realize that he was still alive. He straightened up. His gaze focused on Rey.

   "Are you okay?" she gasped.

   Her companion was about to answer when he noticed something unusual. He looked down, his eyes wide with horror. Rey frowned, puzzled, then looked at her left forearm. Several cuts now streaked her skin from her elbow to her wrist. Blood flowed from her wounds onto her hand, staining her fingers, dripping near her feet, and staining what remained of the pendants. At the time, she hadn't felt anything.

  This sight appalled Ben. It moved him. It made him feel terribly guilty. Rey had stepped between him and his fate. She had just saved his life. But she had been injured in the process. And it was entirely his fault.

Chapter Text

   Why? Why had Rey done that? Why had she felt compelled to risk her life to prevent him from being crushed by part of the chandelier? Ben had immediately taken her to the ER, and now he was sitting in the hospital hallway, worrying himself sick, stomping, waiting for them to finish stitching her up. The doctors said she was very lucky. If she had been a few inches closer, the sharp debris could have hit her head. Ben looked at the dried blood on his trembling hands. A reminder of how he had struggled earlier to apply pressure to the wound to stop the bleeding. His first instinct when he saw Rey's injuries, once the shock had passed. Rey, what possessed you to do that? he despaired inwardly.

   "Mr. Solo? Well, well!"

   A familiar voice pulled him out of his anxious thoughts. The poor man jumped, looked up, and saw Dr. Kalonia, accompanied by a nurse.

   "What are you doing here? Are you visiting your grandfather?"

   At the mention of his grandfather, Ben felt a cold shiver run down his spine. He swallowed hard, stood up, and shook his head.

   "No, I'm here for something else. I came with my... Actually, I... I just accompanied a friend here after she had a little accident. I'm waiting for her to get stitched up."

   His interlocutor nodded.

   "We don't see you here very often," she lamented. "You know, I'm sure your grandfather would be pleased if you visited him more regularly. He hardly ever has any visitors and..."

   "No," Ben said bluntly, his gaze hard, his tone hostile. "He doesn't need me. He's living in a five-star hospital and has all the medical staff fussing over him. Call me when he kicks the bucket. Then I'll gladly come and take care of the body."

   With that, he nodded soberly to Kalonia, turned on his heel, and left, while under the shocked gaze of the two colleagues. Later, he reunited with Rey, still terribly worried about her condition, but he was assured that everything would be fine. On the way home, although he tried to focus on the road, Ben had glanced at her bandaged arm a few times.

   "You were really lucky," he sighed. "Do you realize that? It could've been pretty bad! You had a narrow escape from death tonight!"

   Anger mingled with his fear and dismay.

   "Some people don't deserve for you to sacrifice yourself heroically for them," he said firmly. "Come on, you hardly know me!"

   At his side, Rey groaned and rubbed her eyes, still a little groggy from the anesthesia.

   "What, would you have preferred me to let you die, or something?" she whispered.

   "Is it that damn manual again that forces you to do everything you can to protect the client in case of danger?" Ben asked, carefully avoiding answering the question.

   The injured woman gave him a weary look.

   "No, but if the client dies impaled by a chandelier after just one day, it might look bad on the agency's performance evaluation, don't you think?"

   Ben opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He watched his passenger for a few seconds. She smiled ironically, then leaned on the window sill and thoughtfully stared at the landscape passing before her eyes. So that was the only reason for her "sacrifice"? Even if she probably didn't imagine she would get hit by the broken pendants instead. She hadn't thought about it and just wanted to protect him.

   Not because she liked him, no. Ben suspected as much, without understanding the twinge of pain he now felt in his heart. To tell the truth, for a moment he had believed that someone was willing to sacrifice themselves for a wretch as insignificant and despicable as him. He had been touched by this gesture. But if Rey had acted that way, it was solely in the interest of the agency's business. As if she had been programmed to do so. That was another reason to think that this girl was actually a robot. If he had been in her place, he would have let his obnoxious client die crushed under the chandelier.

