Not all is well in paradise, in fact for Charlotte Cosgrove, everything immediately starts falling apart on her honeymoon. The man she is in love with, loves someone else; in a desperate attempt, she pleads with powers beyond her comprehension for help and gets a whole lot more than she bargained for.
PART I - PARADISE
"I've missed you."
"I know," the man, who is sharply dressed in a casually effortless way, acknowledges the blonde woman's statement. It's a sentiment behind a pout. He boldly moves to embrace her. It's been too long.
"Is it safe to be seen like this?" she asks, softly and cautiously, tensing up in his arms.
Marshall Cosgrove likes Pandora precisely because it's not filled with the kinds of people who recognize him. It's a dusty, devil-may-care kind of place. A desert. No one hassles him, asks for money, or an introduction. No one judges him there.
"...Yeah, it's fine."
There's a reason the Cosgrove Family holds weddings on their private estate. They've gotten too rich, too influential, and too well-known to have these kinds of celebrations comfortably in public spaces. It's away from reporters, wedding crashers, obvious sycophants, and corporate beggars.
This wedding, of the heir of the Cosgrove Estate, is one the media would love to get their cameras on. Miss Charlotte Calhoun and Mr. Marshall Cosgrove, are finally getting married.
Marshall is the third child and only son of the patriarchal, old-money, family.
Charlotte could be considered his childhood 'sweetheart'—their parents pushed them toward each other all their lives, planning to solidify the two families for generations to come before they were even born.
Charlotte's two older brothers and Marshall's two older sisters had already tied the knot years ago.
So, why had it taken them so long?
Why was there a five-year-engagement? The public wanted answers. The shareholders of the Cosgrove Collective wanted security.
Marshall could no longer afford to be a bachelor.
Charlotte has her own ambitions; she owns an art gallery in Memosa Bay. Marshall knew this and wanted her to have time to chase those ambitions.
They both knew she was apprehensive of being seen as just another Cosgrove 'Trophy Wife.'
For such an important wedding, the family kept it small and private. It takes place in the Cosgrove Estate Orchard.
Marshall has his best man, Skyler Greystone and a groomsman, Ethan Elberts at his side.
Both friends he picked up at Sim State, while he was in the prestigious Hoh Fruhm fraternity.
Charlotte has Evelyn Jane Orbinson and Gabriella Zeitlbahn. She's been friends with Gabriella so long that she forgets where they even met.
Evelyn Jane is a family friend.
Gabriella had her own wedding not too long ago. Evie doubts she will ever tie the knot, to her, love is a joke.
Skyler has been a family man for some time, even being a romance sim he's held down a marriage and had four sons! His eyes have never wandered.
Ethan just had his first son, and it took him so long to find love. He hopes Marshall will settle down and enjoy it.
The vows are spoken. The wedding concludes. Marshall takes a breath of relief now that it's over.
The wedding guests wish nothing but the best for the bride and groom.
His mother finally has all her children married off to Calhouns. She also breaths a sigh of relief.
Charlie Calhoun, the only Calhoun child not to be married to a Cosgrove, has a moment of confusion and tries to kiss a woman who he thinks is his wife. But it's not his wife, it's Evelyn Jane Orbinson! His real wife, Amelia, is livid.
The reception gets underway, on the other side of the orchard. Charlotte dances with her father. Marshall's parents and sisters dance with their partners, as well.
Amelia dances with their nephew, Bryce.
Someone started a slap dance. This is another reason why they don't have these things in public anymore.
Melinda and Mira are Marshall's sisters, catching up even though they work at the same architecture firm that Mira heads.
Their mother gets herself a stiff drink. Wedding planning takes its toll.
"I got you a piece of cake before everyone swiped them all," Alexander offers to his sister, Alice. They are children of Melinda, Marshall's next oldest sister.
"You are the best," she swipes it from him for herself and beelines for a specific table.
"Heeeey Uncle Marsh!" Alice chirps and unceremoniously parks herself at the table he is eating the rest of the cake at with Charlotte.
"Uh, hi, Alice."
"So, where's your blonde friend I saw you with yesterday?"
Marshall knots his brows, "You'll have to be more specific."
Alice smirks then takes a bite of her cake and chews thoughtfully.
"You know, the one at Cárdenas Station? You were hugging her really close so I thought she must have been invited to the wedding."
Marshall frowns. Alice is a little brat and she knows it.
"You must be mistaken. I wasn't in Pandora yesterday. I had to fly out to Quincy for a meeting with real estate developers."
"I thought that meeting was canceled?" Charlotte says.
"Yeah, only after I landed I got the memo. So I made a day of it in Quincy."
He didn't.
Which is why he was at a motel last night in Pandora.
"My bad," Alice raises a doubtful brow and excuses herself.
Charlotte sets down her fork with force and pinches the bridge of her nose. She can smell Marshall's BS from five miles away.
