Overnight Wife

“Be tricky to sign our annulment papers if you do that, won’t it?” he yells back.

It’s childish, I know, but the only reply I can think of is to offer him my middle fingers, just as the doors to the elevator slide shut. But that’s as much energy as I’m willing to expend fighting him any more on this right now. Because my head has started to pulse and I swear I’m going to be sick if I worry about anything one minute longer.

I reach my floor and stumble down the hall to my room, swiping the key and making it all the way inside before I remember that I’m sharing this room. And shockingly, in a move that feels patently unfair, Lea is sitting up in her bed already, on the other side of our double room, watching television with a spread of room service around her on the mattress.

She takes one look at me and smirks. “So, I see your wedding night went well.”

3

Mara

I slam the door behind me and flop face-first onto my bed with an angry groan that turns into a scream halfway down. “I can’t believe you let me do that,” I yell when I’m finally ready to turn back over again and glare at my ceiling. “What happened to sisters before misters and all that?”

“Hey, you seemed entirely into it. I mean, the number of times you swore to me you wanted this, honestly—”

“I was drunk!” I wail. “Why didn’t you stop me? You know I’m a lightweight.”

“Relax, Mara. This kind of thing happens all the time.” Lea smiles over at me. “You guys can just go say it was a goofy one-night mistake and get it all cleared up by morning.”

“It is morning,” I point out testily, with a glare at the curtains, as if the bright desert sunlight out there is personally responsible for the terrible decisions I made under the influence last night.

“By tomorrow morning, then.” She waves a hand, but the words send a stone ricocheting through my gut.

Tomorrow morning. When I’m supposed to be back in Los Angeles, ready to start my brand-new dream job at Pitfire Media. I cannot have this hanging over my head while I’m there. It will ruin any chance I have at concentrating on what I’m supposed to be doing. “That’s not going to work,” I groan. “I need to fix this today, Lea. Tomorrow I won’t have time; I need to have my head in the game. This is the worst possible moment for me to decide to go off the rails—”

“Which is probably why your subconscious decided to go wild,” she points out. “The harder you suppress your wild side, Mara, the crazier it becomes when it bursts free. Trust me on this one. I’ve learned it the hard way.”

“Yeah? Did you get married to a complete stranger yesterday?”

“Well, no…” She smirks. “You might beat me on the wild side front now, actually.”

I groan again and grab one of my pillows to bury my face in.

“Come on.” Lea pats the bed next to her. “Come over here and have some breakfast. You’ll feel better with some food in you.”

The word breakfast just reminds me of John. Probably waiting downstairs at that café he suggested, feeling all smug in his knowledge that I’m thinking about him. He thinks I’m just going to cave and come running after him like a good little wife? Well, he’s got another thing coming.

I grab the ring, giving it a tug. But it’s stuck on my finger, probably because my hands are swollen from the heat and all the booze last night. Nobody warned me how sweaty and yucky hangovers would feel. I can’t decide if I want a cold shower or to drink a gallon of water or maybe just fall into a hot tub and drown myself.

“Whoa. I didn’t notice that last night.” Lea crawls over to my bed, and offers me a plate entirely consisting of bacon and eggs. I dig into the bacon, unable to stomach the site of the slightly congealing eggs, and crunch on it while she forcibly examines the diamond. “Is that real? Holy shit, girl. Maybe you should stay married to this guy. Who the hell did you say he was again?”

I groan. “No idea. John somebody?” I don’t even know my husband’s last name. What a mess.

“It’s probably on your marriage certificate,” Lea points out with a sly grin, and I want to smack her all over again. I kick her away with a grumble of annoyance, though not before stealing one last slice of her bacon first.

“It’s got to be fake,” I say. “He probably bought it at one of the zillion arcade-looking stores on the main street.”

“That thing is not plastic,” Lea disagrees, but I just stare at the ring, too stubborn to think about what it means if she’s right.