A/N: Hello everyone! No, you're eye s are not decieving you. A new story is here!

This is a story that I've started, but haven't finished, so I wanted to post this to kind of get feedback on it and see if I should continue or not. And I know the title might be a little weird, but...it'll make sense later. :P

I hope you all enjoy!

"Whoever wrote that ad is either a serial killer or someone making pornos." Dak declared without looking away from the TV.

My other roommate, Carlos, snorted. "That, or he's a serial killer making pornos."

I laughed and rolled my eyes. "And that's different from any other ad, how? This is Hollywood, guys."

Dak frowned. "I'm serious. That's not a normal ad. Not even in this town. It's fucking weird."

"Oh, it is." I peered at my laptop and the ad I'd incredulously read aloud to my roommates. "But I won't lie...I am curious."

Dak just shook his head, still frowning.

"I'd be curious, too." Carlos said. "How come no one ever offers to be my sugar daddy?"

"Because you're straight, stupid." Dak said with a laugh. "You need a sugar mama."

"Hey, look, I'm broker than both of you. I won't discriminate if someone wants to pay my bills." Carlos, lounging beside me on the battered old sofa, craned his neck to look at my screen. "Does it say being gay is a requirement? Or could a straight guy-"

"Oh, no you don't." I turned my laptop away and shot him a playful glare. "I've got dibs."

"But…" He pouted, then huffed. "Fine."

"That's what I thought."

Dak blinked. "Kendall, please tell me you're not actually going to respond."

"No, I'm not going to respond." I started typing. "I'm responding right now."

He shook his head and turned back to the TV show we'd all been ignoring. "Enjoy making serial killer porn."

I chuckled but didn't say anything.

In the email, I wrote:

Hello, I saw your ad, and I'm interested. Could you please contact me with details?

It was a benign enough email. The same generic response I'd send to any ad I'd found, but as I hit Send this time, there was an odd flutter in my stomach. Equal parts curiosity, amusement, and...jitters?

As if the person on the other end might reply to me, and something might come out of this besides them having a good laugh because someone had fallen for it? I couldn't put my finger on it.

But the response was sent, and all I could do now was wait.

I closed the email, but there was still a browser tab open to the ad, and I couldn't resist reading it one more time.

Marry me for one year.

Payment: $1.2 million.

I'm a man looking for a temporary husband. $100k per month. Cohabitation, legal marriage, and NDA are required. Sex is not. Contact for more info.

Okay, so I could totally see why Dak thought it was weird, but I mean…$1.2 million was $1.2 million. That would pay off student loans for all three of us and still leave enough for, I don't know, a trip to In-N-Out for burgers or something.

It was probably a prank. Or a phishing scheme. I had no doubt just signed myself up for thousands of spam emails. That or a team of hackers was, as I sat here, breaking into my financials and bleeding me dry.

Joke was on them if they were. I hoped they liked In-N-Out because that was all they were getting with my hordes of riches.

Ugh, I hated being this broke. Why had I let someone talk me into going to school again? Oh, right, because without a college degree, I'd spend the rest of my life pathetic, broke, and living with two roommates in a tiny apartment in a shitty neighborhood. Wait…

But hey, at least our shitty apartment had five degrees on the wall-all of our bachelors' degrees, plus Dak's MBA and my Masters in Theatre Arts that had totally not been a waste of time or money. Another few months and we could add Carlos' MBA to the wall of shame too.

After that, we could all celebrate by adding some actual seasoning to our ramen and toasting with whatever store-brand soda was on sale that week.

So, yeah, to be honest, serial killer porn wasn't as unappealing as you might think.

As long as there were no clowns involved. I was desperate, but a man had to have some standards.

We were halfway through an episode of Supernatural when my email pinged. I jumped like someone had shocked me, and sent up the same prayer I always did when I had a new email.

Please tell me Kelly landed me another audition. That well had been discouragingly dry lately, but hope sprang eternal.