   "Okay, are you taking me to McDonald's now?" Rey grumbled. "I'm starving."

   "McDonald's?" her driver repeated, puzzled.

   She chuckled weakly.

   "It's quite within your means, don't worry. Anyway, it's probably one of the only places still open at this hour. Come on. I saved your life. You owe me that much, don't you?"

   It was the first time in a long time that Ben had been to a fast-food restaurant, especially at this hour. As soon as they arrived at the nearest McDonald's, he and Rey got in line.

   "So, what are you having?" the thirty-year-old asked, consulting the menus displayed on the screens. "A Big Mac trio? Quarter pounder? Cheeseburger?"

   "I hate burgers," Rey replied. "It's against my religion."

   Her companion raised an eyebrow in surprise.

   "What, veganism?" he joked.

   "Not even that," she muttered. "I just don't like meat. On the other hand, I love chicken nuggets."

   Then she told him she was going to find them a table while he ordered for both of them. Ben watched her walk away, dumbfounded. When he finally returned to the young woman, it was with two trios of McNuggets on a tray. Rey had sat down facing the window. He took a seat next to her and gave her fries, nuggets, and paper cup.

   "Are you copying me?" she wondered, seeing that he had ordered exactly the same thing.

   "I don't like meat either," Ben admitted casually. "So burgers..."

   Little by little, Rey's trademark smile reappeared.

   "That's good," she said with a smile. "Good to know. If you had liked eating steaks, I would've had to either force myself to eat or prepared two different dishes for you and I."

  That's a very special thing to have in common, thought her companion. It was better than nothing. The brunette got up and went to fill her cup with iced tea at the self-service soda fountain. When she returned, she tried to put the plastic lid on and pierce it with a straw, but her injured arm made her flinch every time she tried to use her left hand. And using only her right hand, when she was clearly left-handed, made the task much more complicated.

   Ben watched her persevere for a few seconds despite her handicap, then urged her to let him help her. Her determination to triumph over the straw and the lid was nonetheless quite endearing. Rey thanked him tacitly. The man was about to turn his attention back to his own meal when she suddenly reached out and brushed a few wild locks of ebony hair from his forehead.

   At the touch of her slender fingers, Ben shuddered and stiffened, stunned by her gesture. The contact sent a slight electric shock through his body. He held his breath. His pulse raced. His cheeks flushed. Rey was acting like a devoted girlfriend. Then her client realized that she was just examining the scar above his eyebrow.

   "It's not healing well," she noticed. "You'll need to put some ointment on it."

   The next second, she lost all interest in him and wolfed down her meal, stuffing herself with fries and dipping her nuggets in a small bowl of ketchup before devouring them. Ben raised his eyebrows, never taking his eyes off her. Well, well, well! She had quite an appetite. He swallowed hard and forced himself to eat as well. A silence fell between them. But the thirty-year-old was eager to break it. In fact, a string of questions was swirling around in his mind. Against all odds, this girl was beginning to genuinely intrigue him.

   "Can I ask you a question?" he finally said.

   Rey giggled.

   "Isn't that what you just did?" she teased, giving him a friendly nudge.

   He looked sheepish. Faced with his puppy-dog eyes, she sighed and encouraged him to ask his question.

   "How many times have you been married through the agency?"

   "You're my fifth husband," the escort-girl told him casually, her mouth full.

   "Wow... Put like that, you sound like a real man-eater," Ben laughed nervously. "So, do you really like it? What made you choose this profession? Have you ever been married for real?"

   Perhaps he was mistaken, but he thought he saw Rey's muscles tense slightly. She stopped chewing for half a second, then bit into yet another French fry as if nothing had happened.

  "You said one question, Ben," she chided him gently. "Can't you count?"

   Ben pursed his lips. He waited a moment for her answer, but she said nothing more.

   "Don't you want to talk about it?" he asked. "Are these questions too personal?"

