Chapter 3
Anya
Whenever people said curiosity killed the cat, I had a strong defensive reaction for the feline in the scenario. Curiosity wasn’t a bad thing. It was the hallmark of every great discovery, every scientific breakthrough, every theory eventually proven right. At some point, a person asked a question that couldn’t yet be answered.
As an undeniably curious person, I couldn’t help that prickle of interest when I wanted to know something. The driving urge almost always pressed me into forward motion. I never stopped to think, oh hey now, this might kill the cat .
Me. I was the cat.
Objectively, waking up to a hot, naked man chest was great, right? Yet the first thought upon prying my eyes open and seeing nothing but flawless skin and muscles was, oh fuck a duck, I’ve finally gone and done something really genuinely stupid.
Curious I might be, but stupid I was not. Before I moved, I took a second to assess.
First, I was neck-deep in the worst hangover of my entire life, which hopefully meant naked man chest was also hungover, and would be slow to react if I bolted from the bed. If he had serial killer tendencies, I’d likely be dead already, so I guess that was a small comfort.
Second, I was never, ever drinking again for the rest of my life.
Third, the body that currently served as my pillow was impressive .
Warm, hard pectoral muscles rose and fell under my cheek, a slow, heavy heartbeat thumped steadily against my ear, and underneath my hand was the most perfect set of abdominal muscles my fingers ever had the privilege of … fondling.
Not that I was really fondling anything because when you wake up hungover as hell, mouth cotton dry, and someone splitting your head open with a metaphorical ax of death, I was just trying to figure out whose bed this was, why he was naked, and why the hell I couldn’t remember how I’d ended up there.
The body attached to all the nice muscles didn’t move, and as I carefully looked underneath the sheet wrapped around my body, I let out a small groan when I was naked except for a shirt that I did not recognize.
No bra. No underwear. And upon further, horrifying inspection in the weak light of the hotel suite, it wasn’t a T-shirt at all. It was a jersey.
I sat up way too fast, the room spinning dangerously as I speared my hands into my tangled hair. When the terrible rocking sensation stopped, I stared down at the front of the jersey and pulled it away from my chest, the details coming into horrifying view as my vision sharpened.
Blue and green and white, and the circled edges of an 8 and a 5.
“Shiiiiiiit,” I whispered under my breath. I knew those team colors. And I knew whose fucking number that was. A desperate whimpering sound escaped despite my best efforts to keep it locked down.
Next to me, the big, warm, muscley body groaned, turning toward me as his arm snaked around my hips to tug me closer. The man gave good veins. Really good veins. They roped over his larger-than-average hand, curling over a thick wrist and a muscled forearm covered in a dusting of dark golden hair.
I knew that forearm.
I knew those veins.
I’d had more than one moment of giving them an innocent little side glance when he didn’t think I was looking because if that man knew I looked at anything of his twice, I’d never hear the end of it. Also, you know, I’d had that pesky fiancé for the past couple years, so looking at another man’s forearm was generally frowned upon.
Panic had my muscles locking tight, and I pinched my eyes shut before I slowly turned to glance over my shoulder, horror blooming under my chest like an ink stain.
“Oh holy fuck,” I breathed.
This was bad.
This was worse than bad.
There was one person in the entire universe in whose bed I did not want to wake up.
Parker fucking Wilder—all-star tight end for the Portland Voyagers, handsome as the devil himself, and the cockiest son of a bitch I’d ever met.
And there he was, naked and big and sleepy and warm and naked . Everything in my brain was fuzzy and out of reach, disappearing in a frustrating puff of air the moment I tried to latch onto a single shred of logical thought.
Vida. This was Vida’s fault. If there was a fancy term for the murder of one’s best friend, then I was about to commit that particular crime.
What happened?
Drinks.
Not just drinks. Sad shots. Oh holy shit, the sad shots. I covered my mouth as I tried to take some deep breaths.
The dark back seat of a limo. Lips brushing against my ear while he whispered something to me.
“Pretend with me, sweetheart. Let’s make them think you’re mine.”
The memory of his voice pulled at the hairs on the back of my neck, and I pinched my eyes shut for a moment, only to have them snap open again.
A kiss.
Wait. An almost kiss.
A hand sliding around my waist, the heat of his hand on my back when he kissed just to the right of my mouth.
I rubbed my temples as I tried to sift through the evening, but the pieces refused to snap into place. A helpless glance around the expensive-looking room didn’t provide any immediate answers until my gaze snagged on the nightstand next to my side of the bed.
My entire body trembled as I brushed aside my lacy black underwear lying on top of an innocuous piece of white paper, a gold seal pressed into the bottom right corner.
“Oh dear God,” I moaned. With my thumb and forefinger, I carefully plucked at the paper, the entire freaking universe bottoming out as my eyes scanned the very official-sounding words. I spoke quietly as I read through the damning proof. “This is to certify … The Little Vegas Chapel of Diamonds … Parker Wilder and”—my throat damn near closed as I tripped over my own name—“Anya Hennessy are joined in lawful wedlock…”
My shaking hand snapped over my mouth as I tried to swallow down a sob.
While my brain sifted through a screaming chorus of absolute fucking panic, Parker’s body froze too. Where his chiseled face—damn my eyes for noticing the stubble on his jaw—was pressed into the pillow, I felt the slightest puff of air as he pulled himself into wakefulness.
His eyes blinked open—dark and slightly bloodshot because apparently we both hated our livers—and when they moved past his arm, where it was still wrapped possessively around my hips, past the jersey covering my regrettably naked chest, and up to my face, I sucked in a breath to wait for the explosion of what the fuck that was about to make me regret every single life choice that brought me to that moment.
But he didn’t swear. He didn’t freak out.
Oh no.
It was so, so much worse.
His sculpted lips split into a devastating grin as he slowly pushed himself up to a seated position next to me. Damn if it wasn’t like watching a mountain lion move—lithe and slow and powerful. His skin smelled like a sexy forest of sex, and my stupid nipples tightened underneath the silky material of his jersey when he stared at my lips for a second. When his gaze moved up to mine, I could hardly look him in the eye because I just knew that last night, I’d probably begged that man to screw me into the mattress based on the involuntary reaction of my body.
Memories were solidifying.
There was begging involved—copious, horrifying, wanted-to-slice-out-my-memories begging—and I was pretty sure I was going to have to go hide in a closet for the rest of my life after this.
Parker, please.
Please make me feel good.
He’d said no . Because this entire thing was not embarrassing enough, I begged the hot, playboy football player for drunk sex—drunk married sex, in fact—and he said no .
Yup. I could never show my face in front of this man again, and I could almost hear his stupid smug thoughts before they came out of his stupid smug mouth.
A whimper almost clawed out of my throat while I waited for him to say something, and when he did, when that low, delicious rumble hit my ears, I knew just exactly how screwed I was.
“Good morning, wife.”