Page 35 of Top Shelf

There’s another pause, and I pretend to take another sip of my coffee.

“Yeah,” Carina says, softer. “I know it’s still not twenty-two thousand dollars. Send me the final draft, and then go eat something before you do more math.”

Twenty-two what?

My eyes spring back up to Reid. He is watching me carefully now. Carina speaks again after another pause.

“I’m not bossing you around, I’m providing the necessary irritation you require to keep you on track.”

Despite myself, I almost smile. Carina ends the call a minute later and comes back into the living room with Ivy still on her hip.

I should say nothing. I am good at saying nothing.

“What is twenty-two thousand dollars for?”

Carina pauses and tilts her head, and Reid closes his eyes. “Something you overheard because you have ears the size of dinner plates, clearly.”

“My ears are normal.”

She shifts Ivy, studying me with the same look she used to give Reid when he was being a bad patient. “It’s Heidi’s business. I’m not giving you her financial details.”

“You said the number out loud.”

“I was on the phone to her, in my own kitchen.” Her expression softens a fraction as she studies me, and she sighs. “She needs a deposit by next Friday to secure the studio space. Because the landlord has another tenant interested. That’s all you need to know.”

Twenty-two thousand dollars by Friday. That is a lot of money.

Heidi’s folder swims into my mind. The way she had looked at the clinic doors before that meeting, and the way she had talked about the studio as her dream for months beforehand.

She needs money, and I need a wife.

The thought arrives without warning. It is a stupid thought. Ridiculous, but somehow practical—and I can’t shake it.

Reid’s eyes narrow at me. “Vik.”

“I could marry her.”

Silence sweeps through the living room. Carina stares at me. Reid stares at me. Gremlin, from beneath the coffee table, begins loudly licking a paw.

The silence is broken when Carina barks out a sharp, disbelieving laugh.

“Absolutely not.” Her smile dies when I look at her. “Viktor.”

I spread my hands. “It would solve both problems.”

“No, it’d create about four hundred new problems.”

“It would only need to be a temporary marriage,” I add.

Reid’s hand comes up over his mouth, his hand stroking his chin as he considers me.

Carina’s eyes widen as she looks from him to me. “This is deranged. You’re not proposing to my best friend because you overheard a phone call about money and have a Swedish inheritance situation.”

I shrug. “She needs funding. I can provide it. And I need a wife… she could provide it.”

“Vik.” Reid drops his hand. “You’re talking about a person.”

“I know.”