Her Accidental Husband

by Mallory, Ashlee

  He laughed. “I earned that.”

  “Glad to see we agree on something.” The sound of music from up ahead began to play, and Payton hurried her steps. He reached out, grabbing her hand so as not to lose her in the burgeoning crowd. It felt nice. It seemed to fit perfectly. She glanced back at him, a knowing glint in her eye, but didn’t slow down, instead cutting through the crowds.

  They reached the stage set up near the gazebo, already teeming with people, some dancing to the music that filled the warm night air. Payton seemed entranced by everything around her, smiling and laughing, throwing her head back. Her enjoyment was infectious, and he couldn’t wipe the stupid grin off his own face. It had to be the tequila.

  At one point, Payton paused and stared up at the night sky. He followed her gaze. “I was just trying to see the stars.”

  He noticed the way the light reflected off her hair, shining, and he wanted to touch it. He found his voice instead. “Going to have to get farther away from the lights to see them.”

  “Yeah, you’re right. It just seemed like everything else was so magical, that I might catch a few.”

  The shuffling of dozens of boots on the stage brought their attention up where Lenny and Bev and the rest were walking across the stage. They hesitated only a moment as the new song came on, before bursting with surprising energy, swinging and clomping around the stage. The crowd was energized as well as they clapped to the beat. Payton looked so young, so free as she clapped along with them, joy and wonder glowing on her face.

  She should always look so free. So happy.

  A woman in bright costume was working her way through the crowds with a tray filled with small cups that people were taking. The local refinery throwing this shindig certainly knew how to celebrate the introduction of a new line.

  Payton was already stretching her hand out for one and he beat her to it, grabbing one for each of them.

  It couldn’t hurt to have one more. Wouldn’t want to waste a perfectly decent shot of tequila.

  Gone was Payton’s initial reluctance to taste the strong liquid as she first sipped and then threw the rest back. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes danced with laughter, her dimples deep and charming. Damn. He was going to need all the self-control he could muster to not kiss her at some point tonight.

  She looked at him, waiting for him to throw his back.

  “Maybe I shouldn’t—”

  “Are you saying that a big, strapping man like you can’t hold his liquor?” She batted those eyelashes, teasing him. “Come on, Cruz. You only live once. Try it.”

  She was incorrigible, but he had to admit, he was having fun. And the scent of the liquor in his cup was enticing. Before he could talk himself out of it, he threw it back, enjoying the flavor, and placed the cup on a passing tray. She grinned in victory.

  Damn. She really was a temptress. A sweet, dimpled, funny temptress.

  It has to be the alcohol. This moment of temporary insanity.

  Of feeling like she belonged with him.

  Their friends finished their dance and another group moved to the stage. Women in vibrant skirts with matching tops twirled around, the color almost became a blur. And then a cowboy followed, showing everyone his dexterity while hopping through a lasso.

  Payton remained mesmerized by it all, occasionally looking up at him and smiling before returning to the activities. Her hand somehow found itself back in his and a wave of possessiveness hit him as he clasped it.

  When the performances were over, the lights around them suddenly burst on, lighting the town-square with white twinkle lights. The musicians up in the gazebo played a faster tempo, and the crowd cheered as everyone spread out and started to dance.

  Another tray with more tequila appeared and Payton grabbed two shots, holding one out to him. “To Kate and Dominic.”

  Well, he couldn’t very well say no to that. And the next one slipped down.

  Caught up in the celebration, he didn’t care anymore about tomorrow, about what was the right thing. He was with the one woman who’d been haunting him since he first met her. A woman who was as complicated as she was beautiful. Who made him laugh. Made him feel things he hadn’t felt before.

  Her hand still in his, he brought her around to face him as his other hand slipped around her waist and he pulled her against him. She was so soft and smelled so sweet and enticing.

  She sucked her breath in, surprised by his actions almost as much as him. Her mouth parted and he didn’t hesitate.

  He brought his lips down to hers, initially just to graze them, to feel their silky touch. But she didn’t hold back, and leaned in, her mouth moving against his. Demanding more, so hot and sweet. In that moment, he forgot they were surrounded by people, laughing and dancing around them. He could shut all that out, believing that they were the only people in the world.

  She melded her body against his like a second skin and a different need grew, one that wanted to see this woman naked under him, welcoming him just as fully and completely.

  He heard familiar voices around them and became aware that they were no longer invisible among the other revelers as the square dancing troupe surrounded them, cheering and smiling at what they saw as a young couple’s antics.

  Payton seemed to realize it, too, as their lips broke contact and her eyes slowly opened. But remained locked with his.

  He held his breath, waiting to hear her reaction. Her gasp and realization that they’d made a mistake. For her to pull away. But she didn’t. Her lips only turned in a smile of what could be described as wonderment.

  “I think we should work on that,” was all she said and he couldn’t help but laugh.

  But he wasn’t ready to let Payton leave his grasp and instead grabbed both hands and swept her out at arms’ length and twirled her back in that familiar dance his mama had made sure he knew. She looked even more surprised. “You dance too?”

