Marriage Certificate

"What the fuck?!" Winter's scream woke Rome immediately. At first, he couldn't quite fathom where he was, but in a few seconds, he realized he was in a hotel room.

Then, he slowly turned to look at the lady behind him who had just screamed.

"And… who are you?" He asked with raised eyebrows. His well-sculpted pointed Grecian nose scrunched up as his dark brown eyes stared into Winter's hazel eyes.

She was about to yell again while holding the marriage certificate in her hands when he added. "Besides, do you not know that it's wrong in every manner to wake someone up? Worst still, with a scream?" He asked and scoffed, still staring at her with an annoyed look on his face.

"Maybe if you can explain what this shit is to me," she wiggled the certificate in her right hand. "Then I'll understand that next time I shouldn't scream when someone is sleeping!" She snapped.

Without a word, he raised the duvet from the other half of his body and got up from the bed.

Winter could not help but notice his chiselled face which made him so handsome, and those abs that looked like he had been working out all his life.

"This isn't the time to drool over some random man because right now, your career is on the line." She said to herself.

"Have it, and explain what this has to do with me and why my name and signature are right here on it!"

Given the height difference between them, she plastered the certificate on his chest when he got to her front, as she looked up at his face, glaring at him. Although he wanted to snap at her and tell her to never try that again, he was more curious about what she was yelling about.

He grasped the certificate and glanced through it. Almost immediately, his pissed reaction changed to that of surprise and shock. He could not believe his eyes.

"What the actual fuck is this?" He muttered, still staring at the certificate in disbelief. "When did I even sign this? How in the world did this get here?"

"I believe you aren't asking me that because I need answers too!" Winter snapped at him.

His eyes moved from the certificate in his hands to the lady in front of him. He was towering over her, so as he looked, he looked down at her with a look of disgust and annoyance. "If you raise your voice in this room one more time, you won't get away with it."

"Why can't I raise my voice, uh? You can't understand it because I'm the one in—"

Rome cut in, a stern look on his face. "For one, this shit in my hand isn't a one-sided thing. My signature is also on it, and I can't tell how or when I signed it, so, if you want this to have a breakthrough, you had better calm down and let me call someone who can help." He said the last part of his sentence with a little harsh tone.

"Who are you going to call?"

Without replying to her despite hearing her question clearly, he walked to the other side of the bed and picked up his phone.

"This had better be fake," he muttered while dialling a number on his phone.

As he sat, waiting for the person he was calling to pick up the call, memories of the night before flushed through his head.

He had prepared one of the most expensive restaurants in the bubbling part of Las Vegas. He paid the owner of the restaurant to make use of it for his proposal to Isabel, the woman he loves and wanted to marry. Unfortunately for him, he ended up getting rejected by her. The heartbreak was too much to withhold, which was why he headed to the bar to get himself drunk and get the thoughts of the break-up away from his head. He could not take it, he loved Isabela way too much.

He recalled how he had met Winter in the club and how they had left, but everything after that didn't come clear to him. He tried to remember, but he just couldn't.

"What the heck?" He muttered to himself as he used his hand to hit his forehead slightly as if trying to make himself remember. He couldn't even remember coming to the hotel with her. Then, his eyes suddenly went wide open in the realization of something. "Wait, did I drunk drive last night?"

"Earth to you!" Winter snapped her hand in front of Rome's face as she folded her arms In front of him.

"When did you get here? You were on the other side of the room," Rome asked immediately as he jerked back to reality from his thoughts.

"If you want to daydream, not now that my head is banging because of this dumb certificate!" She yelled. "I wonder if you're even as bothered as I am. I bet you're not," she muttered to herself, glaring at him.

"Must you raise your voice?" He asked calmly, although pissed since she kept yelling. "You should even be thankful that you're alive. I fucking drunk drove last night! What if I crashed the car or something?" He raised his voice at her a little.

Winter thought about it for a few seconds but warded it off. "Doesn't matter. The car didn't crash, so we have to face what's at hand." She pointed to his hand. "Your phone has been ringing for about five minutes now and for a reason I don't know, you've zoned out for a while now," Winter said and began to rant. "So, if you want us both to know if we're dead or not, kindly pick the call if that's the person you claimed is going to help us."

"You talk too much." He stood up and picked up the call, placing his phone by his right hair. "Lawyer Sawyer, yeah? Yeah, I woke up in my apartment this morning to see a marriage certificate signed by me and some…" he paused to look at Winter who was also staring at him.

"Some woman I don't even know. Is this real or…" He paused for a couple of minutes to hear what his lawyer was saying.

At some point, his eyes went wide open in shock. "It isn't? Damn. Alright. Thank you, Sawyer. Have a nice day."

"So? So what did he say?" Winter asked curiously.

"It's a legal certificate," Rome blurted out. He already knew what her reaction would be, and he wasn't in any way surprised when he got the exact reaction he had expected.

"What the fuck?!" Winter exclaimed. "I'm so dead! How did we even get to this point? How and when in the world did we sign this in the first place?"

"When we were both drunk, he said we went to a chapel last night, we had some shit done and we got married." He said and sighed. "It's just fucked up,"

"So, what's the way out uh?" Winter asked and began to pace around the room. "We have to find something to do about this, or else it'll hurt my career. My career is on the line!" She exclaimed.

"Calm down, young woman!" Rome snapped at her, getting tired of how she kept pacing around.

"How do you expect me to—"

"There's a solution," Rome blurted out, making Winter stop in her tracks as she looked at Rome with a glint of hope in her eyes.

"There is?" She asked. "What is the solution?"