As soon as I'd opened the window, my teeth snapped together so hard I almost bit my stupid tongue. The email was not from Kelly.

Sender: guest-user

Subject: re: Marry me for one year.

I had to force back an excited announcement to my roomies that the mystery sugar daddy had responded. Better to see what he'd actually said before I made more of an ass of myself.

Holding my breath, I opened the email

Thanks for the response. Are you seriously interested?

I swallowed, then wrote back: I need details, but yes.

If I hadn't been curious before, I was now. If he asked for my bank details, then I'd block the hell out of him, but so far he hadn't mentioned anything about being a Nigerian prince. Not necessarily promising, but definitely intriguing.

The next reply came in seconds:

Would you be willing to meet? I would prefer not to discuss this via email.

Serial killer porn was sounding more and more plausible. On the other hand, if I was going to be "marrying" this guy for a year, it probably wouldn't hurt to see him face to face and make sure he wasn't...like…

A serial killer porn star?

I cleared my throat. "So hey, remember that sugar daddy ad?"

Both my roommates turned to me.

I gestured at the screen. "He responded. He wants to meet to talk details."

Dak made stabbing motions and mimicked the shrill music from Psycho.

Carlos leaned closer, peering at my screen. "Did he give you any more info?"

"No, he just said he doesn't want to discuss it via email."

Right then, my Nigerian prince of sugar daddy serial killer porn wrote back. The email contained the name of a restaurant, an address, and a time.

Tell the hostess you're here to meet Justin.

I quickly googled the restaurant, which turned out to be an insanely high-dollar place in West Hollywood.

"Holy shit. I probably can't even afford the tap water at this place."

Carlos whistled. "No kidding. So are you going to go?"

Some part of me thought the smart answer would be "Uh, no," followed by deleting the email, closing my laptop, and never speaking of this again.

But in some way, every step I took down this rabbit hole made me curiouser and curiouser. Who was this guy? What was his deal? And who the hell needed to hire a husband-an actual, legal husband-anyway? Was this some sort of romcom sitch where he had to get married in order to stay in Daddy's will?

"I think I'm going to do it, yeah." I said.

Dak huffed. "Dude. If this guy's rich enough to pay a million bucks to marry him, doesn't that tell you that maybe there's a reason nobody's been willing to marry him for free?"

"Shut up." Carlos hissed. "Kendall's about to get rich."

"Or murdered."

"I'm not going to get murdered." My hands hovered over the keys though, and I cut my eyes toward my roommates. "But, um, could one of you hang out close by? Just in case he does turn out to be Pennywise the Porn Star?" Oh Christ, there really would be clowns, wouldn't there?

Dak shook his head. "No way. I'm not having any part of this."

Carlos rolled his eyes. "I'll go. My car will actually get you there without breaking down, too."

He...wasn't wrong. My poor clunky beater was one sudden stop from going to the big parking lot in the sky, but Carlos' ancient Honda was still puttering along somehow. Seriously, that car was immortal.

"Okay. Thanks. I'll see if I can smuggle you out some breadsticks or something."

Carlos groaned. "Oh my god. Yes please."

I chuckled and turned my screen. With a little trepidation, a lot of curiosity, and maybe a pinch of excitement, I wrote back:

See you at 8.

XxX

"I'm here to see Justin." I felt stupid as hell saying those words to the bow-tied hostess at the restaurant's podium. It reminded me of one of those ads on the radio where they said you're supposed to "tell them Bob sent you" or whatever, and nobody ever actually did because even as broke as I was, a dollar off was not worth the momentary humiliation.

The hostess didn't miss a beat, though.

"He's waiting for you in the VIP section. Right this way."

The VIP section? Whoa.

As if this place wasn't already gleaming right out of my price range. It was dimly lit, and everything that would have been paper in a restaurant that might have hired me-yeah right-was linen, and every surface that would have been smudged in fingerprints or grease was immaculately polished marble, faux gold, or some other shiny stone or metal that my trash ass could never identify.

