Chapter 24 Too late to regret.

Arwen blinked. Was it really that easy? Even as she signed her name on the form, she couldn't quite believe it. As she pushed the documents toward the man sitting beside her, she ogled his composed demeanor. He was so calm, as if nothing was out of the place. He had come for her, and she was meant to be his. "Do I intrigue you so much, dear wife?" Aiden suddenly turned to her, catching her off-guard. Befuddled, Arwen nodded at first, but then after considering what he had asked, she shook her head. "Not at all. You look very ordinary." "Ordinary?" Aiden raised a brow. Arwen nodded, flustered, knowing full well what a big lie that was. He was anything but ordinary. Aiden smirked. "Fine, we will discuss that later. From now on anyway we have all the time in the world to explore what you mean by 'ordinary'." Arwen turned to look at him with creases formed in between her brows, briefly forgetting the weight of his words. But, as if to remind her, the magistrate spoke up, "There, it's almost done." He picked up the department seal, pressed it onto the paper beside the President's seal, and signed his name. "I now declare you husband and wife. You can take the receipt now, and come back to collect your official marriage certificate in fifteen days." With a smile pressed on his lips, he looked at Arwen and then shifted his gaze to Aiden. "Congratulations to you both!" Aiden nodded to him before turning his attention to Arwen to say, "The procedures here are done. Emyr will take care of the rest. We can leave." The assistant didn't understand the first part of the magistrate's statement, but nodded to the latter. Outside, Emyr huffed, looking down at the file of documents in his hands. Only he knew how he had made everything possible in such a short time. Everything had moved so fast that for a moment, even he couldn't process it. They had been waiting, observing Arwen's every move, until out of the blue, his boss asked him to get the marriage documents approved by the President's office. Since the documents were already prepared before they returned to the country, Emyr had no confusion about that. But what puzzled him was why his boss had decided to push it all through so suddenly. That hadn't been part of the plan. Now, though, he understood what his boss had been aiming for. Arwen was walking beside Aiden, still trying to grasp what she had done, when she suddenly remembered something she had overlooked. She stopped in her tracks, her brows furrowing. Noticing her stopping, Aiden turned to look at her. Seeing her confused expression, he asked, "What's wrong?" "I didn't ask for your name," she admitted, feeling truly dumb. She had just gotten married without even knowing the man's name. What had she been thinking? Aiden tucked his hands into his pockets. "Are you scared now?" He asked, but Arwen shook her head. "No, I just ... I didn't get to ask your name, and the reason you agreed to our arrangement?" "Arrangement?" He repeated her chosen term. Just as Arwen was about to explain, he added, "I made it very clear –I don't do arrangements. If we marry, we marry for real. And now, it's too late to regret." The way he said that made him seem cool, but at the same time, Arwen sensed he was too sure about her. As if he knew he had known everything. Did he know her? Remembering the familiarity she had felt around him earlier, she asked again. "Do we know each other? I mean have we met before?"