“The problem is I don’t want to get married! I’m only twenty-nine!” He slams down his now-empty third—or is it fourth?—drink. “And I definitely don’t want to dupe some unsuspecting person into marrying me so I can inherit two million dollars.”

“Dupe? Dude, just ask politely. You drive a Tesla, and you have the hair and jawline of a young Matthew McConaughey. Any woman in this bar would happily marriage-of-convenience you.”

“I’m not sure that’s true….”

I drunkenly continue, “You don’t need to stay married. You just need someone to marry you until the inheritance hits your bank account, right? Then you can divorce them? It’s not like your dead grandpa is going to take back the money if your marriage falls apart.”

Andrew sits up straighter in the booth, and I briefly worry I’ve offended him. But his eyes go wide beneath his eyelashes. “Wait, you mean, kind of like a green-card marriage?”

Not offended, then. “Exactly. Happy to help.” If only solving my own problems was this easy.

He pinches the bridge of his nose for a second, and the gesture cuts through the Moscow mule fog like a dart to my memory. I see her standing in the snow, pinching the bridge of her nose almost exactly like that.

“You really think I could find someone who would do that for me? Fake-marry me?”

“Sure. It happens in romantic comedies all the time.”

He puts both hands flat on the table and leans in even closer, all eyebrows and that fucking smile. “Would you do it?”

I laugh-belch in his face. “I think you can aim higher in your aspirations for a fake wife.”

“I’m serious. What if we split the inheritance? Well, not split. I could give you… ten percent?”

I attempt drunk math. “You’d pay me twenty thousand dollars to marry you?”

“Two hundred thousand dollars,” he corrects.

“Fucking Christ.” I can barely fathom that kind of money when sober, but drunk—it’s like Andrew’s eyes have turned to slot machine readouts with money bags on them. Two hundred thousand dollars. I could get an apartment that’s aboveground. I could buy a car. I could afford to eat fresh vegetables.

I could afford a therapist who actually listens to me.

Still, I’m not drunk enough to think that is a good idea. “Sorry, but no. Not me.”

“But you said anyone would happily marry me.”

“Anyone but me.”