Perhaps realizing how out of character she sounded, she backed off a little. “All I’m saying is to go to Vegas. Then figure out the rest when you get there.”
“It’s a really good plan,” Ben added. “I’d certainly feel better if you were out of town right now.”
“How is it any different than you being here?” My tone was harsher than I’d intended, but not harsher than I’d meant.
“It’s way different,” Ben said. “Dad doesn’t know I’m here. He doesn’t know where to find me. He doesn’t care to find me. And I’m not the one who he’s already asked to do something for him. Plus I have Eric to protect me.” Both men laughed at that like there may have been an inside joke.
Or maybe they were just that happy together.
And Norma had Boyd.
“You’re thinking about it.” Ben winked. “You’re just as easy to read as you always were.”
I rolled my eyes. “But you just got here. I can’t leave when we haven’t had time to catch up.”
“I’m going to live here, drama queen. We’ll see each other All. The. Time. Besides, Eric and I don’t have time for you. We have to see a million places and decide where to live by Sunday when we leave. You’d be in the way.”
I was too exhausted to make any more excuses. Ben was right—I’d see him later. I’d also feel better away from my father while he was on the loose. It was a good idea, really.
And I did want to be with JC. I didn’t want to marry him, but I wanted things to work out. I needed him to know that I wasn’t going to get scared off by whatever trouble he was in.
I picked up Norma’s phone sitting in front of her and looked at the time on the screen. It was a quarter to twelve. The bubble of excitement that had started to form fizzled and popped. “There’s no way I can make the flight.”
Norma shrugged. “Book the next available. Use my credit card. Do you know where he’s staying?”
“Yes.”
“Good.” She looked over at the man who’d driven me there. “You know the man who drove you here?”
“The Tom Selleck wannabe?” I asked.
Ben hit the table with his palm. “That’s who he looks like.”
She couldn’t help but crack a smile at that. “His name is Reynold. He’s one of Hudson’s staff bodyguards. He loaned him to me for the day. He’ll see you home and stay outside the door and then he’ll drive you to the airport.”
“He’ll sit outside the door?” I’d figured he was security, but I’d thought he’d be more undercover. “He already looks like Magnum P.I. Isn’t that a bit obvious?”
“I’m not trying to be discreet,” she said, frustration underlying her words. “I want Dad or any of his friends to know that you are being watched.”
“Okay, okay.” Honestly, I was tired. I should have simply said okay from the beginning.
Another sudden wave of emotion crashed over me. This particular wave was filled primarily with gratitude.
I reached for Norma’s hand with one of mine and one of Ben’s with my other. “Thank you, guys. You especially, Sissy. For everything.”
Norma put her other hand on top of mine. “I love you, Gwen. There isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for you.” Her delivery was so matter-of-fact. So plain as day that I had no choice but to truly believe it.
She pulled away first, and I knew it was with the sweetest affection that she said, “Now get the hell home and pack.”
***
The soonest available flight I found to Las Vegas was a red-eye that didn’t leave until midnight. The wait didn’t bother me much. It gave me time to do what I needed and let my emotions settle a bit. I booked the ticket and packed a bag then called Norma with the details of my plans.
“Good. Do you want to tell Reynold or should I call him?”
Since I wanted to pretend that I had no reason to need a bodyguard, I asked her to call him. “What about you, Sis? I don’t want you alone here.”
“I’m going to go straight to the boy’s after work.” She’d taken to calling him “the boy” on our phone calls, in case anyone ever overheard her. “So I won’t see you. Have a good trip. Enjoy yourself and call me when you get there, okay?”
“Got it. Love you. Be safe.”
We hung up and I called Matt. He didn’t answer, and I had to leave him a voicemail telling him I’d be out for at least the next week. I felt a little like an asshole, running away and all. But all I had to do was think of my father with his cocky grin and his upraised hand, and I didn’t care anymore if I was running away. It was survival. This was what I needed to do in order to not break down.
As much as I had on my mind, I still was able to get a few hours of a nap in. When I woke up, it was time to go.