   His partner let out another sigh. She then turned her head toward him and looked him straight in the eyes. She was no longer smiling.

   "Ben... If I asked you why you hate that damn chandelier in your house so much, would you answer my question without hesitation?"

   Hearing this, the poor man froze. He gritted his teeth and remained silent. Rey gave him a sad little grin.

   "You have your answer, then."

   "I... I never said I hated it," Ben said painfully.

   "You didn't need to tell me," Rey argued. "You always avoid looking at it, you tense up as soon as you hear the pendants rattling, and most importantly, you attacked it with a beer can earlier. Which wasn't necessarily smart."

   At the police station, when they first met, the escort-girl's client would never have imagined that she would prove to be so observant and perceptive. She had easily seen through him. Read him like an open book. Which troubled him more than anything else. Ben bit his cheek, then got up from his stool and gave her what was left of his own meal, sensing that she was still hungry anyway.

   "We'd better go. Finish eating and I'll wait for you in the car."

***

   Dawn was breaking when the couple finally returned home. Ben went up to his room and decided to treat himself to a thirty-minute nap before getting ready for work, hoping to recover a little from the eventful night. But very quickly, a noise pulled him out of his slumber. The sound of dishes crashing to the floor.

   Instantly, old memories came flooding back, hitting him with full force. His grandmother screaming and crying. His grandfather grabbing her by the hair. Strangling her with one hand. And the porcelain plates shattering into pieces. Then Ben saw the chandelier again, just as it was about to crash down on him. The sharp pendants clanging incessantly in a deafening din. The sandworm with its large, sharp teeth. Rey's wound. The drops of blood spilling onto the floor.

   Ben opened his eyes, sweating, breathing heavily. He jumped out of bed, got dressed quickly, and went down to the kitchen. It was there that he realized he hadn't hallucinated the noise earlier. Rey had accidentally broken a plate while trying to set the table for breakfast, despite her injured arm. As soon as the young woman saw Ben, she apologized profusely.

   "I'm sorry. The cut still hurts and... it slipped out of my hands."

   A sigh. Her companion simply retrieved the dustpan from under the sink and picked up the ceramic fragments with it.

   "It's okay. I told you I never eat breakfast."

   "I... I know, but I do, though," Rey stammered pitifully.

   "Order something, then. Just use my card. Get whatever you want."

   He threw the remains of the plate in the trash. He assumed that a good, caring husband would've rushed to make breakfast for his lady. But he had never wanted to play that role with her. And he didn't have the energy for it, especially not this morning. For some reason, Ben felt slightly guilty at the thought. But it was true. He didn't have to do that. They weren't really together, after all.

   "Well, I'm off," the thirty-year-old concluded. "I have a meeting."

   "At quarter past six?" his partner asked, looking at her watch.

   "Well... Yes, the... the meeting at quarter past six."

   Then, Ben almost ran out of the house. In truth, his studio didn't open until 7:30. So he had to wait in his car for a while before entering the building and going up to his floor. Once there, he barged into Poe's office without explanation, collapsed on the sofa, placed the ear pads of a pair of headphones over his eyes as if they were a sleep mask, and tried as best he could to catch up on his sleep, just a little. It was behavior his best friend was more than used to. At first, he said nothing. But after two hours, he began to grow impatient.

   "Hey, can you tell me what's the point of you coming to work early if you're just going to veg out on my couch?"

   "Ugh... Mind your own business." Ben grumbled.

   "You're really losing it, man," Poe lamented.

   "Great."

   While muttering this word, the poor exhausted man sought a more comfortable position.

   "Is it this stupid remarriage business that's getting you into this state? On top of everything else?"

   "Could be."

   "I still don't understand why you're doing this to yourself, seriously. You refuse to explain it to me.”

   Ben sighed deeply and removed the headphones from his face. Nothing worked. He couldn't rest. His terrible headache hadn't even subsided.

   "Andy said we'd get back together after a year if I agreed to do it," he replied, rubbing his eyes. "For twisted reasons that I still struggle to understand."

