Chapter Seven Alex
The small corner store we find on our way back to the hotel can maybe fit five people inside before you start breaking fire code. The counter takes up half the store, with alcohol and cigarettes behind it. The other half has basic necessities, magazines, and not much else.
“What’s the best way to remove a ring from a swollen finger?” I ask, eyeing the minimal supplies. There’s a refrigerated section at the back of the store that looks like it might have butter and a few cooking supplies crammed onto a single shelf. “Butter? Olive oil?”
“Do you plan to return it?” Euan asks.
“If they’ll let me.”
He holds up his hand and examines the ring still stuck on his pinky finger. “It’s got a lot of crevices. Butter might get stuck in them and go rancid.”
I wrinkle my nose at the thought. There's no way the jeweler will take it back if it smells like sour milk. “So, olive oil then?” I ask, picking up a small bottle and searching for its price tag.
“That, or …” Euan trails off.
I look up to see Euan standing in front of a display with a dozen different brands of condoms and small sexy toys. “We are not using KY Jelly.”
He chuckles and picks up a small bottle of clear lube. “They don’t have the brand name stuff here,” he replies. “But it’s scent-free and should be safe for metal.”
I look between the olive oil and the lube. The olive oil is clearly the less embarrassing choice, but I have no idea if it’ll leave residue or a smell on the ring. Sighing, I set it back on the shelf. “You’re right, we’ll go with your idea.”
The cashier doesn’t bat an eye when we present them with our single purchase. While the transaction is finishing up, my phone buzzes. I accept the lube with one hand while checking my phone with the other.
Theresa
We need to talk.
I bleat like a sheep and fling the lube away from me before I even register the action, my guilty conscience trying to get rid of the evidence.
Euan catches it against his chest and raises an eyebrow at me. The cashier’s blank eyes spark with interest.
Buying the lube isn’t suspicious. Screaming over a text while buying the lube definitely is.
Ex-girlfriend. She is your ex-girlfriend. You aren’t cheating on her. Hell, you aren’t even using the lube for anything fun!
I nod a hurried goodbye to the cashier, grab Euan’s arm, and drag him out of the store.
“Something you want to talk about?” Euan asks.
Now that we’re on the sidewalk rather than a seedy corner store, the surge of guilt slowly drains away. “My ex wants to talk,” I explain, not quite looking him in the eye.
“Ah. Do you need to call her? I can return to the hotel first.”
God no. The last thing I want to do right now is talk to Theresa before Euan and I sort this whole marriage thing out. There are only two reasons she’d contact me so soon after the breakup: to convince me to change my mind, or to retrieve her things from my apartment.
If she wants to get back together, that’ll be an awkward conversation on so many levels.
First, because I might be fucking married.
Second, because I have no regrets about breaking up with her.
Maybe because my brain is occupied with a much bigger, stranger problem.
Or maybe because … the breakup was kind of overdue.
I didn’t realize how unhappy I was in our relationship until it ended. It’s only been one day, so I wouldn’t say I’m happier without her, but there’s this … absence of misery.
If she wants to retrieve her things, it doesn’t have to be now. I need to focus on the problem of my potentially-real-but-hopefully-fake marriage to Euan.
“I’ll talk to her later.”
Euan accepts my answer with a simple nod and leads the way back to the hotel.
In the lobby, we pause next to the closed doors to the bar. The sign says it’ll open in another hour, so we head up to Euan’s room instead.
“Alright, let’s lube you up,” I say as soon as the door closes behind us.
Euan’s lips twitch as he gives me a stern look. “Now you’re doing it on purpose.”
I place my hand on my chest and give him my best offended look. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’m being one hundred percent serious. Get your mind out of the gutter.”
He snorts and moves to the table, pulling out one of the chairs and thumping down into it. Then he sets down the bottle of lube and lays his left hand, palm down, next to it.
I sit across from him and pick up his hand, examining it carefully. The flesh of his pinky looks a little swollen as it pushes up against the ring. At least the redness faded after he stopped fiddling with it.
Grabbing the bottle of lube, I squirt a generous amount right on top of the ring.
