The barn was a converted dairy farm in Vermont, decorated with string lights and mason jars and the kind of rustic charm that cost more than my car. I’d been dreading this wedding for six months — my best friend, Marcus, was marrying Kami, the woman who’d dumped me two years ago, and I’d RSVP’d “plus one” without actually having anyone to bring.
Then my grandmother called.
“Elena,” she’d said, her voice sharp over the phone. “Your cousin brought a lawyer to the reunion. Your sister brought a doctor. If you show up to another family event alone, I’m rewriting the will. Find someone. Or find a new inheritance.”
I found Sloane on an app called Plus One — “Professional Dates for Professional Problems.” Her profile said: “I’ll convince your family. I’ll dance with you. I’ll kiss you in photos. I won’t fall in love. Guaranteed.”
She was twenty-seven. Blonde. Sharp in a black suit. She showed up at the barn ten minutes before the ceremony, handed me a corsage, and whispered: “Just follow my lead.”
The ceremony was torture. Kami looked beautiful. Marcus cried. I sat in the front row with Sloane’s hand on my knee, pretending we were in love, pretending my heart wasn’t breaking, pretending I didn’t notice that Sloane’s thumb was tracing circles on my skin in a way that felt completely unprofessional.
The reception was worse. The toasts. The first dance. The moment when Kami walked over to our table with a champagne glass and a smile that said she knew exactly what I was doing.
“Elena,” she said, her voice sweet as poison. “I didn’t know you were seeing someone. How long?”
“Six months,” Sloane answered before I could speak. She squeezed my hand. “Best six months of my life.”
Kami walked away. And I found myself in the corner of the barn, leaning against a wooden beam, my bridesmaid dress too tight, my heart too full.
“My grandmother is watching from the reception tent,” I whispered, looking at Sloane. “She said if I don’t bring a date to this wedding, she’ll cut me out of the will. So I hired you. A fake girlfriend. For one night. One dance. One convincing kiss. That was the contract. That was the agreement. And now you’re looking at me like—”
Sloane didn’t speak. She just leaned in, her cheek brushing my jaw, her hand sliding from the beam to my waist, pulling me against her.
“If you kiss me here,” I breathed, my voice trembling, “it’s not fake anymore. And your ex-girlfriend is the bride. She’s looking over here right now. She’s going to see us. She’s going to know that the woman she dumped is kissing someone who looks at me like I’m not a client. Like I’m not a problem to be solved. Like I’m—”
She turned my face toward her with a finger under my chin. Her mouth found mine. A kiss that tasted like wedding cake and revenge and the exact moment when a lie becomes the only truth that matters. It was slow, convincing, completely devastating — her tongue sliding against mine, her hand sliding to the back of my dress, finding the zipper.
The bride walked toward us.
“Elena?” Kami’s voice. Close. Too close. “Your grandmother wants a photo. The whole family. With your… girlfriend.”
Sloane didn’t pull away. She just pressed her palm against my back, her fingers finding the zipper of my dress, sliding it down an inch. Then she turned to Kami with a smile that was completely predatory.
“Of course,” she said, her voice light, casual, completely at odds with the hand that was currently unzipping my dress. “We’ll be right there.”
Kami walked away. Sloane pressed me back against the wooden beam, her mouth on my neck, her hand inside my dress.
“The contract said one night,” she whispered against my skin. “I just decided to renew.”
She made me come against the wooden beam, my dress open in the back, her fingers inside me, her mouth on my breast while the string lights turned everything gold and the wedding band played a song that was supposed to be about Marcus and Kami but felt like it was about us.
After, she fixed my dress. Led me to the family photo. Put her arm around my waist and smiled like she’d been doing it forever.
Grandmother approved. The will remained intact. And Sloane followed me home that night — not because the contract required it, but because she said she couldn’t imagine sleeping anywhere else.
We still have the contract. It’s framed in our hallway. And every year, on the anniversary of Marcus and Kami’s wedding, Sloane takes me to a barn and shows me exactly what “fake” looks like when it’s real.
Kami divorced Marcus last year. She called me last month. Asked if Sloane was still “fake.”
I sent her a photo from our living room. Sloane asleep on the couch, her head on my lap. No caption needed.