   "Are you fucking kidding me? You're really planning on getting back together with that bitch? Now that you've finally gotten divorced?"

   Instantly, Ben sat up straight and glared at his friend.

   "Wait, what did you just say?"

   "Yes, I said bitch, and I stand by it!" Poe exclaimed in the same tone. "I'm tired of being polite. Though I'm still being polite, considering who she really is. Don't let her near you anymore. Respect yourself, for fuck's sake."

   Luckily for him, the ex-husband was still too tired to argue. He sighed a second time and rubbed his temples.

   "If you really wanted me to leave you alone, you should've taken a day off and stayed home."

   "I... I can't," Ben said desperately.

   Deeply troubled, still plagued by guilt, he wrung his hands nervously and confided pitifully:

   "Rey... Well, the escort-girl I'm going to 'marry' under that contract, you know? She hurt herself yesterday. So badly that I had to take her to the hospital. And it's my fault. I haven't felt very comfortable since. And I think it would bother her too if... if I stayed home. So I left as soon as I could."

   He quickly thought back to last night. To the way she had rushed to protect him. To the way she had clammed up when he asked her slightly intrusive questions at McDonald's. Then Ben looked up, met Poe's gaze, and saw him frowning, puzzled.

   "Wait... What do you mean, 'home'? Are you two already living together?"

   A wave of discouragement washed over the unfortunate man. Damn, telling his friend everything was going to take a long time. A very long time.

***

    After a long, well-deserved nap, Rey wandered aimlessly through the big, empty house. While Ben didn't collect dead kittens' heads, he did have a collection of medications. When she opened the medicine cabinet in the bathroom adjacent to his bedroom, the young woman thought she was hallucinating. She carefully inspected a few labels and examined some pill bottles more closely. To be honest, all of this worried her. She seriously doubted that a doctor could've prescribed him so much.

   Leaving the bathroom, Rey noticed the half-open door of the wardrobe, a room which must have been as big as her first, ridiculously small apartment. The thought brought a wry smile to her face. Out of sheer curiosity, the brunette stepped inside the wardrobe. It was half empty. And for a millionaire—well, Rey assumed that a man living in such a castle was at least a millionaire—Ben was always content with fairly ordinary and inexpensive outfits. The only thing that must have been priceless was an old tuxedo molding away in a protective cover, hidden at the back of the closet.

   Around noon, Rey went out for groceries. Her new "husband" was more accustomed to ordering his meals than preparing them himself, or even having staff prepare them for him, so the refrigerator was emptying rather quickly. The young woman was browsing the aisles of the nearest supermarket, on the lookout for the best products, when something suddenly caught her eye. A cold shiver ran down her spine.

   She'd seen a shadow out of the corner of her eye. A shadow that remained standing there, in a corner. Rey felt like she was being watched. So she quickly turned her head. But there was nothing there. Far from feeling at ease, she swallowed hard, tightened her grip on her bag strap, and tried to continue on her way as if nothing had happened. She didn't like it at all, though. It didn't bode well.

   Later, Rey went to the parking lot, put her grocery bags in the trunk, climbed into her old Beetle, and started to fasten her seatbelt. That's when someone knocked on her window. The young woman gasped, stifling a scream. Then she let out a long sigh when she saw who had come to question her, feeling both relieved and annoyed.

   Finn Storm, dressed all in black, like all the agency's Protectors did, motioned for her to unlock the doors. Rey complied. He walked around the car and sat down in the passenger seat. The escort-girl knew exactly why he was there. Of course the agency knew about her injury from the previous day. Marriage Experience covered all her insurance. At the hospital, she had asked them in a brief message not to worry.

   "I told them it wasn't necessary," Rey frowned, pulling her sleeve down over her bandaged arm.

   "It's procedure," Finn justified. "Because the agency looks after the well-being of its employees, as you know. This incident will leave a mark on your medical record. And that may complicate the finalization of the contract. So tell me. Was there any violence or abuse?"

