The Proxy Bride

Part I: The Auction of a Soul

The ink on the contract was still wet when my mother started crying. Not tears of sorrow, mind you, but tears of relief. She was already mentally spending the money, calculating how much would go to the loan sharks and how much would go toward a new lease on a life she hadn’t earned.

“You’re a saint, Elena,” my father muttered, refusing to look me in the eye as he poured himself a scotch. “It’s just marriage. People do it for less.”

I stood by the window of our crumbling apartment in Chicago, watching the grey rain wash away the grime of the city. I was twenty-four years old. I had a degree in Literature, a job at a bookstore I loved, and dreams of traveling to Italy.

In one hour, all of that had evaporated.

My parents had gambled away everything. Not just their money, but my future. The debt was astronomical—two million dollars owed to men who didn’t send overdue notices; they sent broken kneecaps.

And then, he had appeared.

Arthur Sterling. A real estate mogul, seventy-four years old, with a reputation as cold as the steel buildings he constructed. He had offered to pay the debt in full. The condition? I had to marry him.

“Why me?” I had asked him in his office earlier that day.

Arthur had looked at me with eyes that were unreadable behind thick glasses. “Because you are kind, Elena. I have watched you. You volunteer at the hospital. You read to the blind. My life is… empty. I want a companion who has a heart, not just a ambition for my wallet.”

It sounded like a transaction. A purchase.

And now, standing in my parents’ living room, I felt like cattle.

“When is the wedding?” my mother asked, wiping her eyes.

“Tonight,” I whispered. “He doesn’t want to wait.”

I packed one suitcase. I left my books. I left my dreams. I walked out of that apartment knowing my parents were safe, but I felt like I was walking to my execution.

Part II: The Winter Wedding

The ceremony was held in the private chapel of the Sterling Estate, a sprawling gothic mansion on the edge of Lake Michigan. It was a cold, desolate place, surrounded by iron gates and leafless trees.

There were no guests. Just a judge, Arthur, and me.

Arthur wore a tuxedo that looked like it belonged in a different era. He leaned heavily on a cane. Up close, he looked even older than his years, his skin like parchment paper, his breathing labored.

I wore a simple white dress he had provided. It fit perfectly, which unsettled me.

“Do you, Elena Vance, take this man…” the judge droned on.

I looked at Arthur. He wasn’t looking at me with lust, or even affection. He was looking at the altar, his expression one of profound sadness.

“I do,” I said, my voice cracking.

When I signed the marriage license, my hand shook so badly I almost dropped the pen. I didn’t even read the document. I just wanted it to be over.

“It is done,” Arthur said softly.

He didn’t kiss me. He simply nodded to the housekeeper, a stern woman named Mrs. Higgins. “Take her to the Master Suite. I will join her shortly.”

The walk up the grand staircase felt like ascending the scaffold. Mrs. Higgins opened the double doors to the Master Suite. It was a massive room, dominated by a four-poster bed draped in velvet. A fire crackled in the hearth, casting long, dancing shadows.

“Dinner will be brought up,” Mrs. Higgins said, and closed the door.

I was alone.

I sat on the edge of the bed, trembling. This was it. The part I had dreaded the most. I was twenty-four. He was seventy-four. I tried to dissociate, to tell myself it was just a body, just a moment in time. Do it for Mom and Dad. Do it so they live.

I waited for an hour. The silence of the house was heavy.

Then, the handle turned.

I squeezed my eyes shut, gripping the bedsheets.

“Elena?”

The voice wasn’t Arthur’s.

It was deep. Resonant. Young.

My eyes snapped open.

Standing in the doorway was not the frail old man I had married. It was Arthur Sterling, yes, but he was still in the hallway, leaning on his cane, smiling gently.

Inside the room, standing by the fireplace, was a man in a wheelchair.

He was in the shadows, but I could see he was young—perhaps in his late twenties. He had dark, messy hair and broad shoulders. But half of his face was covered by a black silk mask, and his left leg was encased in a brace.

“Who…” I stammered, standing up. “Who are you?”

Arthur stepped into the room. He closed the door and locked it.

“Elena,” Arthur said, his voice surprisingly warm. “I told you I was looking for a companion. But I never said the companion was for me.”

Part III: The Truth Revealed

I looked from Arthur to the man in the wheelchair.

“I don’t understand,” I whispered.

Arthur walked over to the young man and placed a hand on his shoulder. “This is Julian. My son.”

The young man, Julian, looked away, staring into the fire. He seemed angry, ashamed.

“Three years ago,” Arthur began, “Julian was in a car accident. He lost the use of his legs. He suffered severe burns. But the worst damage wasn’t to his body. It was to his spirit.”

Arthur looked at me with pleading eyes. “He shut the world out. He thinks he is a monster. He thinks no woman could ever look at him with anything other than pity or horror. He refused to date. He refused to live.”

“So you bought him a wife?” I asked, a spark of anger cutting through my confusion. “You tricked me?”

“I couldn’t tell you,” Arthur said. “If I told you the truth—that I needed a wife for my reclusive, disabled son—you might have said yes for the money, but you would have walked in here with prejudice. Or you would have said no out of fear.”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out the marriage license. He handed it to me.

“Read it, Elena. Carefully.”

I looked at the paper.

Groom: Julian Arthur Sterling.

I gasped. “I… I married him?”

“By proxy,” Arthur said. “It is legal in this state under specific circumstances. I stood in for him, but the signature… the name… it is his.”

“Dad, stop,” Julian growled, his voice rough with emotion. “She looks terrified. This was a mistake. Let her go.”

