Chapter 9 Nina
NINA
Make it make sense.
The phrase kept echoing around my head, along with a pounding that made me squeeze my eyes shut. The room was daylight-bright, even with the blinds closed.
But I couldn’t make anything make sense, because I was in bed next to a snoring Logan Ashford.
A snoring, naked Logan Ashford.
Face down, ass up, with the sheet only covering the backs of his knees.
What the actual hell?
How?
At least I wasn’t naked. I’d somehow ended up in Logan’s white undershirt, which was tent-sized on me.
Yeah, awesome that I was covered up, but the fact that I was naked beneath it opened up all sorts of possibilities about what might’ve gone down after we stumbled into the suite last night.
Last night. There were so many holes in my memory. I could recall most of dinner and the beginning of craps, but after that, all I could conjure up were fleeting moments of giddiness.
And laughing. So much laughing.
I glanced down at my inexplicably sore knees and discovered carpet burn and two new bruises. Um, how?
“Fuck.”
Logan stirred and started to sit up.
“Oh my God,” he inhaled, blinking and looking around like he was coming out of a coma.
I forced myself to ignore the way his biceps flexed as he propped himself up.
Logan realized he was naked and beside me right before he sat all the way up. He pulled the sheet up and flipped over.
Hold on. Was the sheet tented over his waist, or was I imagining it? He raised his knees so I couldn’t investigate further.
“I, uh…”
Logan trailed off, because what was there to say? The most obvious question—did we sleep together—had a pretty self-evident answer. I wasn’t sure what he was feeling, but my body had had an active night—confirmed by the pile of gold wrappers on the nightstand.
How many times had we had sex?
And more importantly, did either of us remember what had to be an epic night of fucking?
“Hey,” I said simply.
“Hey.”
“How much did we drink last night?” I asked.
“So much,” he grumbled. “I’d prefer death over the way I feel right now.”
“Same.”
I watched him glance at the pile of wrappers and flinch. “I guess we…”
“Yeah.”
We both went silent. I cringed when I had a flash memory of Logan’s head between my thighs.
My boss went down on me last night?
“Well, we can move past it,” he said with what sounded like forced determination. “Right? We had a night of, uh, poor decisions, that won’t define our working relationship. We won’t discuss it again. Are you comfortable with that?”
Another vision, this time of me attempting to deep throat Logan’s impressive length.
Wait, not attempting. Succeeding. I didn’t have a gag reflex.
“I am,” I said quickly.
I really liked my job, especially the way it was evolving with Noah. I didn’t want to put his healing in jeopardy because his father and I had gotten drunk and horny for each other.
“Okay, then. I’m glad we agree,” Logan said in his businessman voice. “No changes to our working relationship. Now I just need to find my clothes…”
We both glanced around the room and morphed into crime scene investigators. His blazer was nowhere to be seen. My dress was crumpled in the doorway. His pants were in a pile next to it. My bra was snagged on the edge of the dresser.
“There’s my shirt,” Logan said.
I watched as he reached toward the end of the bed.
His hand froze in midair. “What is that?”
I scanned the room, looking for whatever could have freaked him out. Cameras? Spiders? An emptied minibar?
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Look…at…your…left…hand.”
I held it up in front of my face and gasped.
He wasn’t talking about my chipped manicure. There, on my ring finger, sat a stupidly shiny gold band.
That perfectly matched the one on his hand.
“It has to be a joke,” I finally managed. “Like, party favors, or something. Or maybe they’re smart rings from the casino? You can scan them instead of using credit cards?”
“I sure as hell hope so,” he grumbled. He pulled his button-down on and leaned over the edge of the bed, presumably looking for his shoes. He sat up abruptly, clutching a piece of parchment that looked like a diploma.
“No.”
There was so much nuance in that single syllable. Anger. Disbelief. Horror. Logan closed his eyes and sank back against the headboard.
I leaned over and snatched the paper away to see for myself.
Certificate of Marriage.
There, at the bottom, were our scrawled signatures.
And I’d dotted the I in my name with a fucking heart.
My heartbeat shot up to marathon level as I considered what it meant. I’d been blackout drunk once or twice before, but the results had never been anything worse than crushing an entire pizza solo.
“No, no, no, this can’t be real,” I moaned, scanning the very real looking document.
The officiant’s name. Witness signature. Fancy gold seal. License number.
“This is not good.” Logan stated the obvious.
“How?” I shrieked. “Like, how would anyone agree to marry us when we were circus-clown drunk?”
“Speak for yourself,” he answered.
“Oh, so you were in your right mind when this happened?” I shook the certificate in front of his face.
“Clearly neither of us was,” he said in a voice that was probably supposed to calm me down. “Now we need to figure out how to fix it. Damage control. Can you remember anything about the ceremony? Was anyone else there?”
I paused. “I’ve got nothing. The last thing I can clearly remember is that guy offering us the suite for the night.”
He grimaced. “Same.”
He leaned over the side of the bed again and came back up already dialing his phone.
“Who are you—”
He was already focused on the call. “Drew, I need to talk to you.” A beat. “No, not about Dad. Me. Something happened last night, on Nésion.”
My head was foggy, but I finally remembered that Drew was one of his brothers. Logan was calling for help with damage control.
“I, uh, woke up married.”
The resulting laughter was so loud that Logan pulled the phone away from his ear and fumed.
“Yes, I know her,” he hissed into the phone once Drew finally calmed down. “It’s Nina Reyes. She’s helping with Noah.”
I watched him listen to his brother.
“No, we’re still in the suite they gave us. Yeah, comped, because Nina won at craps. I don’t know, we didn’t count it out. Anyway, how did you handle your…scenario? I’m putting you on speaker so we can both hear.”
