Flirting With Disaster (Camelot 3)

“To be forgiven, you have to say you’re sorry.”

“I knew you were going to say that.”

“It’ll be easy,” she said, reaching out to rest her hand on Judah’s shoulder. “You’re getting good at it.”

Judah raised his drink. “Cheers.”

Their glasses collided with a melodious clink, and she drank to the past. To the person she used to be, and whoever it was she and these men she loved might become if they gave themselves half a chance.

Chapter Thirty-six

Katie woke up to Madonna screaming at her head. Someone was shoving an object right in her face.

“Turn it off,” Sean said, his voice sleep-muffled and grouchy.

Her phone. Her alarm. She pushed his hand away and rolled over, but her stomach was on a five-second delay, and her brain felt like someone had been after it with a meat tenderizer. The inside of her mouth tasted like Coke syrup and regret.

“Fuck,” she said, partly because she felt so utterly horrible and partly as an experiment, to see if her mouth still worked.

It did, but her voice came out hoarse, as if she’d been crying a lot. Or, worse, singing.

Sean must have figured out how to turn off the music himself, because it stopped, and then something clattered against the nightstand, and one of the bedside lights came on and drove a railroad spike into her hippocampus. Katie covered her eyes with her hand and assumed the fetal position.

“I’ll be fine,” she said, mostly to herself. It was what she always said when she got hurt, before she even had a chance to assess her level of woundedness. It made her feel better to know she was sound enough to dismiss the severity of her injuries. “I just need to sleep.” For three days.

“Do you have to be ssomewhere?”

“Like where?”

“You t-tell me. You sset the alarm on your phone.”

Katie tried to think why she would do such a gruesome thing. “What time is it?”

“Sseven.”

Oh, hell. Breakfast.

And she must not have told Sean, probably having reasoned—with the typical brilliance of the intoxicated—that it would be easier to tell him in the morning.

This was going to be ugly.

Katie took her hand off her eyes and gingerly turned her head so she could see him. Squinting against the light, she focused on his face. His hair was all rumpled, his face sleep-creased, and he looked mildly ticked off to be awake.

Her heart dilated with love.

“Judah invited me to breakfast,” she said.

“Judah looked even drunker than you when you two c-came out of the bar. No way is he guh-gonna be awake.”

Katie used her palms to push herself into a semi-reclining position against the headboard. If she concentrated on Sean instead of the queasy feeling in her stomach or the sharp pain in her head, it was okay. She could do this.

“He’ll be awake. He’s having breakfast at Ben’s.”

Sean flew into a seated position so fast, she went cross-eyed. “No, he’s not. Nuh-not without security. Not until we talk to ssomeone at the library.”

“We can’t stop him. He’s a free man.”

“But what if Ben is the one b-behind the messages? He c-could pull out a gun, or he c-could try to blackmail Judah. I don’t trust that guy, and—”