Page 40 of Sweet Surrender

I’m married.

Fucking married.

Last night flickers through my mind like a slideshow of someone else’s life. Someone else’s perhaps, yet . . . every moment of it was lived.

“Dance with me,” Hendrix shouts above the bruising tempo of the music.

I rise from my seat in the darkened corner of our VIP pod and adjust my hat lower over my face. On any other day, it’s okay for Gizmo from BENT to be seen partying in Las Vegas. Just not tonight and not with a woman who has a sixty-thousand-dollar wedding ring on her finger.

People can look back in a week and realize the guy who looked familiar but who they couldn’t place really was me, really was here, and really was with his wife, but the plan is for them to remember I looked like I was hiding. That I was trying to have a private moment.

But those thoughts, the careful planning, dissipate as I step up and slide my hand around Hendrix’s waist. With my front to her back, I pull her against me so that my lips brush against the shell of her ear when I speak. “I don’t dance, Cookie.”

She spins around, her lips pink and her eyes alive as she hops up and down to the beat. I try to ignore the jostle of her breasts or how they rub against me as she does. The enticing sight of her body moving in tune with the beat. She smirks and then leans in close to me. “And I don’t get married, Jase.” She then throws her head back and whoops. “Now, dance.”

Then there was the two-a.m. snack run that had us sitting cross-legged on the cement of the hotel balcony with two spoons and a gallon of mint chocolate chip ice cream between us.

“How many other people in this city do you think are celebrating getting married tonight?” she asks around a bite of ice cream while wielding her spoon like a conductor when she talks.

“A lot. A little. I don’t think all of them are celebrating though.” I take a swig of my beer. It doesn’t pair well with the mint but fuck if I care at this point.

“That’s depressing.” She’s buzzed and the little grunt she makes as she tries to dig another spoonful of ice cream out of the container is adorable.

“But true. Accidental pregnancies. An escape from something worse. I—”

“Oh my God.” Her eyes widen and the alcohol makes her every expression animated.

“What?” I whip my head over my shoulder toward the suite behind us, thinking someone’s in there or something, and it takes a few seconds for the spinning in my head to catch up with the movement.

“Is that what people are going to think of me?” she screeches.

“No. Never.” I take another bite. “Yes. Probably.”

“Besides, no one’s probably going to believe it either. This. Us. I’m the exact opposite of your type.”

“I don’t have a type.” Yes. I do.

“You’re so full of shit.” We both chuckle as the spoons clink on our teeth and we fall silent. “But we’re not fraternizing like that.” Her every word is enunciated.

“Correct. It’s not in the contract.” It may have crossed my mind a time or ten tonight. What she’d feel like beneath me. What those eyes of hers would look like when she came. How her hips would feel gripped in my palms.

“Pretend marriage. Pretend sex.” She giggles and rests her head back to the wall and stares up at the sky. “Best relationship ever.”

She has a soft smile on her lips and her dark lashes rest against the curve of her cheek. I contemplate the words she just said. The things she just implied.

A best relationship means pretend sex?

What the hell does that mean? It’s not my place to ask. Hell, I’m probably drunk and misheard her. Then again, she was pretty fucking clear and my head is full of ways I could show her different.

“Hendrix—”

“Nope. Not talking about it.” She giggles again and I can’t figure out if she’s that buzzed or is using it as an excuse to shove away whatever she thinks I was going to ask.

“Shit. Crap. Brain freeze.” She laughs and hisses as she puts the heel of her hand to her forehead and squints her eyes—while digging into the shared container with the spoon in her other hand.

“That sucks. Are you okay?” I lean over and press a kiss to her forehead.

The action is so natural, so . . . just there without thinking, and so is her putting her hand over my entire face and pushing me back while laughing. “I’m fine. I can handle a little ol’ brain freeze.”