God, her head hurt. Too much wine. Nothing got her toasted quite like wine did. Smacking her dry mouth, Kylie pulled the pillow over her head.
Something on her hand caught on the pillowcase at the same time a warm arm wrapped around her waist.
And slowly, these things didn’t add up. Through the pulsing of her head, Kylie forced herself to roll over in bed, which was harder than she’d anticipated.
It put her nose to nose with a sleeping Cade Archer.
Kylie jerked backward in shock. Oh, shit. Shit, shit shit.
Cade kept sleeping, though. He apparently was a heavy sleeper. Thank God for some things. He was also gorgeous, his full mouth slightly slack, tanned skin—tanned naked skin—peeking out from under the white sheets. While sleeping, she got a great view of his sinfully long blond lashes and the perfection of his nose. What on earth was he doing with a girl like her?
Then again, what was she doing in bed with a guy she was supposed to be avoiding? She carefully slid off the side of the mattress, tugging a sheet around her. She was naked. Oh, sweet Jesus, this was what she got for not wanting to waste a five hundred dollar bottle of wine. She should have sipped one glass, said thank you, and left it at that. Instead, she had vague memories of licking melted chocolate off of Cade’s fingers, staggering back to the limo drunk, and . . .
All right, she was pretty much a foggy blank after that. A big, slutty, foggy blank.
Seriously, though, had she walked under a ladder recently? Broken a mirror? Why on earth was she so damn unlucky? She padded to the bathroom. Maybe it wasn’t so bad, she told herself. Maybe they both got really damn drunk and naked, but no one had sex. Sure, that was entirely plausible . . . if you were twelve. Still, she clung to the hope, heading into the bathroom.
When she got there, though, the hickeys on her skin told a different tale. Kylie put a hand between her legs and groaned. Damp and sore. Definitely not the trademarks of someone that hadn’t had sex. There was a bruise on one of her breasts, too, and she reached up to touch it, wincing . . .
And noticed the huge honking ring on her hand.
She nearly passed out at the sight of it.
Dear sweet lord, what the hell was that?
Kylie stared at her hand. Just stared. There was a huge double-ring on her ring finger, big enough to cover her entire knuckle. The stone was a bright red square surrounded by dozens of tiny sparkly yellow stones that she sincerely hoped were fakes. The band was silvery with more of the yellow stones, etched designs swirling over the thick band. It looked . . . really expensive and not fake.
Oh God. Oh God. Her breathing sped up.
Bad enough that she’d slept with Cade again after vowing to leave him alone. Bad enough that she’d apparently gotten drunk and climbed him like a tree despite knowing that he was putting her job in jeopardy.
But seriously—how fucking drunk was she that she’d married him?
Clutching the sheet close to her body, she headed back out to the bedroom, noticing for first time that this wasn’t her hotel room. It was too big, too opulent. Where was she? She ran to the nightstand and read the label on the phone—the Belaggio. Okay. Okay. Okay. The clock read eleven thirty, so she had time to get back to her own hotel, check out, and head to work as if nothing had happened. She just needed a shower, something to cure her pounding headache, and to get rid of the ring and the husband she’d magically acquired overnight in a drunken bender.
First things first, she told herself, and tried to pull off the ring.
It wouldn’t come off.
Horrified, Kylie twisted at the enormous rock, trying to drag the band over her knuckle. It didn’t move. How had she gotten this thing on? Frantic, she pulled at it for a moment more, then ran to the restroom and squirted hand soap all over it, rubbing wildly. As she did, she noticed a dent in the back of the ring—the soft metal had hit something last night, and that was why it wasn’t coming off. A jeweler might be able to snip it, but no amount of twisting and silent praying on Kylie’s behalf budged the damn thing. Now, with all the attacking she’d been doing to her hand, the skin was red and chafed and beginning to swell. There was no shot in hell of getting the bands off now.
A sob broke from her throat, and she rushed back to the hotel room. “Cade! Wake up!”
He bolted awake, his soft blond curls sticking straight up. The sheets fell to his waist, revealing a chest covered in scratches and hickeys of his own. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“This,” she cried out, holding up her hand with the huge ring. “This is what’s wrong! Did we get married last night?”
Cade scrubbed a hand over his eyes wearily. “You don’t remember? Really?”