  He grinned back. “There’s a lot of things I can do. And one thing you should know about me: I don’t just ‘do’ them. I excel at them.”

  Her hand tightened in his. “I hope that’s a promise.”

  Hell and damn.

  Because it certainly was.

  Chapter Ten

  Bright, blinding light seared into Payton’s eyeballs no matter how tight she squeezed them shut against the unwelcome intrusion.

  Why does my head feel like it’s being smacked against a wall?

  Tentatively, she opened one eye, trying to get her bearings.

  Crap. She felt like she was going to die.

  The sudden twisting in her belly immediately became her most pressing concern as she jerked upright in bed and swung her legs to the floor. She raced to the bathroom, making it just in time.

  Oh. Crap.

  Exactly how much tequila did I drink last night?

  The tiles under her knees were cold and welcoming as she laid her head on her arm, waiting for the next spasm to start.

  Another minute passed, though, and nothing came, but her stomach ached. She breathed slowly, hoping she’d rid the worst of the contents from her belly. What on earth had possessed her to drink so much last night? Even more importantly…

  Why am I completely naked?

  Wait. She was in that hotel room in Tequila. A room she’d shared with—

  An image of a naked torso moving above her, of dark eyes staring into her own as they shared the closest intimacy two people could have.

  Oh. My. Gosh..

  She raised her head. She needed to clear this fog clouding her brain. Because there was no way she’d do something so idiotic just days after breaking it off with her fiancé.

  Although…for some reason, the faintest blurry memory of last night didn’t seem like something to be ashamed of. No, the memory seemed to bring her a feeling not just of obvious pleasure but something more.

  Of happiness. Excitement. Tenderness.

  Coming to her feet, she turned the faucet on and let the water trickle into her hands
before patting some on her face. She scooped the water, ready to bring it to her mouth when she remembered where she was. No, she couldn’t risk getting a parasite. She already felt like she was dying. What she needed was some bottled water. The bottled water from her purse outside the bathroom.

  Was he out there?

  In her rush to get out of bed, Payton hadn’t processed if she was alone in the bed or if someone else had been next to her.

  Sneaking to the bathroom door, something she’d somehow found the will to shut before kissing the porcelain throne, she pulled it open far enough to look out.

  The bed was empty. No. The whole room was empty.

  Maybe it had all been a dream. Something she’d thought about one too many times in her waking hours that took over in her drunken stupor.

  Although it didn’t quite explain her nakedness now.

  Where was he then?

  Grabbing a towel in case he returned, she wrapped herself in it and scurried across the room to grab the water before barricading herself back in the bathroom.

  She turned the bathroom light on and for the first time got a glimpse of herself in the mirror and gasped in horror. Her hair was ratted in the back and fell limply around her green-tinged face. Dark raccoon-like rings appeared around her eyes, a combination of mascara, dehydration, and too little rest.

  Lord. She was a mess.

  What she needed was a shower. A long, hot shower to wash away all the stink and then maybe she’d be able to remember things more clearly.

  And it wouldn’t hurt to look human again.

  She started the water and tested it before climbing in. Her stomach roiled at the steamy moisture, and she turned it down before letting the water sink into her skin and hair. Giving herself the freedom to pick at her memories. To try and remember how she’d landed herself naked in that bed out there.

  The tour of the agave fields and the distillery. That she remembered. A shot of tequila. Dinner down in the cavern beneath the distillery. A second shot of tequila. Candlelight. Conversation. More tequila. Later, dancing with Cruz under the stars. Tequila. The hypnotic gleam in those dark eyes of his, and—

  A kiss.

  A kiss like she’d never had before, one that made her toes curl and her insides turn hot and squishy. A kiss that had made her hunger for more.

  More images started coming to her.

  Of Bev and Lenny and Pat and the rest, smiling and teasing them as they caught their kiss. Another shot as they toasted the happy couple. A late night tour of the old church in the town-square. Of several couples making their vows to God and each other before the crowds and a slightly inebriated priest. Of—

  She froze. No. Not possible.

  But the memory of standing face to face with Cruz, her hands in his as she stared into those dark eyes that promised so much. Seeing him smile, something she’d been determined then and there he would do each and every day as they said the words. Familiar words. Promising loyalty and fidelity. Love. Of promising to take care of each other…

  All the days of their lives.

  She let out a strangled cry and ripped the shower curtain away and stumbled back out of the tub. Trailing water she slipped her way across the floor and into the bedroom where she studied every surface of the room. She stopped as her gaze fell on a piece of paper tossed carelessly on the nightstand.

  Her legs trembled as she walked to the stand, praying it wasn’t true. Her wet fingers lifted the paper and she took a breath before processing the words.

  It was in Spanish, but it wasn’t hard to miss her signature below. And Cruz’s. And a few others.

  Not even able to understand the words on the document, she knew without out a doubt what it said.

  She and Cruz were married. They were husband and wife.

  Cruz busied himself filling two cups with coffee at the hotel lobby. He didn’t know how Payton took her coffee, so he grabbed a handful of sugar and sweeteners and creamers and stuffed them in his pocket.