"Really? The night before our wedding, Marshall?"
He lowers his voice, "It was the last time. I promise. We talked about this—"
Charlotte takes her plate in a huff and leaves without letting him finish.
Charlotte was a great woman, he had seen her grow from a girl that loved to finger-paint to a woman that worked in oils and watercolors and could capture more emotion in one stroke of a canvas than he could ever articulate.
He didn't want to cause her pain, but she knew and had known who he was all these years. People don't just change.
He knows he has to smooth it over with her.
Marshall is more than adept at using a silver tongue. He uses it every day whether cutting deals in his father's business or charming the waitress, and it works on Charlotte. She melts like butter every time he apologizes and compliments her, extolling her virtues and making her feel like a Queen.
She is his queen now, they might as well have been royalty in Kashmire.
But, Kings have always taken mistresses...
Marshall and Charlotte head off to Twikkii within the week. His alleged transgressions are all but a blink of a memory.
Charlotte is smiling, the weather is sublime and they take time at the spa to relax and rejuvenate.
Marshall sinks into a mud bath, and relaxes, looking forward to being with his new wife for a few days, alone.
Charlotte chooses the luxurious milk bath. She's never been to Twikkii before, but Marshall and her in-laws have a family home not too far away. They offered the place, but Marshall insisted on staying in a grand hotel by the beach.
As they leave to go partake in dinner and dancing, Charlotte notices his head turn when a pretty blonde walks by and their discussion over wedding cake comes crashing back to the forefront of her memory.
She dances half-heartedly in the club ruins, with the music bouncing off the ancient stone, wondering if the Queens of Twikkii ever cursed unfaithful husbands.
Her suspicion is brought to an unpleasant truth when they return to the hotel and the same blonde is waiting outside and smiles at Marshall when they approach.
A hard *smack* disturbs the serenade of night crickets.
Charlotte is angrier at the fact that he promised it would be the last time than the fact he has wandering eyes. She had always known that about him, it's why it took five years for them to finally wed.
She checks into her own room, books it for the remainder of the honeymoon, locks the door, and parks herself on a bed to stew and read a novel she wanted to finish.
He knocks in intervals of thirty minutes. She ignores them all until midnight.
"What do you want?"
And there he goes with his usual routine of regret and untruths. She severely doubts the woman just happened to be on vacation at the same time as them in the same place.
She doesn't give in as easily. He broke a promise. She always took him for a man of his word—he never ever promised something he couldn't deliver.
"Come on, come to bed," he pleads.
"No. I'm staying here," she is firm.
She is emotionally exhausted.
Marshall doubles down since his bed is empty for the night, and she is already there. It would be a waste.
They pass each other in the lobby.
"Where do you want to go today?"
"I'm not going anywhere with you."
So, it looks like their excursions are going to be separate. Marshall seems bemused that his silver tongue isn't working like it usually does.
"If you haven't seen the pirate ship yet you should!" some random kid offers unsolicited advice on local attractions.
"Thanks, we'll keep that in mind."
Marshall actually takes the kid's advice.
He grabs at one of the wooden planks nailed to the mast and ascends the ladder toward the crow's nest. This thing has to be at least 100 years old!
He's been to the ship before. His sister, Mira, once plundered the Captain's cabin and found an old journal. It was her most prized possession growing up. Then she gave it to Jimmy Calhoun.
Jimmy had been Marshall's brother-in-law since before he started college. He grew up with all the Calhoun kids. On some level they must have known the powers that be (their parents) were guiding them toward each other and pairing them off.
Damn, the view from the crow's nest is nice.
He is surprised to find Charlotte on the beach when he disembarks and tells her as much.
She's been playing or practicing with a cutlass, he eyes the blade as she swings it up, "I didn't think you would take some random kid's advice and come to a place you've been before."
"I was nostalgic," he admits.
"I don't believe you. I don't believe anything you say anymore, Marshall," she growls and thrusts the cutlass forward until it's an inch from his nose before she throws it into the sand and marches away—as best as one can on the sand.
Charlotte finds herself back at the hotel, not wanting to risk ending up at the same place as her husband. How can he just keep going on this vacation like he didn't break her heart? Just like he broke that promise.
She had resigned herself to the fact that she wouldn't always be his priority, but she had hoped for some respect. She could very well as easily have found a handsome side piece to entertain her but she didn't. She hated Marshall. She loved him.
When he was a boy, he hung all her paintings in his room. He was her first kiss. They dated in high school and then left for seperate colleges.
He proposed. She knew it was coming but still felt so surprised.
And somewhere along the way he stopped being the Marshall she knew and became the man he is now.
She mourns the loss of that sweet boy.
"Char?"
She turns away, hiding her face and tears.
"Go away."
"Come on, we can't be like this."
"There is no 'we' in this," she mumbles, "I've tried to make the best of it but you exploit my kindness at every turn. Did you ever even love me?"