The bottle squelches and gulps lewdly in the otherwise silent room.
Anyone with a hand fetish would be foaming at the mouth right now.
Euan’s hands are large and warm, his fingers thick with a scattering of dark hair over the knuckles.
They’re neither too smooth nor too calloused.
His middle finger is a little crooked, leaning toward his pointer finger, like it was broken at some point.
The engagement ring looks so dainty and dazzling on his masculine hand. Every movement changes how the light hits the diamonds in tiny, shifting rainbows.
I focus on massaging the lube around the ring, trying to get it between the metal and his skin. The slickness is familiar, inspiring images of other parts I could be massaging. A hand gliding along a hard cock. Fingers penetrating a tight hole.
The ring slips off Euan’s finger so suddenly that I drop it onto the table.
It spins erratically before rolling right off the edge.
“Fuck, not again!” I drop to my knees, trying to catch it before I lose it completely.
Thankfully, the carpet slows it down, and it only rolls a few feet.
I snatch it up, glaring at the stupid thing. Are you trying to cause me problems?
I blindly reach out toward the furniture to pull myself up and my hand closes around something firm and covered in rough fabric. Slowly, I turn to stare at my hand gripping Euan’s thigh. I raise my gaze to his face.
His legs are splayed wide enough to accommodate me if I move that last foot forward. He watches me, dark eyes hooded, his expression hard to read. The muscular thigh under my hand flexes with tension. “Need some help?”
At the question, I yank my hand away with so much force that I fall back on my ass. “Sorry!” My eyes flick back and forth between his face and the thigh I’d practically groped. There are dark blotches scattered over the denim in the vague shape of my hand. “Shit! I hope that doesn’t stain.”
“It’s fine,” he says, lips quirked in amusement. Then he offers his hand to me, and I realize I’m still sitting on the floor.
It would be more awkward to ignore the gesture and find another way up to my feet, so I push past my minor humiliation and grab his hand.
Both of our hands are slick from the lube, which means he has to hold me a little tighter so he doesn’t accidentally drop me.
With one swift tug, he hefts me to my feet.
As soon as I’m standing, I slip my hand out of his and back up until the backs of my knees hit the bed.
I sit down heavily and try to make it look intentional.
I have to say something or my thoughts will keep lingering on the idea of me kneeling between his thighs, hands slick with lube as I—something pokes uncomfortably into my palm and I look down at my clenched fist. The engagement ring!
“We got it off!” I announce, holding it up with a triumphant grin.
Euan flexes his left hand, carefully curling his fingers toward his palm before stretching them wide, displaying the full width of his hand from thumb to pinky. “Good, that’s one problem solved.”
“Just a million more to go,” I mutter.
“How about we watch our wedding video now?”
Surely there’s another way he could have phrased that.
“Right. The wedding video.” We’ll have to sit really close together to watch any sort of video on his phone.
Shoulders pressed against each other. Our knees brushing casually.
Maybe even our heads tilted together. So close that either of us turning could lead to an accidental kiss …
While my mind is wandering like a horny teenager, Euan gets up and casually strolls across the room to his luggage. Then, of all things, he pulls out a laptop.
It’ll be a lot easier to watch this on a bigger screen. We won’t need to be quite so close. And I’m not disappointed at all.
While he’s setting up, I return the ring to its box and glare at it.
“Stay put,” I hiss in a low whisper. The ring sparkles at me innocently, like it hasn’t caused a dozen problems in the last twenty-four hours.
I snap the lid shut and stuff the whole thing back into my suit pocket to deal with later.
At this point, I don’t even care if I get any money back, I want the cursed thing out of my life.
When I turn around, Euan is sitting on the bed, back against the headboard, computer settled in his lap. I look at the table, where I expected him to set up, and then back to the bed, trying to decide which is weirder: his choice of location, or my self-conscious thoughts lingering on it.
I sit on the bed next to him and feel the mattress dip beneath me. It’s a king-sized bed with plenty of space, and Euan is firmly planted on the other side. I’ll either have to awkwardly scooch across the bed, jostling the whole thing, or crawl toward him on my hands and knees.