There was a bar that looked like it only served top shelf, and between that and a fireplace, an actual string quartet wore tuxes and played soft music.

As I followed the hostess past all this class and style, I self-consciously glanced down at my button-up shirt and slacks and quickly scrutinized my hair in one of the many shiny surfaces. Did I look remotely suitable to be in anything marked VIP? Should I have worn something else? Did I look like a million dollars? Because I was here to convince a man I was worth a million dollars.

Oh, sweetie, some voice inside my head tsked. You look like twelve bucks in wrinkled bills.

Great. This felt like every audition and interview I ever did-blown before I walked through the door.

There was still time to hightail it out of here, right? It wasn't like anyone knew me, so-

The hostess opened a door with VIP in gold letters, and she waved me inside.

"Your party is here. A server will be along to get your drink order."

"Oh. Um." I cleared my throat. "Thanks."

She shut the door, and I was in the VIP lounge, and there was only one other person in this room, and Justin was...oh my Lord, Justin was not what I had envisioned.

Between reading the ad and walking into this room, I'd painted a mental picture of him that involved scraggly gray hair (assuming he had any left), fucked up teeth (assuming he had any of those left), and a skin-crawly perma-leer. I mean, that wasn't technically fair, but it was hard to ignore Dak's comments about what kind of guy was loaded and still had to buy a spouse. It hadn't taken long for my imagination to build a Justin with Mafia ties, dragon breath, and some serious toenail fungus. Clown hat optional.

So I was utterly unprepared to walk in and see someone that gorgeous looking back at me.

Sitting at a small booth, leaning back against the leather seat with a half-empty glass in his hand, was a tall man who belonged on a magazine cover. His chestnut brown hair and fair complexion brought out his startling hazel eyes, and a dusting of five o'clock shadow framed gorgeous full lips. There was no expression on his face-he was studying me intently, but I couldn't have guessed what was on his mind.

He'd worn a gray button-up shirt that wasn't any fancier than the cranberry one I'd worn. That made me feel better about being underdressed, at least until I noticed the two-tone Rolex peeking out from his cuff. I wasn't a watch connoisseur or anything, but my brother had been given a similar one by his coach after he'd qualified for the Olympics the first time, and I knew at a glance that was a ten-plus thousand dollar watch. So much for not feeling underdressed.

Justin cleared his throat, and I realized with no small amount of mortification that I'd been just standing there staring. As he rose, so did my pulse, and when he extended his hand, I almost forgot what to do with it.

"You must be Kendall?"

I swallowed, and mercifully remembered how to shake hands.

"Yeah. I assume you're Justin?"

The expressionless facade broke, and I was again startled, this time by a soft laugh that sounded...shy? Really?

"Justin isn't my real name. Just a name I use for…" He waved toward the door.

"So like a code name?"

"Kind of, yeah." He met my gaze, and a smile lingered on his lips. "My name is James."

"Oh. Okay."

We locked eyes for a moment, and James gestured at the table.

"Have a seat. We can order drinks and discuss-"

"I'm pretty sure I can't afford more than water in this place." I glanced around. "I might not even be able to spring for that much."

His smile warmed. "I'm buying."

"Are...are you sure?"

"You answered my ridiculously cryptic ad, and made it past all the emails that probably sounded creepy." He chuckled self-consciously. "After all the cloak-and-dagger, the least I can do is buy dinner."

"Oh." I blinked. "Okay. Sure." My stomach growled, though I hoped it wasn't loud enough for him to hear. After months of eating whatever garbage I could afford, I was getting dinner in a place like this?

Well, hell. Bring on the serial killer Nigerian prince clown porn.

Done! So, a short chapter here, but it's more of a prologue of sorts. I'll post the next chapter within the next few days so you all can get more of a sense of the plot and then go from there.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on the chapter, as well as if you happened to have a favorite part/moment! And of course, if you would like to see more or not. :)

The next chapter will be up either sometime this weekend or early next weekend.

Until then! :D

-Epically Obsessed