Exit strategy.It was the sanest idea to come out of this whole ridiculous plan, and yet, I hated it the most. Because it means we will once again be going our separate ways, and I will have to say goodbye to Hollis Beck.
And this time, I fear it might be forever.
“Okay.” I steady my breath and steel my spine as if I’m preparing for war. “Let’s talk details.”
Chapter Eighteen
HOLLIS
It is nine in the morning.
I just flew in from Las Vegas on a redeye. I am running on zero hours of sleep, five cups of coffee, and I’m currently knocking on Jonas’s front door, hoping he doesn’t kill me for the early morning visit.
He pulls the door open, dressed in nothing but a pair of black sweats, and gives me a once-over. “Man, you look like shit. What the hell happened to you?”
“I got married.”
His brows shoot up so high, they nearly touch the door frame. “I’m sorry, can you repeat that? ’Cause what I think you said was?—”
“I got married. Do you have coffee?”
“Of course I have coffee.” He ushers me in, and we both head to the kitchen. Keisha is at the stove, humming and making pancakes in a long, fuzzy pink robe. My mouth waters. I don’t remember the last time I ate. I headed to the airport with Pres around noon for her afternoon flight back to California.
Our goodbye was awkward as fuck. Do you kiss your fake wife at the airport? Shake hands? We settled on a brief hug, and even that went terribly.
After that, I just sat around for hours on standby until I could get back to Nashville.
I hadn’t wanted to leave in the first place.
But I needed to come back and make arrangements.
Which is why I am here at Jonas’s house at nine in the morning on a Saturday.
“The expansion idea…” I jump right in, eager to sell him my plans—the ones I came up with on the fly when I blurted out the crazy idea that we stay married. I’m practically bouncing on the balls of my feet with the need to get this all out. “Are you still on board with that?”
“You mean the one we’ve barely had the chance to discuss because you’ve been too preoccupied with Presley Creed for the last two months?”
“Yeah, that one,” I answer, not even bothering to deny it. I know I’ve been distracted. But to be fair, he was equally distracted during the first six months after he met Keisha, so I’d say I’m ahead of schedule.
“Yeah, why?”
“’Cause I want to open a club in LA,” I announce. “And I’d like to be on site to oversee everything.”
Keisha pivots to gawk at me while Jonas simply gives me an assessing gaze. “So let me get this straight.” He folds his arms across his bare chest. “You get married in Vegas…” Keisha gasps, covering her mouth as her husband continues, “And now you want to run off to LA and open a club just so you can live with your wife, who I’m assuming is also Presley Creed?”
“Yes.”
We look at each other for a moment, then a huge smile spreads across Jonas’s face. “I told you crazy things always happen in Vegas.”
He steps forward to pull me into a hug. “Congrats, man.”
“Don’t congratulate me yet,” I warn. “We don’t even remember getting married, and right now she’s using our drunken marriage as an excuse to distract her family from her thief of an ex-boyfriend.”
“Wait, what?” Keisha exclaims over her shoulder. “I’m gonna need you to back up and explain.”
So I do. Or at least what I remember. I tell them about the rush I felt when I saw her again, about our day of sightseeing, and how easy it was to fall back into our natural rhythm.
How I never wanted the day to end.
