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I grab a towel and dry off, wrapping it around my waist and heading out into my room. I stop immediately when I see Zoey sitting on the edge of my bed, with wet hair and her white robe again. Her eyes are red, and her cheeks are flushed as she stares at a spot on the wooden floor.
“Zo, are you okay?” I ask, my feet carrying me to her before I can deny myself.
When her head lifts, she looks so broken, so sad and disappointed; the complete opposite of how she’s been for the last few days. She’s so full of wild, untameable energy that seeing her like this has my chest cracking wide open. I suddenly have the urge to scoop her up and go full alpha male on her, protecting her from whatever has her feeling like this. Then it hits me. She looks like this because of me and what we did last night. My chest inflates and deflates with a sigh as I sit next to her. “Please look at me,” I beg.
When she does, I take in the solemn expression painted on her beautiful face as she starts speaking. “I’m so sorry I dragged you into this. I-I don’t exactly remember what happened, but I’m almost certain it would’ve been my idea. My whole life I’ve been the black sheep of my family and they’re constantly waiting for me to fuck up. This though…” Her icy blue eyes lock onto mine, the redness around them making them appear even more blue than normal. “I’m so fucking sorry, Harrison.”
She falls into my shoulder sobbing, and that possessive need to protect her roars in my chest again. “Listen, Zo. I’m a grown up, I own everything I do. This is not your fault,” I say firmly, but her sobs don’t let up. Before I know what I’m doing, my hands are hauling her onto my lap so I can cradle her against my chest properly. I run my hands through her wet platinum hair, making shushing noises until she finally calms down. “It’s okay, sweetheart. I’ve got you,” I whisper, as I press my lips to her forehead.
Minutes feel like an hour as we sit, Zoey pressed against my chest. I feel her breathing settle and her heart stop thrashing, and in this moment, I know if she asked me to stay here with her all day, I would do it without question. When she eventually lifts her head, her eyes look tired and missing the brightness she possesses. “Thank you for being here. Most men would’ve run straight to the courthouse to get this shit annulled.”
I take a breath, ready to tell her what I remembered in the shower. “I don’t think we actually got married.”
Her eyes widen. “You what?” She shifts off my lap to stand in front of me, the white robe swamping her tiny frame. “Do you remember everything?”
I run my fingers through my damp hair. “Not everything. But I remember being outside the chapel with Elvis taking pictures. Go get your phone.”
Zoey high tails it to her room and is back in a millisecond. Opening her phone, she throws her hand over her mouth and watches the video of us pretending to get married with fake Elvis on the street, complete with Elvis yelling, ‘You may now kiss your fake bride’ and us yelling, ‘Happy fake wedding day’.
“We didn’t get married.” The deflation in her shoulders tells me she might cry again, so I grab her hands and pull her into my chest.
“Hey, that’s a good thing. You’re not stuck with an old mountain man for a husband,” I laugh lightly.
“And you’re not stuck with all my chaos.”
“I don’t know. I like the chaos,” I admit, softly running my hands up and down her back.
“Honey, you haven’t seen the half of it yet.” She lifts her head and smiles at me. It’s sad and happy and everything in between. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Not being an arsehole about all this.”
Instinctively, I move my lips to the top of her head and kiss lightly. “We’re good. I mean, I have a dent in my bank account from the rings, so at some point we were stupid enough to do that part, but we’re still very much single,” I say before pulling back.
She sniffs, wiping her eyes again, and takes a deep breath. “Thank God we didn’t become one of those cliché couples that get drunk married in Vegas.”
Right.
Right?
Chapter 15
Harrison
Asthedaywenton yesterday, more and more of the evening came back to both of us. We would have done the real thing had we not been so blind drunk. The others apparently found us laughing and joking with Elvis at some point and so far, no one has commented on the fact we were wearing rings. It feels like the twilight zone, but what I can’t work out is how I feel about all this. My brain is soup.
“Morning.” Her soft, raspy voice filters into my room as she stands, leaning against the open doorway.
“Morning. Did you sleep well?”
“I did.” There’s a pause in her voice, trepidation that isn’t usually there.
“Zoey—”
“I wanted to give you this back. I know it cost the same amount as a small country, so…”
I snap my full attention to her as soon as the words leave her mouth and register in my brain. She holds the ring out for me to take from her as I stand from my bed and stride over to her, I feel a pang of something in my chest. “You don’t have to.”
