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“Go ahead,” she challenges. “Take something that wasn’t offered to you. Prove to me what kind of monster you really are.” Well, that’s a mood killer. “Get it over with. Maybe you’ll get me pregnant and we’ll only have to do this once.”
I roll off her, back to my original position.
“Calm down. How can I impregnate a woman I would never willingly fuck? I wouldn’t touch you with your doctors insemination tools. Have a baby with you? Why? So they can have your big ass forehead?”
She frowns at me as she absently rubs her forehead.
“Look, after tomorrow, I’ll be Mrs. Hale - damn, saying that burned my throat a little - and we have to be some sort of team. So how about you shut up and let me rant because you’re literally the only person I can talk to right now. Can we just focus on our dads being gambling assholes?”
Her situation does kind of suck. I can speak to whoever I feel like calling, not that I’d call anyone other than Jagger, even then I boot him off the phone quickly. She has a point about our dads. I’d love to chin check both motherfuckers right now.
“You have five minutes. Real husbands don’t listen either.”
Her growl sounds more like a pur and it’s sexier than I’d like to admit. Silence stretches between us long enough for me to wonder if she’d given up on trying to communicate with me. Later, she takes a breath and begins sharing her thoughts.
“This is a big undertaking. I’m not the kind of girl who had a scrapbook planning the perfect wedding. It’s just one day and - let’s face it - it’s more for the guest than the couple. I did, however, imagine I’d be in love and my groom would love me. Not be some big brute who doesn’t give two shits about my existence, calls me inanimate objects, and pushes me around.”
I smile in the dark. I don’t know why I’m amused, but I am.
“I see what you’re trying to do. Move on or I’ll kick your ass out.”
Karessa rolls onto her side, facing me in the low light. I can feel her studying my profile, trying to get into my head. It will not work. I don’t have space for her in my life, married or not. It will be in name only.
“Have you seen that movie War of the Roses? Do you really want that to be us? Going to war every day?”
“Good point. You should surrender now and save yourself the trouble. I already told you to move on to the rest.”
“And I told you not to interrupt my rant. You gave me five minutes, let me talk,” she rages far gentler than I’m used to. It’s one of the many things I’ve noticed about her. She’s poised and gentle even when she’s trying to be edgy. “I’m just sa
ying,” she continues. “Wouldn’t it be nice to marry someone you knew in and out and not some stranger?”
“I never planned on getting married.”
“Well, I think it’d be nice for my husband to know that cherry blossoms are my favorite flowers…” That explains why she was staring at that ring and necklace last week. “Know what’s my favorite comfort food to offer me when I’m having a bad day, and would want to hold me when I’m down.” I don’t need light to know she’s crying again. I hate how her soft sniffles make my chest contract. When she speaks again, her voice sounds a little broken. “I just knew we’d have a favorite show we’d wait for each other to watch or discover one to binge together. I was looking forward to those moments.”
She’s on her back again, joining me in watching the ceiling.
“I like I said, I didn’t have a scrapbook to plan the perfect wedding,” she repeats. “But, I’d hoped like hell I’d have a good marriage.”
“One minute left,” I tell her, not liking the softness of my voice.
“Out of all things wedding,” she says as if I didn’t speak. “I’d imagined buying half of the lingerie store and happily trying on set after set until I found the perfect one for my wedding night…”
“You could have done that.” Now it’s my turn to shift to my side and look at her profile. “I could give you a wedding night. It just wouldn’t be anything you’re imagining. I’m not in love with you. We wouldn’t make love. We’d fuck, and I’m not gentle.”
“Don’t do me any favors,” her snark makes me grin through the emotions I don’t want to face. She sits up, giving me her back as she swings her legs over the edge of the bed. “I’m not expecting you to provide any solutions. I’m aware you have nothing to give me. I just wanted to rant.”
With that, she practically floats out of my room on her way back to her air mattress in my trophy room. I almost invite her to stay. Almost. It is best that she knows her place with me. I’m not husband material. I won’t fill her head with bullshit I don’t believe. This isn’t a union either of us wanted, so there’s no point blurring the lines.
Chapter 8
Karessa
This is it. There aren’t any last-minute hail Mary’s, or some magical on screen boyfriend to come save me. My dad really made a deal with the devil, sign my name on the dotted line, and banish me to Hell.
Straightening my spine, I drop the contents out of my makeup bag and begin working to make all traces of me crying myself to sleep disappear. It’s weird that I’d felt a little better after five minutes in his bed soaking up his heat. It was a sign that I need a hug.
I push it out of my head. I can’t be splotchy on the millions of photos I’ve subjected myself to during the wedding. I don’t know what I was thinking doing a full traditional wedding. While I’ve created the wedding I want, I don’t have the groom I’d like. He wasn’t there when I woke up. Instead, Jagger - partially dressed in the all black motif I’d picked for the men - smiled gently and empathically and ushered me to his Aston Martin where he burnt off like a bat in hell. I’d briefly wondered if Ainslee gets car sick riding with him.