   "No. None of that."

   He took out his tablet and a stylus to check "yes" or "no" for each statement on the questionnaire. She hated it when her friend took this factual tone.

   "Do you feel exposed to potential violence and abuse?"

   "No, not that either."

   "Could the current situation lead to violence and/or abuse?"

   "He didn't do anything to me," Rey said angrily. "He didn't beat me, hit me, or anything. Okay? What happened to me was just an accident."

   The Protector gave her a concerned look.

   "It always starts with accidents."

   "I'm telling you, everything's fine."

   Finn sighed, then nodded and checked "no" for all the questions. He then got out of the car. But before closing the door, he looked his friend and colleague straight in the eye and insisted:

   "Let us know if anything happens. Okay? It's important. Please. The Protectors are available at all times. And so are friends."

   Rey bit her lip. The shadow she thought she had seen in the supermarket aisles suddenly came back to her.

   "Is it...?"

   "Yes?"

   No. It was better not to tell him about it. The Protectors wouldn't protect her from anyone other than a client of the agency. And even as a friend, Finn couldn't help her. She refused to put him in danger too.

   "Nothing. Thank you."

   Despite her confident smile, the young man didn't seem fully convinced. He stared at her, then nodded, said goodbye, and left. But as Rey drove back to her new "home", she still felt like she was being watched. She thought she saw a disturbing shadow lurking near her new address.

***

   Drinking a little too much whiskey, like a desperate loner in a bar finding solace only in a drink, made Ben do stupid things. Fighting, for example, as had happened last time. Or sending text messages to the woman who was supposed to be his ex-wife, for that matter.

   Apparently, Poe had briefly mentioned the chandelier incident to his wife, and Kaydel, being the gossip that she was, couldn't resist telling Andy all about it during one of their meetings today. Spending the day working on the sound mix for a mediocre film, Ben had expected his beloved to come see him and ask for more explanations. Call him on his phone. Or at least ask him a few questions by text message. Nothing. She'd ignored all his messages.

   The poor man decided to send her another one anyway. Underneath the ones saying: "This girl is already driving me crazy," "I miss you," and "I need you," he wrote: "I heard that Kaydel told you about yesterday's incident. It's true. It was my fault, but Rey still wanted to save my life. She got hurt because of me. I'm so angry with myself." Unsurprisingly, however, this umpteenth message went unanswered.

   As soon as Ben got home around midnight, he saw that Rey hadn't prepared any dinner. The packaging in the trash confirmed that she had simply ordered food. She was probably unable to cook because of her injury. For a moment, Ben remembered his grandmother when she'd had a broken arm. Her right arm, no less. With it in a cast, completely disabled, she couldn't do anything for herself. Not even... The man gritted his teeth and immediately dismissed his dark and painful memories.

   Ben took off his shoes, threw his long black coat in a corner of the living room, and approached the stairs. He dared to glance at the cursed chandelier. The entity responsible for all his woes. It was undoubtedly the strange aura it gave off that had cast a curse on him. And it hadn't finished tormenting him yet. Ben tensed, gripped the banister tightly, and climbed to the first floor. He heard the sound of the television and found Rey, just like last night, sitting on the sofa watching a game, this time ice hockey, wearing her blue light-blocking glasses and her hair down.

   "You still haven't treated that cut," the young woman observed when she noticed him.

   It took her partner a second to realize she was referring to the cut above his left eyebrow.

   "It's nothing," he said, downplaying it. "It's just a scratch."

   "It looks deeper than that," Rey insisted, looking contrite.

   "I promise you it's nothing. Don't worry about it."

   With that, he walked over to her and flopped down next to her on the sofa.

   "Are you watching hockey now? Who are you rooting for?”

   Rey pointed to the Montreal Canadiens, who were battling the Boston Bruins.

   "The Habs," she replied proudly. "Obviously."

   "Ugh!" Ben snorted. "They suck!"

   The brunette shrugged.

