Settling the clipboard onto the desk, I turn and head back in her direction, where she’s no longer sitting in the chairs in which I left her. Instead, she’s up and moving.
She waves frantic hands at her face, the crimson red wave of her anxiety cascading off her cheeks and down the line of her neck, and I step back as her red-tipped fingers swing out and almost hit me in the face.
“Okay. Okay,” she repeats to herself, spinning in the world’s tiniest circle. “Everything is fine. This is no big deal. People do crazy things like this all the time for far less rational reasons, and I’m just…taking care of business. Handling my shit. Making life my bitch. I can do this.”
I step back and out of the way as she does some sort of power-skip, half-jump thing and lands on her toes. My eyebrows lift slightly, but I don’t say anything else. I’m not even sure there’s anything that can be said to calm her down at this point.
That’s not entirely true. You could tell her she doesn’t have to do this. That life happens for reasons, and maybe it’ll turn out to be a good thing that her visa expired. My stomach flips in protest, and I shake my head slightly to clear it. No, we’re doing the right thing. Saving her career. Her future. It’s not a big deal.
I’m a practical guy, rationality and logic always the foundation for my decisions. A guy like me doesn’t do impulsive shit unless it serves an actual purpose. And this, obviously, serves a very important purpose.
Actually, you don’t do impulsive shit, period.
I can’t deny this is, hands down, the most impulsive thing I’ve ever done in my life. My brothers would certainly lose their fucking minds if they were here to witness it.
But they’re not here, and according to Ty’s last update, they’re at some bar with beer pong tables and cocktail waitresses that make Hooters’ tight outfits look prim and proper. I know this because he sent me a photo of an oblivious and blindfolded Jude, smiling toward the camera, while two of the scantily clad cocktail waitresses stood beside him.
Jude would be at risk for a fucking stroke if he found out you were getting married before him…
I almost start to marinate in that thought and allow the reality to sink in, but the doors to the chapel swing open so dramatically they hit the wall with a shocking bang. Instantly, a very broad-shouldered man wearing a white halter top dress and a face full of show makeup steps into the space.
“Oh my God,” Daisy whispers, her voice rising at the very end to an almost silent shriek. “Is that…uh…Marilyn Monroe?”
I almost snort, but in deference to her obvious freak-out, I don’t. One thing is for sure, though, that is most certainly not Marilyn Monroe. But it’s a pretty damn good showing by a man trying to look like her, I have to admit.
“Daisy Diaz and Flynn Winslow?” Fake Marilyn calls out with a movie-star smile and flutter of eyelashes, and Daisy’s hand shoots out and grabs me by the forearm, her fingernails digging into my skin, even through the material of my tux jacket.
“Us? Already?” Her eyebrows practically shoot up past her hairline. “But you just handed in the clipboard, like, a second ago. What kind of operation are they running here?”
I can’t help but chuckle. “Seems like a quick one.”
Daisy’s glare is pointed and strong and oh-so amusing.
“Ready?” I ask with a simplicity the two of us know isn’t all that simple.
She takes a moment of consideration, but it’s not more than a few seconds before she’s nodding and taking me by the arm to lead us toward Marilyn. “That’s us.”
“Great,” Marilyn coos, shooting us a wink before waving a hand and escorting us through the doors to the chapel. “Let’s do it.”
The door bobs and bounces against itself as I reach out to catch it without pushing through. Instead, I turn to Daisy with a raise of my eyebrows. You sure about this?
Her words are a declaration—and the first step in a whole new part of our lives. “Let’s do it.”
For better or for worse and until Daisy gets a green card, Mr. and Mrs. Winslow, here we come.
Daisy
Flynn tosses the keys to his motorcycle into the bowl beside the door and walks down the hall, leaving me to follow. I watch silently as he puts down the duffel bag from his bike that houses our normal clothes and then works off the tie at his neck. His strong shoulders work to take off his tuxedo jacket, and I bite my lip to stop my mouth’s nervous quiver when he reaches back to ruffle the hair at the back of his head with long, tanned fingers.
And I thought he looked good in leather. This sophisticated tux look takes Flynn Winslow’s hotness to a whole new level. It’s almost a shame it’s a rental that will have to be returned.
You do realize that this marriage is fake, right? You’re not going to, like, move in with him and pop out 2.5 kids…
His house is dark, but lights set to motion sensors illuminate each space as we move through it. First, down a long, large, high-ceilinged hallway, and then through a living room with modern, dark-green velvet sofas, and finally into a huge kitchen, set against a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows and a terracescape in the backyard. Even outside, lights begin to dot the hillside as Flynn walks in front of the windows.
Wow. This place is… Well, it’s not my dinky apartment in LA, that’s for sure. It’s a place for someone with money.
The silence, for the first time all night, is heavy. It’s laden with things unsaid—things I’m afraid to say—and even as I chip away at the block with my mental ice pick, I’m having the damnedest time trying to find some words to say.
I mean…what do you say in this situation? When you find yourself at the remote house of your new husband, about whom you know next to nothing?
“Do you…do you have a shirt I could sleep in, maybe?”
Oh God. I’m pretty sure that’s not it.
Under normal circumstances, with the men of my past, I might actually have the opportunity to be embarrassed. To wonder what he’s thinking as he stares at me in sheer disbelief. But not with Flynn. No. He turns without a word and walks down the hall. And, yeah, it’s things like that that let me know how wrong I am every time I try to convince myself that anything about what I’ve just done is normal.
That’s my husband. And I don’t have a freaking clue what he’s going to do from one moment to the next. For the love of God, I kissed that man, not even an hour ago, after promising ourselves to each other until one of us reaches our ultimate demise.
Drag Marilyn fanned herself and asked someone for a glass of water, and all I could do was stare into the deep ocean of his eyes and wait for a tidal wave to knock me out of my misery.
The kiss…it was powerful. Gravity shifting. So fucking exceptional that my lips have yet to stop tingling.