Page 23 of Billionaire In Vegas

Hank laughed. “He owns the whole floor. His is the only place here. Go ahead and knock, I’m pretty sure he’s in.”

I thanked Hank and made my way to Jude’s door. I didn’t know what I was going to say, but I hoped Jude wouldn’t close the door in my face once he saw me. I’d been mean and nasty, and I was ashamed of how I had reacted.

It wasn’t his fault I’d got drunk. It wasn’t his fault that we’d got married. None of it was 100% his fault. I just hated that I’d let myself lose control to the point where I made the biggest mistake of my life.

I mustered up some courage and knocked lightly on Jude’s door as if I actually didn’t want him to answer. I waited for a second and then raised my hand to knock again, when Jude pulled the door open.

He didn’t look happy to see me.

“What can I do for you, Lacey?” His words were friendly enough, polite obviously, but his face was unsmiling. He didn’t look like his normal gregarious, anything-goes self. He looked serious, no nonsense. I wasn’t used to this version of Jude.

Softly I said, “Can we talk?”

“Talk? I thought we didn’t have anything to talk about.”

“I was wrong,” I said with a shrug.

He didn’t respond. He stepped back, and with a sweeping arm gesture invited me in. Reluctantly I crossed the threshold, secretly afraid that once I stepped in I’d see hints of our indiscretion.

Bits and pieces of last night were coming back to me and I avoided looking at his coffee table where our indiscretion had started. And I equally avoided looking towards the bedroom door where our indiscretion had ended.

I avoided his eyes and looked anywhere else. My gaze settled on a pile of clothes I realized were mine. He saw me looking and said something about dropping them off downstairs with Renee for me.

His tone was nonchalant, but I knew he was making idle chitchat. He clearly didn’t want to have this conversation either, so I cut to the chase.

“What are we going to do?”

Jude took his time answering as he moved to his couch and sat down. He crossed one ankle over the other and folded his arms behind his head. The position emphasized his muscular arms which I remembered the feel of, and his long legs stretched out in front of him made me remember the feel of his strong thighs under mine as I rode him last night.

I didn’t like the direction of my thoughts and apparently, I’d spent too long staring at Jude, speechless. He easily figured out where my thoughts had gone, saying, “Your memory’s coming back now, huh?”

It seemed pointless to play coy and I just answered honestly. “Unfortunately.”

He laughed, that playful expression that I remembered all too well back in his eyes. I didn’t want to admit I was glad to see him smile. I missed his smile.

“I know I was drunk, but I wasn’t that bad, was I?”

“I’m not here to stroke your ego.”

“Are you here to stroke something else?”

I rolled my eyes. “Can you be serious for one moment?”

“Yeah, but that moment passed. Come sit down. I don’t bite... Mrs. Foster.” He gestured for me to sit down next to him and instead I sat in the accent chair across from him.

“About this Mrs. Foster thing, how soon can we get an annulment?”

He laughed bitterly. “You want the bad news or the good news first?”

Impatiently, I said, “Just spit it out.”

He nodded and folded his hands together and leaned forward. He put his face in his hands and rubbed hard, as if trying to build up to say something he’d regret.

“Come on, Jude. You’re killing me here.”

“So I called my dad’s lawyer. And apparently, the guy can’t keep his mouth shut.”

“What? What happened?” I didn’t understand what he was talking about.