By the time I landed in Vegas, I’d managed to put the reason I was running away from New York completely out of my mind. Now that the trip was all about meeting up with JC, I started to get excited. Really excited.
And anxious.
He wouldn’t mind if I surprised him like this, would he? It was certainly the most spontaneous thing I’d ever done. It made me feel a little crazy. Crazier was that, at some point on the flight, I’d actually begun contemplating his proposal. Why shouldn’t we get married? What could be the worst thing that happened?
I still wasn’t convinced, but I’d open the door for it to be an option. Like Norma said, I’d get there and then I’d see what happened. It was enough of a possibility, though, that my stomach remained in a constant flutter long after the descent into McCarren.
I was so abuzz with nervousness and anticipation, in fact, that I didn’t realize the major flaw in my plan until I walked through the doors of the Trump Hotel and stood in the lobby—I didn’t know what room he was in. And I couldn’t ask the front desk since I still didn’t know his actual fucking name.
Fighting the distinct urge to crumple to the floor and have an epic cry, I forced myself to think of solutions before giving up entirely. There were only two elevators. I could sit by them and wait until he came down. Which could take days. I let out a heavy breath of frustrated air.
Then I remembered the name he’d booked his flight under.
It was worth a try.
With as much confidence as I could muster, I approached the desk. “Hi, would you happen to have an Alex Mader staying in the hotel?” I wasn’t sure the hotel would legally be able to disclose room numbers for registered guests. If that was even the name he’d booked under.
I got hopeful when the desk clerk responded by typing some things into his computer. After a minute of studying his screen, he asked, “Are you Gwen?”
My heart pounded so loudly, I was sure he could hear it. “Yes, I am.”
“If you can just show me your ID, Mrs. Mader, I can get you a key to your room.”
Mrs. Mader. JC had said he booked the room already before he left New York. He’d been hopeful. I tried not to let that mess with my head too much as I pulled out my card and handed it to the desk clerk. “It, uh, still shows my maiden name. Does that work?” I fought the shiver that threatened to run down my back. It was too easy to enjoy this. Too easy to believe that I was actually on my way to becoming Mrs. Mader.
Or Mrs. Whatever-JC’s-Real-Last-Name-Was.
“This should be fine.” The clerk scanned the ID then gave me a keycard. “Room four-seventeen.”
That was it. I had the key. I had the room number. I was doing this.
The only other time I’d been in Vegas was for a birthday weekend with Norma when she’d turned thirty. We’d stayed at the Venetian, a huge sprawling hotel that could practically call itself a city. The Trump Hotel was nothing like that. It was small and classy. There wasn’t even any gambling, which was probably exactly why it was small and classy. While most of Sin City had turned me off on my other visit, I liked this.
What I didn’t like was how fast I made it to the fourth floor. I’d barely had time to gather myself, and here I was about to see JC. A string of I shoul
d have’s made their presence in my mind and stalled me for a few minutes after the elevator doors shut behind me. I should have waited to get here until a decent hour of the day. I should have stopped in the lobby restroom to make sure my hair looked okay. I should have worn sexy lingerie underneath these sweats. I should definitely not have worn sweats at all.
What the hell had I been thinking?
But sweats or not, messy hair or not, I was eager to see JC. It felt like a week had passed since we’d parted instead of eighteen hours, and I all of a sudden couldn’t stand for it to be a minute longer.
With renewed excitement, I followed the signs to room four-seventeen.
I hesitated again at the door. Sure, I had a key, but I didn’t want to just walk in unexpected. It would give me a heart attack if someone did that to me. I decided to knock.
It was only seconds before I heard movement and the lock being turned. He hadn’t been sleeping then. Had he been missing me? Did he think it would be me waiting on the other side of the door?
When it opened, though, it wasn’t JC standing there. I was met by an older woman—well, older than me, anyway. Forties, if I had to guess. She had strawberry blonde hair and too much makeup and wore nothing but a T-shirt and panties.
I started to panic and then realized I must not have heard right when the clerk gave me the room number. “I’m so sorry for disturbing you,” I said. “I have the wrong room.”
The woman smiled like it was no big deal. “Who are you looking for?”