   "I believe in them. One day, they'll regain their former glory and win the Stanley Cup."

   "Yeah, right, that hasn't happened since '93, I think," the thirty-year-old muttered, rubbing his face, before stifling a small, ironic laugh. "Is that how you see marriage, actually?"

   "Huh?"

   She turned down the volume on the television, thinking she must have misheard. He turned pale. Shit. Had he said that out loud?

   "Well... Do you try every year in the hope that one day, maybe, you'll win the cup?"

   The escort-girl pouted and probed him with her eyes. Ben didn't know if his bad joke had really offended her or not. But he felt ashamed. He knew she didn't want to talk about the reasons that had led her to take up such a peculiar "profession". He cleared his throat uncomfortably. His eyes drifted for a moment to his companion's bandaged arm. His jaw clenched. A new wave of guilt washed over him.

   "Sorry. It's just... my crappy sense of humor."

   To change the subject, he took his phone out of his pocket.

   "Um... Can I have your number? I haven't saved it yet. I didn't know how to reach you today."

   "You wanted to reach me?" Rey asked, surprised.

   "Yes, to let you know I'll be home late. And to tell you not to make me dinner. Not that you'd have listened anyway."

   She giggled, and Ben caught himself staring at the adorable dimples at the corners of her lips as she took his phone to add her number to his contacts. The man then pulled himself together, took back his device, and cynically renamed her "Rey Whatever-Her-Last-Name-Is". It didn't matter. To him, she would be just Rey. Or maybe even "Rey Solo" after the fake marriage contract was finalized. Soon. Very soon.

   "When Phasma approached me to offer me this job, she convinced me to consider it as revenge."

   Confused, Ben frowned and turned his attention back to the escort-girl.

   "And I accepted, " she continued. "Then I realized I was good at playing the role of the perfect, caring wife. Until now, I have mostly been married to dying men who didn't have much time left. They felt terribly lonely and abandoned. They needed someone to be there for them. I was able to bring them a little happiness before the end."

   A faint, sad smile concluded her words. Her client was surprised that she had suddenly agreed to confide in him. Although he sensed that she was not telling him everything. What did she mean by "revenge"? On the other hand, given her reaction yesterday, he suspected that she must have been the victim of a serious romantic disappointment. Something like that. She didn't have to tell him any more. Now it was his turn to answer her question from the day before.

   "I hate that chandelier because... it's just like my grandfather," he sighed after a long silence, lifting his chin and staring at the ceiling without seeing it. "When you see it for the first time, you just think it's complex and fascinating. Then, when you look closer, you see that all the facets that make it up are as sharp as daggers. He always loved that chandelier. He designed it himself. In his own image."

   Those last words were steeped in bitterness and contempt.

   "And he gave it to you?" Rey asked, listening intently to what he was saying, a furrow of concern gradually creasing her broad forehead.

   "He gave me the house for my wedding because he no longer lived there. I wanted to refuse, but Andy... My... Well, my..."

   "I know who that is."

   "Anyway, she was over the moon," Ben lamented wearily. "She absolutely wanted to live here. I never liked that awful chandelier, but she refused to get rid of it. To her, it was a misunderstood work of art."

   Rey turned to him, pulling her legs up against her body and wrapping her arms around her knees. She nodded slowly.

   "Your grandparents raised you. Is that right?"

   "Mmh... When I was little, I was fascinated by my grandfather," her companion continued. "The great and wealthy Anakin Skywalker, head of Skywalker Constructions, powerful and very influential. He was my role model. I wanted to be like him back then. And I didn't understand why my mother refused to let us visit him. Then..."

   His nose began to tingle. He swallowed and pursed his lips. His heart sank in his chest.

   "Then my parents died in that car accident when I was ten. I guess you already know that?"

   In response, the young woman nodded, looking sorry and sympathetic. This detail of his life was included in his file to prevent his "wife" from making a blunder and asking him an inappropriate question about his parents.

