Page 45 of Bound To Be Mine

His lips twitched, but he didn’t smile. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“It wasn’t really meant as one.”

The waiter appeared, rattling off specials I barely heard. I ordered the first thing that sounded good—some kind of pasta—and when he asked about wine, both Briggs and I said “No” in unison.

The waiter looked confused but nodded and left us alone.

“Water only,” I said. “For the foreseeable future. My liver is still protesting.”

“Agreed.” Briggs tapped two fingers on a file I hadn’t noticed until just then. “I’ve drafted a contract outlining the terms of our arrangement.”

A laugh bubbled up in my chest, slightly hysterical. “You know, every time I see you, you bring me legal documents to sign. You ever think of trying flowers?”

He frowned, already pulling out his pen. “I can add that in if⁠— “

I reached across the table and grabbed the pen out of his hand, holding it out of reach. “Just stop for a second.”

He looked at me, genuinely confused. “What?”

“Put the contract away. Just for a minute.” I kept the pen hostage, watching him. “Can we just talk? Like normal people? Before we dive into the legal logistics of our accidental marriage?”

The guy looked like I just stole his ball. He was genuinely thrown. I couldn’t decide if it was cute or terrifying. But he was my husband—for better or worse.

15

BRIGGS

Ilooked up at her, ready to argue that I needed my pen back, but the expression on her face stopped me cold. She wasn’t amused. She was looking at me like I was some kind of kid with an annoying toy that she was keeping from me. It was the expression on her face that kept me from snatching it from her hand. She was exasperated. Frustrated. With me. Like I hurt her feelings with my business talk.

But it was a business meeting.

“Talk?” I repeated. “About what?”

“Talk like people talk,” she said. “Does there have to be an agenda?”

“Yes.”

“No.”

Briggs shrugged. “Look, you told me to figure this out. So I did.”

“And I appreciate that, but I would like to have a conversation with you that doesn’t involve me signing my name to a legal document. I’ve known you four days and there have been two documents. Now three. That’s a lot.”

“Two.”

“No, we signed a marriage license. Three.”

She was right. My God. How many times was I going to be saying my wife was right over the next few months.

“Look,” I said, folding my hands on the table since I had nothing else to do with them. “I know I can get a little obsessed with the legal details.”

“A little?” She raised an eyebrow, still clutching my pen.

“Fine. A lot. But there’s a reason for that.” I paused, not sure why I was about to tell her this. I never told anyone this story. “When I first started working as one of Blackwell Couture’s attorneys, I missed a detail on a contract. Small thing, really. A clause about international distribution rights that I thought was standard boilerplate.”

“What happened?”

“It ended up costing the company three million dollars in legal fees and lost revenue.” The memory still made my chest tight. “My dad never said anything about it. Never blamed me. But I knew. I fucked up, and it cost my family money they shouldn’t have had to spend.”