Page 29 of Hot Shot

When she looks up at me, I can’t meet her eyes. Instead, I stare at my callused fingers.

“I’m going to take a test or whatever, but you saw her. She’s mine. And if she’s mine, I have to take care of her. I want to take care of her.”

She doesn’t answer.

I huff, standing, pacing across the room. My hand slips into my hair when I stop. “But the only way I can do that is with you. I need my wife.”

Instantly pissed, she stands. “Yourwifedidn’t even fucking know she was your wife until a half hour ago.”

I look at her, as earnest as I ever was. “I never thought that piece of paper mattered.”

“Says the guy who never fucking mailed it.”

“You know what I mean, Cass.”

She draws a breath that is pure fire, but swallows it instead of unleashing it on me. “I was literally at a church, standing at the pulpit, about to marry someone else. You might have thought of me likeyourwife, but I thought of myself asDavis’swife.”

“Fuck Davis.” I spit the words like a curse.

“And honestly fuck you too, Wilder,” she spits right back. “You owe me a divorce, not a fucking guilt trip into helping you.”

Something in me cracks open and seethes with frustration and love and desire as I stalk toward her. An idea sparks, then catches fire as the divine kicks open a fucking door, the window all but forgotten. This time, I bum rush it.

“You just said to me you wish we’d stayed married—well, guess what? We are, for better or worse, just like we promised. I need your help. I’ll give you your divorce”—bile climbs up my throat at the word—“but will you help me with Cricket first?”

Her jaw is set, her green eyes hot for a hundred reasons, most of which are bad news for me. “Married?Wilder, you have got to be fucking kidding me.”

“They can’t keep her without having to sell their house, Cassidy. They’re retired, aging. I can help them. I can help all of them. But not without you.”

“You arecrazy. So, what? I’m supposed to pretend to be your wife? Move in here? We’re supposed to tell our friends andfamily and the whole goddamn town that we’remarriedafter I was just humiliated at the altar by another man?”

I nod. “Just until I’m able to establish paternity and custody in court.”

When she blinks, her lashes flutter. Her pretty mouth is partly open. She looks like she wants to skin me alive.

“You’re insane, Wilder.”

“Why?”

“Because A) I’m not ready to evendatesomeone, never mindmarrythem, never mind be amother. B) I don’t owe you anything, and C) you lied to me.”

“Thing is, A) Davis doesn’t count—you never loved him like you loved me?—”

“You don’t even know me anymore?—”

“B) We’re still married, despite it all, plus we’d only be pretending, and C) let me make it up to you. Stay with me here, and I’ll atone for my sins. Help me figure out how to be a dad, how to help Cricket. Give me time to get the legalities in order. I’ll sign the papers. But I can’t have that little girl out there without your help.” I’m somehow almost flush against her, my breath disturbing her hair when I talk.

Her eyes snap between mine, her body tight. Her face hard with defiance. But behind the incredulous resistance is my salvation.

Hope.

She exhales fire, rolling her eyes as she turns away from me and puts space between us. “You are un-fucking-believable.”

“I know.”

“And crazy.”

“You do that to me.”

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