   "Anyway, since they were my only family, I was sent to live with my grandparents, and that's when I discovered the ugly truth," Ben continued. "Anakin... He's a violent man. A real monster. He often beat my grandmother, Padmé. I think that bastard beat my mother too when she was young. She quickly ran away from home. Only then did I understand why she was so afraid of her father and didn't want him near me."

   "Did he hurt you too?" Rey wanted to know, horrified.

   The man shook his head.

   "Oh, no. He was kind to me. He'd always wanted to get to know me before."

   His jaw muscles tensed. Terrible memories came back to haunt him.

   "The worst part is that, in a way, I wish I had been a victim too. That way, I wouldn't have felt guilty about my grandmother. I don't even know if I could've done anything for her. He treated me relatively well, but her... When he was beating her, I would lock myself in my room, put on my headphones, and listen to loud music so I wouldn't hear the screams. Like a coward."

   He sniffed. Tears burned his eyes, but he refused to show any more vulnerability in front of a girl he barely knew, whose presence he had never wanted. In any case, he was far too exhausted and drunk to cry. Suddenly, a shiver ran through him. Ben looked down. Rey had just shyly placed her hand on his. He caught her gaze. The brunette opened her mouth, then closed it again. Her breathing was shaky. She finally withdrew her hand. And despite himself, he realized he missed her touch.

   "I understand better why you don't like that chandelier,” Rey whispered, looking away.

   Ben stifled a bitter laugh.

   "I haven't even told you everything. My grandfather actually put a camera in that damn chandelier to constantly monitor his wife and make sure she wasn't cheating on him."

   "Damn," the young woman blurted out, still in shock from his story. "And you still live here despite all that?"

   A brief silence followed. Her companion yawned.

   "I know this is where Andy will want to live when we get back together."

   "But does she know what this house means to you?"

   "When we moved in, she took care of renovating and redecorating the entire interior," the divorced man said, shrugging. "Although she preferred to keep the chandelier because she thought it went well with the rest of the decor. She said that you could change the past and transform a place of suffering and trauma into a place of happiness. Because…"

   He never finished his sentence. He fell silent abruptly and clenched his fists. So tightly that his fingernails would surely leave red crescent-shaped marks on the flesh of his palms. He barely felt the pain. It was nothing compared to the more recent, but no less horrific, memories that had flooded back. The truth was that Andy and he had failed miserably to turn this house into a place of happiness. They had had the perfect opportunity but then lost everything. And only managed to accumulate more suffering and trauma.

   "It's a little twisted, but... I understand the logic," Rey finally told him. "Ben... Why are you telling me all this in detail?

   "You said I could be myself with you," he replied with a small smile, his voice tired. "And that we didn't have to try to seduce each other or be in love or whatever. So I'm telling you the least attractive thing about me."

   Rey sighed and wanted to add something, but he interrupted her.

   "You're bound to secrecy, right? It's part of the contract? So I don't really care about confiding in you. You might say it's normal to confide in my wife, but since you're not really my wife, it's like confiding in someone who doesn't exist. It's pretty easy, actually."

  Then there was another silence. Ben just hoped that his words hadn't offended the escort-girl. Why would it hurt her, anyway? Wasn't it the truth, after all? Rey changed positions and turned back to face the television.

   "For what it's worth... I lost my parents too," she confided in a whisper. "But they're not dead. Well... I don't know. They just lost custody of me because they were alcoholics who never took care of me. They even abandoned me in a park once. I was taken by social services, shuffled from foster home to foster home. It's not really the same, but..."

   She used the same detached tone, doing her best to hide an old, deep childhood wound that had never properly healed. Ben stared at her thoughtfully. He could never have imagined that Miss Robot could have endured such trials in the past. And he felt all the more guilty for it. That being said, he also found it devilishly ironic to discover that they had another thing in common. As sinister as it was.

   "I'm sorry," he said, sincerely, filled with compassion. "Does the... Does the manual allow you to tell clients personal things like that?"

