Chapter 7 #2
Sweaty and loving it, the burn of our muscles matched by the burn of tequila. Dom ceased being the guy who'd said those awful things. He was the same guy from the beginning of our date. The one who had my hopes up, who arrived early and said She's beautiful and Who said I was playing?
"Dom," I start, at the same time he says, "Cecily."
I feel as he looks, aghast and horrified and confused.
"Do you remember?" he asks.
I nod, only slightly. Any more movement than that and I'll pull an Exorcist all over the ivory comforter.
The roiling in my stomach may have kept the memories of last night at bay, but they are plentiful now, screaming forth with blinding clarity.
How we'd broken off from the group after gorging ourselves on waffles, warbling songs about Vegas as we walked.
We'd passed a restaurant where Bruno Mars crooned from the speakers, singing about how he was looking for something dumb to do.
Dom had looked at me with a spark in his eyes, said, What could be more Vegas than getting drunk-married?
I turn on Dom now, his hair all bouncy and his face not nearly showing enough signs of how hungover he must feel.
"This is All. Your. Fault," I accuse, pointing a finger at him.
He makes an indignant sound in the back of his throat. "Me?" he sputters. "Nobody held a knife to your throat and forced you to say I do."
My mouth opens to reply, but Paisley screeches. "What? This is real?"
I wince. So does Dom.
Paisley slaps a hand over her mouth. "Sorry. No more high-pitched exclamations."
"We're married," I whisper, the realization slamming through me. "We're...married." My lip curls on that last word.
Dom's mouth flattens. "Maybe if you keep saying it, it will be less true."
"Shut up." I groan, dropping my head in my hands. How could I have done something this monumentally stupid? I'm never impulsive. I do not make bad decisions. Apparently I was saving up all those small bad decisions to make one really, truly, terrible choice instead.
That's when I feel it. The illness climbing, pushing against gravity. "I'm going to be sick," I moan, throwing back the covers and running to the bathroom.
The door opens a moment after I shut it behind me. I hate throwing up, but it's ten times worse when there's an audience. I'm already emptying my stomach over the bowl when strong, nimble fingers gather my hair.
"Go away," I moan, batting behind me. I don't need to look to know it's Dom. I am acutely aware of him.
He gathers a lock of hair that hangs in my face, his fingertips brushing my forehead. "In sickness and in health."
"Please go," I whisper, humiliated. I throw up again, tears leaking from the sides of my eyes. "I mean it, Dom. I don't want you here."
He hesitates. After a moment's deliberation, my hair falls down my back and over my shoulders. The door opens, then closes. Lying down, I press my face to the cool tile of the floor. The bathroom door creaks open.
"Go away," I croak.
"Hey," Paisley says softly. The water turns on, and then Paisley lays a cool washcloth over my face.
I sigh at how good it feels.
"That's a nice shirt you're wearing," Paisley jokes, rubbing a palm over my back.
"Not funny," I murmur.
"Look on the bright side. At least you have a nice ass."
"Wha—" No. This can't be happening. I'm only wearing underwear beneath this shirt. I lied last night when I taunted Dom by telling him I was going commando. So when I got up to run in here... I was right. Rock bottom was an illusion.
"Don't worry," Paisley assures me. "Klein turned away when he saw you get up. He might love to tease, but he takes pride in being a gentleman."
"Dom did none of that." Dom came in to witness my mortification. And to help.
"Dom ran after you. And he asked me to check on you."
I sit up, taking the washcloth and pressing it to the back of my neck. "I can't believe I did something so stupid. I married him." I could say it one hundred times, but it might take double that for me to believe it.
Paisley shoulders me lightly. "Here I thought I was the one headed down the aisle."
"You can't tell Paloma. She will never let me live it down."
Paisley makes a face, one that clearly says too late.
"You told her?"
"You told her. The same way you told me and Klein."
"I sent a photo?"
Paisley nods in the affirmative. "Don't you remember?"
"Not really. I remember the ceremony"—I stammer over the word—"but I think after that I was so tired I could barely stand up. The alcohol turned into a sleeping pill."
Paisley slips an arm around my shoulders, delivering a reassuring squeeze. "This is a messy mess. But it's fixable. You weren't of sound mind during the decision, so you can get an annulment. It will be like it never happened."
"Like it never happened," I echo.
I climb to my feet, and Paisley slips out. I rinse my mouth and splash water on my face, then brave a look in the mirror. Wow. That's...not at all pleasant. I look like I feel. The best I can do now is a finger comb through my hair and leave the safety of the bathroom behind.
Blessedly nobody looks at me when I walk out. Klein and Paisley sit at the small table, and Dom sits on the end of the bed. He has his phone out, thumb scrolling.
"I'm learning about annulments," he says without looking up.
"Can't we say we had our fingers crossed behind our backs? Or we tripped and fell and oops we're married." I climb back into the bed, pulling the covers up around me and my nearly naked bottom half.
Klein looks at me now that I'm appropriately covered. "At least your walk of shame was short. What was it, five feet from the bathroom to the bed?"
"Too soon," Paisley sings.
"Tread lightly, KleinTheWriter," I retort, using his social media handle.
Grabbing my phone from the nightstand, I mentally prepare myself to do damage control.
Please tell me Paloma is the only other person I texted that photo.
Taking a quiet breath, I open my messages app.
I don't want to look, but I have to face it.
Oh no. Oh no no no.
"Dammit." This is so much worse than I thought.
It gets Dom's attention. "What's wrong? Other than the obvious."
"That picture of me and you under the Just Married sign? Apparently I wanted to share our newlywed bliss." It's so unbelievable it feels like it should be happening to someone else.