She can hear him sigh and feels him sit next to her. The sea sloshes against the sand in peaceful, rhythmic, waves. So opposite of her torrid feelings and thoughts crashing against her skull.
An arm goes around her.
"I was told to love you. I have been told I must love you since I was old enough to know what love is. I do love you..."
His pause pains her, she knows there's a caveat coming.
"But at some point, I think I resented the fact I wasn't able to choose who I wanted to love."
She covers her face with her hands, "Was I not worthy of your love?"
"I don't deserve you," Marshall says, probably the first honest thing in quite some time, "it's messed up that our parents put so much pressure on us to be together..."
"Why didn't you just tell them you didn't want me? It could have saved us a lot of trouble," Charlotte hisses, her anger overtaking sadness again.
"Why didn't you tell yours?"
She peeks up at him through her hands, "Because I do love you, and always did. I didn't need anyone else."
A brief look of shock crosses his handsome face as if it's the first time she's ever told him that she loved him and he can't believe it.
He finally says, "You're a fool to love me, Char."
She sniffles, "I know. So what do I do now? Divorce you?"
"No! Definitely not!" his brows knot together and he stomps his foot in sudden anger—as much as one can stomp their foot into the sand.
Then she realizes, since he is the one in the wrong, if she files for divorce she gets half of his assets and wealth. He has a lot of assets, being heir to the Cosgrove estate.
She crosses her arms and glowers. Maybe she should divorce him and then he will feel the consequences of his actions. She feels a prick of vindictiveness and wants him to beg her not to.
"Look, I can't just be your wife while you go messing around with other women."
"For your information, it's just the one! Her name is Saskia, and I've known her just as long as I've known you! I love her, I choose to love her despite everything—no one told me I must!"
Charlotte gnashes her teeth together.
"I'm sorry it was such a burden to be forced into loving me," she bites out and turns her back on him.
It's past the point she can confidently 'work things out with him.' She doesn't want the fancy mansion, the butlers, the unlimited funds, or to be the matriarch of the estate once it passes out of his father's hands. She only wanted him, but now she knows it is impossible.
"Have our marriage annulled, get me an apartment in Memosa Bay, and then don't speak to me ever again afterward."
His stunned silence is only telling that he didn't think she would be so extreme, "Char—"
"Do this for me, and I won't be forced to divorce you and take half your stuff. I promise you I will, and unlike you," she turns her head, catches his gaze, and sneers, "I keep my promises."
Marshall spends a cold night alone, tossing and turning in disbelief that his marriage has effectively ended before it even began. He can't blame Charlotte for her anger or reaction. It was deserved, but he couldn't live a life devoted to just her. He blamed their parents for putting that idea into her impressionable young head.
His siblings settled in so perfectly and nicely to their arranged marriages. That's what they were for all intents and purposes. Marshall was the only one to see it for what it was and he wasn't going to play nicely.
He finds that this honeymoon was not as relaxing as he'd hoped.
Charlotte feels hollow. She had cried her eyes out and felt like shit afterward. Her heart is in pieces. Her time—wasted.
After years of an amiable, even pleasant relationship between them, it was over.
"I wish he would love me and only me," Charlotte whispers to the waterfall that she has made her way to in the old ruins in the jungle.
She has given up on Marshall doing so but doesn't think it would hurt to try to have the Old Gods of Twikkii hear her plea and take a humble coin as an offering.
She spends the day there, bird watching, sitting by the waterfall, and trying to forget. Trying to remind herself why she doesn't want to love him. He is a scumbag, but it will hurt so much whenever she sees him with another woman on his arm.
She wonders if the woman he claims to love, loves him back or is just a gold digger.
She returns before sundown and Marshall is waiting in the lobby for her.
They sit down.
"I spent all morning on the phone but I got a hold of property in Memosa Bay that I think you will like. It's not an apartment but a house. The deed will be under your name."
"Good," she snaps curtly.
He looks at the floor.
"What?"
"I don't think we can get an annulment, Char."
"Why not?" she starts forward, indignant, "It's not a valid marriage because our parents forced us into it, right? According to you."
"You wanted to marry me, you admitted that. And I..."
She raises her brows.
"I thought I wanted to marry you too, and I'm sorry that doing so ended up hurting you more than just breaking it off."
He rubs his hands together while thinking, "How about we separate? Just for a while. Take time to think? We still have our own accounts and I can of course give you anything you need, financially."
She gnashes her teeth, just wanting to have him out of her life so she can get on with hers.
"Fine."
They cut their honeymoon short.
Marshall carries her luggage out for her, it's the least he can do. Honestly, he'd rather hire a bellhop but none are available.
He dreads going back to Kashmire. To face the media, the backlash, the incredulity, and the lectures from his family and the shareholders alike.
But maybe it will all be worth it.
Charlotte deserves more than he can give her, and he deserves to love who he wants.
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