Drew was still chuckling as the call clicked over.
“Hi, Nina, I’m Drew Ashford. Welcome to the family.”
It was enough to make him launch into another fit of laughter. Logan’s jaw tightened as he waited, yet again, for his brother to calm down.
“Hi,” I said weakly.
“Just tell us your best practices for navigating a scenario like this,” Logan demanded. “You had an unexpected engagement, and you lived to tell the tale. So what should we do?”
“Sorry, guys, totally different scenario in my case. I needed the world to believe that Emilia and I were together, so it was no holds barred to spread the word about our fake engagement. You two are the exact opposite; you don’t want anyone to find out that you put a ring on it. ” He snorted softly at his lame joke.
Logan ground his teeth together. “Drew.”
“Look, this doesn’t have to be a big deal. All you have to do is keep it quiet until you get home, then quietly file for divorce. Or maybe even an annulment? Simple, and no one will be the wiser. You can even alert the team so they can start working now.”
Logan considered it, frowning. “Fine. I’ll handle it. Don’t say a word to anyone, got it?”
“Aw, bud, what about a big party to celebrate the news? I’m sure Emilia would love to help plan—”
“Drew,” he growled. “Enough.”
“Sorry, sorry,” he backpedaled. “In any case, you’ll be fine. Keep the certificate safe since you’ll need to have the right information for filing.”
“And take this thing off,” I added as I wrenched off the ring.
Logan nodded and struggled with his until he got it off as well.
“Hey, it’ll make for a great story once you’re past it,” Drew said. “Nina, thanks for putting up with my brother and helping Noey.”
“He’s a great kid,” I answered, happy to focus on something other than our terrible decision-making for a few seconds.
“Okay, we’re good here, thanks for your input. Later,” Logan interrupted, then disconnected the call.
The room went tomb quiet as we both considered our next steps.
“What time is it?” I finally asked.
“Early,” Logan replied. “Like, shockingly early, which is a good thing, because we can get back to the ship before the day starts rolling. We need to head out ASAP.”
“I’m going to get cleaned up, give me five,” I said as I slid out of bed.
His shirt was long on me, but I still felt the need to pull it lower as I jogged to the bathroom.
I was shocked to find a fully stocked toiletry shelf, with luxury goods I’d only ever seen online. And next to all of the goodies? Two matching black track suits with the resort logo on the chest.
Score! Now I’d be a little less conspicuous if someone caught us on the way back to the ship.
Logan was dressed and looking passably awake when I left the bathroom.
“Look at you.” He raised an eyebrow as he took me in. “Are you going to wear heels with that?”
“I think I have to. Just call me a fashion trailblazer.” I looked around the room. “Hold on, where’s my phone?”
Logan rolled his eyes. “I’ll call it.”
We both tipped our heads like dogs as we strained to listen for my ringtone, an old Scarlet Rush song about finding your fairy tale.
“I hear it,” Logan said, stalking around the space.
“Same.”
Huge relief, because losing my phone would’ve been the cherry on top of the nightmare scenario we were living.
I finally discovered it shoved between the couch cushions, along with my thong. So the couch had seen some action as well. I flipped it over and discovered a few missed texts from Tasha, wondering if I was still alive.
“Give me two minutes,” Logan muttered as he stalked back to the bathroom.
His face looked green. He was doing an okay job playing off his hangover, but I could tell he was hurting just as badly as I was.
It was going to be a long day.
I settled on the couch to wait. Tash deserved to know the latest twist in my upside-down life, and I couldn’t resist baiting her a little, so I slipped the gold band back on and snapped a photo with the suite in the background. I could trust her not to tell anyone else.
Her response was immediate: WTAF?!?!
I filled her in with as much detail as I could remember, and each update text was met with exclamation points and shocked emojis.
Then I got to what I could remember of everything that had happened once we arrived in the suite.
You slept with him?????????
I wondered if she was snapping her acrylic nails off as she slammed the phone screen.
That’s what the evidence suggests.
What do you mean evidence? She texted back.
A couple hickeys, a muscle I think I pulled in my thigh, and a stack of condom wrappers.
She sent the GIF of Meryl doing a standing ovation at an awards show.
How was it? Spill every gory detail please.
My mouth twisted into a smile as visions of Logan’s hands all over my body filtered into consciousness.
I can’t remember much.
Damn it!! Repeat performance required, then! For research! She texted back.
Highly unlikely, he’s back to bossman status. Everything is hella awkward now.
I heard noises coming from the bedroom. He was finishing up.
Because he cant stop thinking about your smoking hot body!
I sent back a laughing emoji.
“Ready?”
Logan must’ve made an offering to the porcelain god and washed his face, because he almost looked back to normal. I, on the other hand, looked like I was trying out for a Sopranos reboot in my track suit and stilettoes.
“Why are you wearing that?” Logan demanded.
I looked down at myself, confused since we’d already addressed it. “Because it’s more comfortable than my wrinkled silk dress?”
“No. The ring.”
Whoops. Busted. I’d forgotten to take it off again, which was strange because I never wore rings. It should’ve felt awkward, but the slim gold band seemed right at home on my hand.
I pulled it off and shoved it in my pocket. “Do you remember where they came from? Like, did we go to a jewelry store? Or does the chapel have a selection in front, before you go in?”
He sighed heavily. “I have no idea. They’re probably just gold-plated temporary rings. You can get rid of it. Now, let’s go.”
I nodded and followed him to the door. I slipped my hand in my pocket to cup the ring like it was a good luck charm.
It didn’t feel cheap. It was small, but it had an unmistakable heft. There was no way I was tossing it.
Someday, when I was old and gray and living among my fifteen cats, I could pull it out of a drawer and think back to my wild night marrying a drunken billionaire.