Dom's head shakes in confusion. "Who else did you share it with?"
If I weren't already hungover, what I did would make me sick right now. I meet Paisley's gaze as I answer, because she's the only person in this room who will grasp the gravity of what I'm about to say. "My entire family."
Paisley's gasp is sharp. She knows what my relationship with them is like, tense and strained, a powder keg of hurt feelings. Kerrigan and my grandma are the only family members I talk to regularly.
The group chat, unused for months, now shows unread messages.
I'm not looking. Not yet. Reading those messages is a job for future me.
Current me can only handle so much at one time.
Kerrigan is going to kill me. Duke, my older brother, will criticize like always.
And my parents, well, it's a toss-up between who will notice I exist.
"Why did I do that?" I'm looking at Paisley when I ask, but really I'm asking myself, the universe, anybody who will answer. "Why would I text all of them? Why not just Kerrigan?"
"Intoxication has a way of bringing feelings out of their hiding spots." It's Dom speaking.
"Apparently so," I say meaningfully. "I thought I hated you, but it looks like I can stand you enough to marry you."
"Last night it looked like you could do a lot more than stand him." It's Klein again, with that teasing tone. And Dominic, smirking.
These damn cousins.
"I like to dance," I say defensively.
Klein stands, placing his hands on his knees and shaking his rear end.
"What are you doing?" Paisley asks.
"Dropping it low," Klein answers.
Dom's laughter fuels Klein's charade.
"You should bring it back up," Paisley says, but I know she's repressing laughter.
Klein sits down, grinning at me like he's waiting for me to say something.
"Thanks for the demonstration," I say dryly.
"You're welcome. It was like hitting replay on the night."
I roll my eyes. Even drunk, I look way better bumping and grinding than whatever Klein just did.
"I'm going to need everyone in this room to get serious," Dom announces, attention on his phone again. "It says here we can't request an annulment until Monday. They are not open on the weekends, which makes sense."
I groan. Loudly. "It's Saturday. And I don't know about you, but I'm supposed to fly out tomorrow afternoon."
Dom's back is to me, but he's nodding. "It says we can petition a court in the state in which one of us resides." He swivels around on the bed to look at me. "Lucky for us, I'm going from here to Phoenix to visit my parents. As long as you're free, we can go together on Monday."
"Great," Klein says, clapping once, loudly, and making my head throb. "Who's hungry? I'm starving, and if Paisley doesn't get a bucket of coffee soon, she'll turn into a chupacabra."
"He tells no lies," Paisley confirms solemnly.
Coffee sounds good. Food, however, does not. I may never eat again.
Paisley rises, pulling Klein up with her. "Let's leave these two alone. I'm sure they have some big emotions to work through and they don't need an audience."
Klein wraps an arm around Paisley's waist as they head for the door. "Meet us in the lobby in an hour."
"An hour?" Paisley squawks. "But—"
"Don't worry, Ace, I'm going in search of coffee for you right now."
Ugh. Klein is so good to her. Which is great, obviously, but also ew. I can't take it at the moment. The hotel room door opens, and they disappear through it.
Quiet falls around the room, but it is so loud, bouncing off the vacated seats, careening from the unremarkable picture on the wall. Finally, I drag my eyes to Dom, still sitting at the end of the bed. Hunched shoulders, hand on his forehead, thumb rubbing circles over his temple.
"So..." I don't have anything else to say. I'm reeling, stunned, stumped.
Dom turns around, propping one bent knee on the bed, eyebrows raised. "Guess you're my wife for the weekend."
Wife.
Absolutely not.
The memory trickles in, making me hot and uncomfortable. Dom's mouth on mine to conclude the short ceremony. A searching kiss, extracting from me a response I should have been embarrassed by.
Anger flares, not at the annoyingly handsome face of the man looking at me, but directed inward. And that anger makes me uncomfortable. Hot. On edge.
"I'm not your wife," I grit.
I know Dom doesn't find this funny, but his good-natured take it in stride expression fades. A muscle in his jaw clenches. "You are, actually. That is a fact, plain and simple, and wishing for it to be untrue won't make it less true."
Dom strides, long-legged and lean, to the closet. He opens it and reaches in, producing my yellow dress.
"Did you hang that?" I ask.
"Someone had to," he responds irritably. "You left it in a puddle on the bathroom floor."
Great. My dress is wet. I have to wear that thing out of here. "Why was there water on the ground?"
"Not literally," he mutters. "You took it off and it puddled at your feet." He mimes pulling something down his body and letting it go, and I guess the ending to the motion is that it would puddle.
"I'm sure you'd like to go to your room and get ready for brunch," he says, tossing the garment on the bed.
He disappears into the bathroom, door closing softly behind him.
I have been kicked out. Summarily dismissed. I don't blame him. I would've done the same. Still, it rankles me. I want to be mad at him. If I'm not mad at him, I have to look too closely at my part in all this, and I don't want to.
I shuck the shirt, don the dress, and find last night's heels lined up in the closet. Wincing as I step into them, I step jerkily to the bathroom door, saying with a raised voice, "See you at brunch, Satan's Errand Boy."
His answering sigh is so loud I hear it through the door. "Unfortunately so, Menace."
Menace? I like it. Has a ring to it.
Threading my arm through my purse straps, I pass the closet. The shirt Dom wore last night, the one he had to purchase so we'd be allowed into the club, hangs neatly from the rod.
The soft fabric glides smoothly off the wood hanger. I toss it over my shoulder. Behind me, the soft sound of fabric hitting the ground. Then I exit the room, my feet complaining with every step.
This is my first walk of shame, and it is one for the record books.