Page 14 of One Night Bride
“Agreed,” Esme said quickly, looking relieved.
“So, can I stay with you for a few days while we figure things out?”
Esme’s painted lips opened and then closed. “Here?”
I leaned forward and rested my elbows on my knees. “I mean, I could stay in a hotel in town, but I figured it would be best to get our story straight before I meet any more of your family or people in town who know you. Rumors of the marriage kind can travel fast, if your small town is anything like my small town.”
Her face went positively white.
“I’ll make up the guest bedroom,” she whispered, looking more scared than I’d ever seen her. I found I preferred her angry rather than fearful.
I wanted to stand up, pull her to me, and kiss away whatever it was that had her frightened. Which was ridiculous. We weren’t actually married. I mean, we were. But in name only. I didn’t have the right to pull her into my arms whenever I felt like it.
Did I?
7
Esme
I’d found the quickest way to douse the possibilities of future hot sex with the cowboy who wouldn’t leave my daydreams: tell me we got married somewhere between the bathroom incident and the hotel room the next morning. Shit, this was a mess.
The guest room located next to the master bedroom was already made up for someone to stay there, and yet I tugged at the comforter and fluffed a pillow just the same. Remington—not Remy as my alcohol-addled brain had latched on to—stood behind me, next to me, and in front of me, no matter where I turned. The man was everywhere, the scent of his cologne filling my house and distracting me from the catastrophe I’d gotten myself into.
“There are towels under the sink in the bathroom,” I said inanely, waving my hand out the door in the general direction of the bathroom.
“I showered before I got here.”
I jumped, Remington’s voice coming from behind me yet so close I felt his heat along my backside. Putting down the pillow I was fluffing for the second time, I turned to face him. Why did he have to look so damn good? Possibly even better than I remembered. Why couldn’t he be like most alcohol-induced decisions, an extremely poor choice in the light of the next day?
“How the hell did this happen?” I blurted out.
The side of Remington’s lips tilted up and his bright blue eyes glittered. “Pretty sure it started with a glass of wine and ended with us finishing that bottle of whiskey in the hotel room.”
My heart leaped into my throat and I thought I might just vomit. I ran from the room, with Remington’s question about my well-being echoing in my ears. I didn’t stop until I made it downstairs again and grabbed both our wineglasses off the coffee table. The crystal clattered together, somehow not breaking, even when I dumped their contents in the sink at the bar and laid them down haphazardly.
There. At least I’d diverted us from going down a similar path. New rule: no alcohol with Remington around. It led me to make poor decisions with the potential to ruin my life. It shouldn’t be a hard rule to follow. How long did he intend to stay here, anyway? An annulment surely wouldn’t take more than a day or two to file, right?
A throat clearing had me looking back upstairs to where Remington stood, arms crossed over his impressive chest. “Are you done freaking out yet or should I take a nap?”
Heat flooded the skin from my boobs upward. I hated being out of control. I hated anything disrupting my time line, my schedule, or my carefully laid-out plans. That’s why sex with Remington was supposed to stick to one night while on vacation. He wasn’t supposed to bleed over into my actual life.
I gaped at him, trying to come up with words to describe why his being here was putting me off-kilter, but all I could think about was how good he looked with that T-shirt struggling to span his muscles and the damn jeans that fit his thick tree-trunk legs like a well-worn glove.
It hit me like a scathing review read aloud in public. I could get addicted to this man in the span of a single orgasm, and I’d already had more than a few with him. I had to get rid of him. ASAP.
“We need an annulment,” I stated, never more certain of anything in my life.
Remington barreled down the stairs, his boots a louder sound than my house had heard since I bought it six months ago. He barely fit through the doorways. The furniture looked doll sized compared to him. He didn’t fit in here. He didn’t fit in with my life. He had to go.
“Well, now. Let’s not be hasty,” he drawled, coming close enough to cup his hand on my arm.
I pulled my arm back, afraid a simple touch could lead to…well, hell. We’d already fucked in a public bathroom and gotten married, so what could a touch lead to that we hadn’t already done?
“Ugh!” I practically yelled, seething inside. “Don’t start that good-ol’-boy drawl with me, Remington Roth. My knees won’t buckle like the girls back home.”
He flat-out grinned, the asshole. “I really wish they would. I’d like to see you on your knees.”
A flutter like a hurricane and a fire of painful proportions took up residence between my legs. I sucked in a deep breath and tried to get my scrambled brain to respond.
