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Two sets of sleep filled eyes blinked back at her. She must have had one hell of a horrible look on her face, because her friends tumbled from bed and rushed over to her like she was cut and bleeding out right there on the hotel floor. Fuck. She felt like she was bleeding out alright.
“What happened?” Mandy asked, clutching at June’s hands.
“Yes, what’s wrong?” Jaz set her small clammy palm on June’s shoulder.
June wished she could explain. She wished that her tongue wasn’t thick and swollen in her mouth or that it didn’t feel nailed down, incapable of any kind of coherent language.
She shook her head and brushed away tears, but they fell anyway. She didn’t even really know why she was crying, and it pissed her off. “We- need- to- to get out of here,” she stammered. “Right. Now.”
CHAPTER 19
Brock
Brock stirred to life slowly, unwilling to relinquish the last comfortable vestiges of sleep. He opened his eyes and reached to the side, expecting to find June there, warm and willing. He had a few good ideas of how he could welcome her into the morning. All of them ended with him inside of her and her screaming his name.
His hand hit cold sheets. Brock’s head whipped to the side. His eyes focused and he realized that she wasn’t there.
He sat up so fast that a rush of blood swam to his head. Black spots danced in front of his eyes and he had to take a deep breath to stop the room from spinning. He glanced around, but the place was silent. Nothing. She wasn’t there.
He tried to reason with himself that she could have gone down to the lobby for something. Ice. A drink. To order breakfast.
His stomach tightened like he’d just swallowed a damn brick. He already knew that wasn’t the case. His head whipped around. He went for his cell to see if she’d called or texted. His hand stopped. The marriage certificate wasn’t where he left it. The night stand was black, modern and sleek, with a glass top. The top was raised up by four silver plugs. He’d tucked the folder in there, but now it was sitting on top of the glass.
Fuck. It wasn’t like he was trying to hide it. He was going to tell June who he was. He should have done it the night before, but he just wasn’t ready. He wanted this weekend, a few days with her just being Brock. Just him and her and nothing else between them. He just wanted to have a good time, to let her decide whether he was someone she could see herself spending more time with in the future. He didn’t want the company looming over his head. The money. He didn’t want June to look at him differently, to treat him differently, to base her decision off of what he could give her and do for her rather than off of who he was.
He didn’t want her to be like everyone else. To see him the way everyone else in his life saw him. He liked that he could remain anonymous. That for the first time in years, he could be just him. He put himself out there, laid himself bare.
And now she probably knew that she’d lied.
He didn’t think she’d look at the certificate. What reason did she have? He hadn’t hidden it away because he wasn’t trying to hide from her. He wasn’t trying to deceive her. He just wanted… a little more time.
“Fuck.” His voice echoed through the empty room. He reached up and scrubbed his hand over his face. His fingers rasped on the stubble along his jawline. By now she was probably back at her hotel room. She’d likely borrowed her friend’s phone and looked him up. She found him easily and she knew. She was either pissed as hell, confused as fuck, or plotting how best to get a massive settlement out of him since he’d been foolish enough to think that a crazy, drunk, shotgun marriage idea could work out.
What the hell was I thinking?
He’d had some dumb ideas in the past. Some revolutionary. Some stupid. It was his ideas that set him apart, that gave him that edge, that made him successful. This idea, whatever he’d been thinking, wasn’t one of his better ones.
Brock palmed his phone. He clicked through his contacts until he found Owen’s number, though he knew what it was. It was eleven. Maybe he still had time to get over to June’s hotel and try and explain to her why he hadn’t told her the truth. She’d asked him straight up the night before. He hadn’t really lied, but he hadn’t been honest either. For obvious reasons, but she wouldn’t understand. He needed to talk her down. Maybe he could still salvage things…