   The escort-girl immediately blushed, bit her lower lip, and cleared her throat, visibly embarrassed.

   "Actually, no," she admitted. "What I meant to say was... you're not alone."

   She gave him a slight smile. A smile that moved Ben more than he would admit. He simply nodded, grateful. Then he closed his eyes, finding it increasingly difficult to keep them open. His eyelids were getting so heavy. He had had a tough day. Now he was going to stay there a little longer, with Rey, listening distractedly to the game, before going to bed. A few minutes later, the young woman realized that her companion had fallen asleep. She laughed silently, touched, and turned off the television.

   "See?" she murmured. "The game did bore you after all. I told you it would help."

   Then she leaned over Ben, gently placed her hands on his broad shoulders, and pulled him toward her so he would lie down. He didn't wake up. Rey placed a pillow under his head, then got up, grabbed his ankles, lifted his legs, and laid them on the sofa. She then fetched a thin wool blanket and tucked him in.

   Taking advantage of the fact that he was asleep, the brunette also helped herself to the first aid kit supplies. Since this stubborn man refused to let anyone take care of him, she would deal with it now. She crouched down next to Ben and finally disinfected the wound on his eyebrow. She applied ointment, then adhesive skin sutures as a bandage. Rey grinned weakly and stroked his hair with her fingertips, rearranging a few ebony curls.

   Finally, she plugged in her iPod, placed it on the coffee table next to his makeshift bed, and played a two-hour audio track on repeat entitled: "Rain Sounds and Music for Sleeping and Relaxing". Perhaps it would help him avoid having dreadful nightmares about that cursed chandelier, his monstrous grandfather, and the horrors of his past. But just as the young woman was about to turn off the light and let the sleeping beauty rest, Ben's phone lit up to signal an incoming call.

   Luckily, it was on silent mode, so there was no risk of waking its owner from his much-needed sleep. The contact "My Wife" appeared on the screen. Frowning, Rey approached cautiously and, after a moment's hesitation, picked up the phone and left the living room. Once she was alone in the hallway, she waited a few more moments. The ringing persisted. A myriad of thoughts and questions rushed through her mind. Finally, she picked up the phone.

   "Good evening, Mrs. Snoke."

   Andy Snoke didn't answer right away, undoubtedly shocked not to hear Ben's voice. After a moment of silence, Rey heard a nervous chuckle on the other end of the line.

   "You know, if it was you I was trying to reach, I would've dialed your number."

   "Sorry, he just fell asleep," the escort-girl informed her. "I'd rather not wake him up. As you can imagine, he has a lot of sleep to catch up on. He hasn't slept in days, or at least hardly at all. Is it urgent?"

   "No," her client's ex-wife said simply. "It's fine. Thank you."

   The brunette nodded.

   "I'll tell him you tried to reach him."

   "No, don't bother. Never mind."

   Sigh. Silence. Then:

   "So? How is he? He took his medication, I presume?"

   "What do you mean?"

   "You said he was asleep. Poor thing, he can't sleep without sleeping pills."

   "Yes, but he didn't take anything tonight," Rey realized. "He just fell asleep. ."

   "Oh? Did he?"

  Even though she couldn't see her interlocutor, she could perfectly imagine her raising her eyebrows in disbelief. She might have been wrong, or maybe not, but Mrs. Snoke didn't seem very happy to hear that Ben had managed to fall asleep without swallowing tons of pills. Wasn't that good news?

   "If you say so. Goodbye."

   The call ended the next second. Rey sighed and put the phone back in its place. But as soon as she returned to her room, she discovered that Rose, her best friend, had left her several panicked messages. Messages that instantly made her blood run cold. And confirmed that her recent feeling of being constantly watched was probably not just paranoia.

"I saw him."

"I spotted him on my way home from the hospital earlier."

"It's him, Rey. I'm sure of it."

"He's back."

"I'll keep you posted."

   Five years ago, these messages would have brought her great joy. A lot of hope. Today, they terrified her.