Julian turned his wheelchair to face me. For the first time, I saw his eyes. They were a piercing, stormy blue. Intelligent. Tortured. And wildly familiar.

“You can go,” Julian said to me. “The debt is paid. My father is an old fool who thinks he can orchestrate happiness. I won’t hold you to a contract you were tricked into signing. The money is yours. Leave.”

I stared at him. The blue eyes. The voice.

Flashbacks hit me. Two years ago. The library.

“Jay?” I whispered.

Julian froze.

Two years ago, before the accident, I used to see a man at the university library. We never exchanged names, just book recommendations. We talked for hours about poetry, about philosophy. He was charming, handsome, brilliant. And then, one day, he stopped coming. I had looked for him for months.

“You…” I stepped closer. “You’re Jay. The guy who recommended Rilke.”

Julian lowered his head. “I didn’t want you to see me like this.”

“You knew?” I looked at Arthur.

“I knew,” Arthur smiled sadly. “Julian spoke of the ‘girl in the library’ for a year before the accident. When I found out your parents were in trouble… I saw a chance to save two lives. Yours from debt, and his from solitude.”

Arthur walked to the door. “I will leave you two. The annulment papers are on the desk if you want them, Elena. Or… you can stay and get to know the husband you actually chose, long before today.”

The door clicked shut.

Part IV: The Real Wedding Night

The silence returned, but it wasn’t heavy anymore. It was electric.

Julian wheeled himself backward, retreating into the shadows. “Go, Elena. You don’t want this. I’m half a man.”

“Don’t decide for me,” I said softly.

I walked toward him. My heart was pounding, not with fear, but with a strange, overwhelming sense of destiny. I wasn’t married to a seventy-year-old stranger. I was married to the man whose mind I had fallen in love with in a dusty library stack two years ago.

“Let me see,” I said, reaching for his mask.

“No,” he flinched. “It’s ugly.”

“I’ve seen ugly,” I said, thinking of my parents’ greed, of the poverty I had lived in. “Scars aren’t ugly, Julian. They’re just history.”

I gently touched his hand. He was trembling.

“Why didn’t you find me?” I asked. “After the accident?”

“I couldn’t,” he whispered. “I was the golden boy, Elena. And then I was… this. I didn’t want your pity.”

“And now?”

“Now,” he looked up, his blue eyes burning, “I’m terrified that you’ll stay out of obligation.”

I picked up the annulment papers from the desk. I looked at them. Then I threw them into the fireplace.

“I’m not staying for the money,” I said. “And I’m not staying for your father.”

I sat on his lap. It was a bold move, one that made him gasp. I wrapped my arms around his neck.

“I’m staying because you owe me a conversation about Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet.”

Julian let out a breath, a sound that was half-laugh, half-sob. Hesitantly, his arms came around my waist. He pulled me closer, burying his face in my neck.

“I missed you,” he choked out.

“I missed you too, Jay.”

I reached up and gently removed the black silk mask. The scars were there—burn marks running down the left side of his cheek and jaw. They were red and angry.

I leaned in and kissed the worst of the scars.

Julian shuddered. “Elena…”

“You are my husband,” I whispered against his skin. “Real. And whole.”

He kissed me then. It wasn’t the kiss of a broken man. It was hungry, desperate, and filled with two years of longing. It was the kiss of a man who had been drowning and just found air.

That night, there was no fear. There was no “old man.” There was only Julian. We talked until dawn, holding each other. He told me about the crash, the surgeries, the darkness. I told him about the betrayal of my parents, the fear of the wedding.

We weren’t strangers. We were two shipwrecked souls who had found the same island.

Part V: The Morning After

I woke up to sunlight streaming across the bed. Julian was asleep beside me, his arm draped protectively over my waist. Without the mask, in the light of day, he didn’t look like a monster. He looked like a warrior resting.

The door opened softly.

Arthur stood there, holding a tray of coffee. He looked at us—sleeping in the same bed, peaceful—and tears filled his eyes.

I sat up, pulling the sheet around me.

“Good morning, Arthur,” I whispered.

“Good morning, daughter,” he said, his voice thick with emotion. He placed the coffee on the table. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For seeing him,” Arthur said. “Everyone else just looks at the chair.”

Julian stirred. He opened his eyes and saw his father. For the first time in three years, he didn’t scowl. He smiled.

“Dad,” Julian said raspy with sleep. “Don’t you knock?”

“It’s my house,” Arthur chuckled, backing out of the room. “But… I suppose I can sign the deed over to you two now. I’m retiring to Florida.”

“Florida?” Julian asked.

“I hear the nurses there are very attentive,” Arthur winked and closed the door.

Julian turned to me. He traced the line of my jaw with his finger.

“So,” he said softly. “You’re really staying? You’re stuck with a cripple?”

“I’m stuck with a billionaire who loves books,” I corrected him, kissing his nose. “I think I got the better end of the deal.”

My parents called a week later, asking for more money.

I handed the phone to Julian.

“This is Julian Sterling,” he said, his voice cold and commanding, the voice of a CEO in the making. “Elena’s husband. Do not call this number again. The debt is paid. You sold your daughter, and I bought her. She belongs to herself now. And she is with me.”

He hung up and tossed the phone onto the sofa.

“Ready?” he asked.

I looked at him. He was dressed in a suit, sitting in his wheelchair, looking handsome and formidable. We were going to the library. Our library.

“Ready,” I said.

I pushed his chair out of the Master Suite, down the hall, and into a life I had expected to hate, but which had turned out to be the greatest love story I could have ever written.

The End