The Unhoneymooners

I go to try again and the voice of Satan rings out from behind me. “You have to—” An impatient huff. “No, let me show you.”

There is nothing in the world I wanted less in this moment than for Ethan to show up, ready to mansplain how to swipe a hotel key.

He takes the card from me and holds it against the black circle on the door. I stare at him in disbelief, hear the lock disengage, and begin to sarcastically thank him, but he’s already preoccupied with the view of my tan Spanx.

“Your dress ripped,” he says helpfully.

“You have spinach in your teeth.”

He doesn’t, but at least it distracts him enough that I can escape back into the room and close the door in his face.

Unfortunately, he knocks.

“Just a second, I need to get some clothes on.”

His reply is a lazy drawl through the door: “Why start now?”

Aware that no one else in the suite is remotely interested in watching me change, I toss my dress and Spanx onto the couch and reach for my underwear and a pair of jeans in my bag, hopping into them. Tugging on a T-shirt, I move to the door and open it only a crack so he can’t see Ami inside, curled into a ball in her lacy wedding underwear.

“What do you want?”

He frowns. “I need to talk to Ami real quick.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

“Well, I’m going to have to do, because my sister is barely conscious.”

“Then why are you leaving her?”

“For your information, I was headed downstairs to look for Gatorade,” I say. “Why aren’t you with Dane?”

“Because he hasn’t left the toilet in two hours.”

Gross. “What do you want?”

“I need the info for the honeymoon. Dane told me to call and see if they can get it moved.”

“They can’t,” I tell him. “I already called.”

“Okay.” He exhales long and slow, clawing a hand through hair that is thick and luscious for no good reason. “In that case, I told him I’d go.”

I actually bark out a laugh. “Wow, that is so generous of you.”

“What? He offered it to me.”

I straighten to my full height. “Unfortunately, you’re not her designated guest.”

“She only had to give his last name. Incidentally, it’s the same as mine.”

Damn it. “Well . . . Ami offered it to me, too.” I’m not planning on taking the trip, but I’ll be damned if Ethan is getting it.

He blinks to the side and then back to me. I’ve seen Ethan Thomas blink those lashes and use that dangerously uneven smile to sweet-talk Tía María into bringing him freshly made tamales. I know he can charm when he wants. Clearly he doesn’t want right now, because his tone comes out flat: “Olive, I have vacation time I need to take.”

And now the fire is rising in me. Why does he think he deserves this? Did he have a seventy-four-item wedding to-do list on fancy stationery? No, he did not. And come to think of it, that speech of his was lukewarm. Bet he wrote it in the groom suite while he was chugging back a plastic pitcher of warm Budweiser.

“Well,” I say, “I’m unemployed against my will, so I think I probably need the vacation more than you do.”