  She was going to need the sharp hit of caffeine when she remembered everything from the previous night.

  Memories that were still sweeping over him.

  He couldn’t believe he’d done something so foolhardy. So spontaneous. So…stupid. Because how else would you qualify marrying someone you barely knew while both people were heavily intoxicated?

  See. This was exactly why he went with the expected.

  When he awoke this morning, the insides of his skull pounding about, he’d been more than a little stunned to find Payton draped across his chest. It had taken three point four seconds for it all to come back to him.

  The kiss.

  The special moment of watching other couples making that commitment to each other, of feeling so hopeful and excited at the promise of a future with the woman next to him. Of thinking it could be forever.

  The moment she brazenly asked him if he wanted to get up there before God, their new friends, and everyone else who had crowded into the church, and make whatever was happening between them the real deal.

  Forever.

  God help him, in that moment, he was a goner. He’d said yes.

  And then the long night of discovering each other, finalizing their newfound marital bliss. Of her under him, on top of him, of her giving herself to him in every way that he’d been so humbled and proud and filled with such affection he’d lost his breath.

  Still did.

  Only, the future that had seemed so possible for them both, so attainable last night, somehow in the light of day and without the powerful influence of alcohol seemed like a silly fairy tale. Women like Payton didn’t end up with guys like him.

  They ended up with guys like Brad.

  And as soon as Payton woke up and remembered everything, she was going to realize that. Realize the mistake she’d made in asking him to be her husband. Maybe she’d even been teasing him, not expecting he’d say yes. Then again, she was drunk and vulnerable. And he should have said no.

  Any decent guy, no matter how much his head was clouded with his emotions for the woman, would have said no.

  Meaning when he walked into that room, she just might try to kill him.

  He took the stairs up, balancing their coffee in his hands along with some aspirin from the front desk, trying to think of what he was going to say.

  Then he was at their door and there was no putting off the inevitable.

  With the coffees stacked and balanced between his chin and his left hand, he slid the key in and pushed the door open.

  She was awake.

  And standing naked in the middle of the room, a puddle of water spreading around her feet.

  Her eyes lifted from the paper in her hands to meet his, wide and shocked. It was safe to assume she had figured out some of the events of last night.

  “Please tell me that this is a trick? That this document doesn’t say what I think it says.”

  This was going to take some time. And as much as he enjoyed staring at her lovely naked body—a body he’d become quite familiar with over the past few hours—he was going to need to be thinking clearly. He headed to the bathroom and turned off the water she’d left running before grabbing a towel.

  She barely acknowledged his overture, as he tucked it around her. A naked Payton made it hard for him to concentrate. Period.

  “I have coffee. Why don’t you have a seat, and we’ll try and figure this out.”

  “What’s there to figure out?” Her voice was a couple of octaves higher than usual. “Not only did I spend a drunken night in a hotel room in Mexico with a man I barely know, but I decided to pile on the craziness and marry that man too. I’d say with my track record over the past few days, I might be certifiable. How on earth could you let this happen?”

  He sighed and took both coffees and sat down on the bed. He raised one up in her direction. “I seem to recall I wasn’t the one who actually proposed.”

  At that, her eyes shifted to the side and she paused, almost like she was replay
ing a movie in her head. Realization seemed to hit her and she met his gaze again. “But you didn’t have to accept,” she practically screeched.

  He took a sip of his coffee. He couldn’t even respond to that. Mostly because he had been asking himself the same thing.

  “My mother is going to kill me.”

  She began pacing the floor in front of him, one hand on the towel—barely keeping it around her, giving him an enticing reveal of her backside mid-step—the other hand waving the paper about.

  “The one thing she’s made clear to me since I could remember is that she’s been planning the minute details of my wedding since I was born and that under no circumstance was I ever to even consider the possibility of elopement or she’d skin me from head to toe. And I did it. Not only did I go out and marry some guy I barely even know in a Mexican church with the proof in a language I can’t even read, but I did it practically on the eve of my marriage to another man.”

  “After last night, I wouldn’t exactly say you barely know me,” he couldn’t help adding.

  But she didn’t appear to hear him as she stopped and her hand went to her mouth. “I haven’t even officially broken off my engagement with my fiancé. Haven’t canceled the caterers or flowers or church—even though I told my planner to do it I knew that there was no chance she would have the guts to do it without getting my mother’s approval and that she would never get—”

  “Payton,” he said a little louder this time, figuring her monologue had gone on long enough.

  But she paid him no mind, only resumed the pacing again. “My father will be horrified, having to face Dick Eastman, the man he’d been ecstatic to call family…”

  And that was when Cruz heard the other shoe drop.

  He hadn’t even begun to consider the consequences to himself for this little indiscretion. Cruz would guess that hearing the news that the man he’d asked to watch over his future daughter-in-law had gone and married that very woman would probably not sit well with the man. Not when Dick Eastman was under the impression she was still going to marry his son. If Dick found out, Cruz could kiss their business agreement good-bye as well as the hopes he’d had for the company.