He did a surprisingly good impression of a frog, and when she laughed, he did it again. And then they were both laughing, and that strange tension she had seen in him was gone.
“You have to stop being a frog now, or I won’t be able to keep a straight face while we do the paperwork. I would imagine a straight face is required.”
They went up the steps, and he opened the front door of the town hall for her. He leaned in close to her ear.
“Ribbit,” he croaked.
“Stop it!”
“There’s only one way to turn a frog into a prince,” he reminded her.
“Never mind being a prince.” She did not want to think about kissing him. “You can be a knight to my princess.”
“As long as you don’t expect shining armor,” he told her.
“Tarnished will do.”
He grinned. He opened the door to the inner office for her. “Milady,” he murmured as she went through.
He seemed to Krissy’s great relief to be back to his normal self. They found themselves standing in a dusty and poorly lit town office. The laughter must have still been shining between them, because the clerk, her gray hair in tight curls, looked faintly disapproving as she slapped the paperwork down in front of them and checked their identification.
She was immune to Jonas’s rather substantial charm.
“You can’t use it for twenty-four hours,” the clerk told them sternly. “And you have to use it within sixty days or it’s void.”
See? Jonas mouthed to Krissy, Void.
“It’s forty dollars,” the clerk told them, as if that was a great deal of money, and they should have thought more carefully before spending it, “but that includes the issuance of the certificate of marriage. The officiant—the person who performs your ceremony—can send it to me—the address is here—and then the record of your marriage will be on file.”
“That may have been the best forty dollars I ever spent,” Jonas said, standing at the top of the town hall steps.
They both stared at the document for a moment before he folded it and put it in his pocket.
“What do you think? Something to eat and a hike?”
Marriage license, check. Time to think of food. Such a man thing! So delightful!
She thought, if she was sensible, she should just go home.
But somehow it seemed a little late to be applying good sense to this situation. Besides, Jonas was taking the whole thing lightly, treating it like a lark. He had regained his equilibrium; in fact, he was practically clicking his heels as they left the town hall.
Why be the stick-in-the-mud? Why let on that there was something terribly unsettling about playing with these sacred institutions? Something terribly unsettling about the fact they had shared such powerful intimacies, already, and no doubt would again, before this was over.
Over.
In a little more than a week—after next weekend—the game would be over. She’d probably never see him again. No sense paying any attention to the downward swish in her stomach at that thought. Wasn’t there at least a chance that it didn’t have to end?
Last night had been incredible. If Jonas didn’t like where it was going, wouldn’t he have hightailed it and run today?
No, he had made a choice to ignore the complications. It could even be argued he had complicated things further by buying those rings.
The marriage license, their names joined together on a single piece of paper, complicated things even more. Though they had thought they could escape the implications of such a solemn piece of paper, the very process of applying for it, the fact it was nestled in his pocket, created connection between them.
Obviously, they had incredible chemistry. Obviously, they shared a sense of humor. Obviously, they had fun together. Plus, they both loved the dog!
Was there going to be an awful price for accepting the invitation in his laughing eyes? To let go? To have fun? To embrace the joy life offered?
Krissy faced an awful truth. There was a terrible chance of falling in love with her fake fiancé. She was pretty sure she was halfway there already.
And as powerless to stop it as she had ever been over anything in her entire life.
She surrendered to it.
He did, too.
The rest of the day, they acted as if there were no complications between them at all.
They acted as if they were exactly what they were: fresh young lovers in the throes of discovery. They ate crunchy croissants at a dog-friendly patio outside a bakery not far from the town hall.
When they got back in the vehicle, an ecstatic Chance was somehow on her lap instead of in the back. His huge head was out the window, his tongue lolling happily as they drove through the beautiful countryside, the spring air flowing through her window—the utter happiness of these moments—felt like she was breathing in wine.
Jonas parked in the lot at the head of the trail that he had obviously hiked many times. They held hands as they hiked a winding trail that went up a mountain. He was not dressed for hiking, and his shoes were terrible for it.
The trail was steep and challenging in places. Jonas pulled her over slippery rocks and piggybacked her across a rushing creek, probably wrecking the shoes completely. The trail ended at a waterfall and a turquoise pool. The water was frigid, but they splashed each other, took off their shoes and chased barefoot through the mud. They threw sticks for Chance, who would bring them back and shake all over them.
Between Chance and the mist from the falls, they were soon soaked, their clothes clinging to them, a reminder of how things had gotten out of hand last night.
But it didn’t feel out of hand as their lips met. It felt as if life had conspired to give them each other. In the rainbow hues of its mist, they kissed until they were breathless with it.
Jonas picked the tiny yellow wildflowers that grew in abundance
