Page 33 of All Bets Are Off

“I’m agreeing, but only because I’m tired.” I tried not to frown when he helped me off the stool. “You’re still not the boss of me.”

“Yeah, we’re going to have to discuss a few things tomorrow. You should get some rest first.”

“I’m not going to like these discussion topics, am I?”

He shook his head. “No. You most certainly are not going to like them.”

That’s exactly what I was afraid of. Despite my annoyance, I poked Tallulah. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

She waved me off. Clearly, she didn’t believe that the bartender was going to follow through on Zach’s orders because she was still flirting madly with Kevin. “Have fun. Tell me what he looks like naked. In fact, get me a photo if you can.”

Zach’s forehead wrinkled as he slid his arm around my waist. “What did she say?”

I shrugged. “She’s Tallulah.”

“Was that an explanation?”

“She’s just Tallulah. I don’t know what you want me to say.”

Zach left it at that. I knew we weren’t done with this conversation, though. No, not by a long shot.

8

EIGHT

Who knew one week—seven measly days—could feel so long?

I’d only been a husband for one week and I was already inDatelineterritory. That’s how much I wanted to kill my new wife.

On one hand, Olivia was a relatively quiet roommate. She enjoyed reading and spent all of her time curled up on the couch with whatever romance book had struck her fancy that particular day. Yeah, she read a book a day. Who does that?

It wasn’t the books that bothered me, although some of the covers and titles threw me. It was weird. Some of the covers featured cartoon characters and innocuous titles likeBook LoversandFangirl Down. Some of the raunchier ones were full of bare-chested men with sweaty abs and suggested she try to find a Scotsman to stab her with a sword. Not the one on the battlefield either.

That wasn’t my biggest problem. I could handle the books. They were weird, sometimes annoying, but they were still books. No, my biggest problem was that Olivia was a freaking pig. Neverin my entire life had I met such a small person who could leave such a big mess.

“Seriously?” I strode into the living room, stared down my book-reading wife, and gestured toward the pile of dishes on the coffee table. “Are you trying to see if you can use every dish in the penthouse before washing it?”

She flicked her eyes up without lowering the book. She still read paperbacks, even though I’d suggested that an eReader was a better option for clutter purposes alone. Once she was finished with a book, she left it on the end table. The stack was starting to get high.

“I’ll get to it,” was all she said. Her attention was back on the book.

Annoyed, I grabbed the dishes and carried them into the kitchen. I was huffy. I never got huffy, but she brought out the absolute worst in me for some reason.

“I don’t understand how hard it is to put dishes in the dishwasher.” I made slamming noises as I rinsed the dishes and stuck them in the unit. “You don’t even have to wash the room service dishes. You just have to put them outside the door and housekeeping will pick them up.”

I glared at her as I carried a tray full of room service deliveries to the front door. With exaggerated slowness, I opened the door and waited until she looked at me.

Her gaze was steady over the top of the book as I showed her with precise movements how to put the tray outside the door. Then I let the door fall shut. It was heavy and caused a thunderous echo.

“Feel better?” she asked in her annoying way. She’d been like this the entire week. It was as if she was trying to teach me a lesson. What lesson that was I couldn’t fathom, but my annoyance was through the roof.

“We have housekeepers changing our bedding every three days,” I reminded her. “They dust. They do the floors. I don’t understand how hard it is for you to pick up your dishes.”

She blinked, then shrugged. “I said I would do it.” She was back to reading her book.

Annoyed, I stomped over and grabbed the book from her hands, ignoring the protesting sound she made. “It Happened One Summer,” I read aloud. “What’s this one about?”

“A Los Angeles party girl gets in trouble and has to move to a fishing village,” Olivia replied. “She finds herself and a hot man.”

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