“JC.” Maybe I should have said Alex Mader. I was so confused.
“Oh no, sweetie. You got the right place. He’s here.”
“He is?” I was even more confused now. And panicked. It was rude and out of place seeing how it was her room and all, but she was wearing no pants and was supposedly in a hotel room with the man who’d just asked me to marry him not twenty-four hours before—I had to know. “Can I ask, who are you?”
She didn’t seem in the least offended. In fact, she brightened. As if answering the door to a strange woman at four in the morning and being interrogated was completely normal.
“I’m Tamara,” she said. “I’m his wife.”
Chapter Nineteen
The hall tilted. Blood whooshed past my ears, and my toes and fingers instantly went numb. And my chest—it sunk, like an elevator out of control, plummeting to the ground level, ready to crash.
But it was late—or early—and I was tired from traveling and feeling feelings. It was possible I misunderstood or the chick in front of me misunderstood or that somebody somewhere misunderstood.
Then I saw him—behind her, his hair tousled, his chest and feet bare. Somehow seeing him like that, half-dressed and intimate, was worse than simply hearing that the goddamn motherfucker was married. Because, number one—it seemed to prove that he actually was married. Number two—it suggested he’d probably been fucking her earlier that very night while I was rushing to be with him.
And, number three—oh-my-god-I’d-fallen-in-love-with-someone-who-was-fucking-married!
When he realized who I was, his eyes popped open and his face paled. “Gwen!”
I delivered the most scathing glare I could muster and still didn’t begin to scratch the surface of what I wanted him to understand from me. “You’re a fucking asshole.”
Then, since I didn’t know how to actually express any more than that, I spun and headed back toward the elevator, dragging my suitcase behind me.
Fuming. I was fuming and raging and red. I was red. All sorts of red. I wanted to scream and yell and hit and throw things. I hated that I felt so violent. So red.
And somewhere under all of that red, there was blue. But I wanted to get out of there before it showed itself with something as weak as tears or blubbering.
“No, no, no, no!” JC must have pushed past his wife—his goddamn fucking wife—because he was instantly at my side. “That isn’t what it looks like.”
“Yep. That’s what they say.” My words were tight, clipped. Red.
“Hold on. I’ll explain.” He jogged to get ahead of me then walked backward as he begged me to stop. “Please, you have to let me explain. Don’t just leave. I can explain.”
I wanted to keep walking. My internal tracking system had locked on the elevators, had locked on escape. It was survival instinct. But I was a reasonable person, a person who relied on more than instincts. I had to give him a chance to clear things up.
God, please let him clear things up!
I stopped, my face hard. My heart, not-so-hard. “Try.”
“Okay. I. She.” He gave an exasperated tug to a lock of hair at the top of his head. “Jesus, I don’t know where to start.”
I folded my arms over my chest. “Start wherever. Just start.”
He rubbed his palms together. “Okay. Okay.”
His difficulty to summarize the situation killed any lingering hope that the whole thing was a misunderstanding. It was only sick curiosity that made me prompt him. “Who’s the woman? Start there.”
His face scrunched up, as though that question was particularly hard for him to answer. I waited for him to confirm what she’d said. Waited for him to say the words, she’s my wife.
Instead, he said, “I don’t know.”
“Yep. Fucking asshole.” I would listen if he talked. More evasive answers were all I ever got from him, and they were not going to be good enough. Not this time. I started to go around him.
He spread his arms out, blocking my way around him. “I mean it. I woke up right before you got there. That’s when I saw her.” He was squinting, I realized, and as he talked he lifted his hand to shield the light coming from the wall sconce. “I went to the bathroom. And I came out. And there you were. I’m sorry, I’m having a hard time gathering my thoughts.”
Gathering your lies, more likely.
Except, now that I was adjusting to the haze of red surrounding me, I could see that his skin looked really funky. Pale. Almost green. When I leaned forward, I saw his eyes were bloodshot. And he smelled weird. Like toothpaste and sour.
And the way he was blocking the light… “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“Nothing.” He shook his head then stopped, seeming to regret it. “I’m. I have a hangover.”
“At four in the fucking morning?” It felt surprisingly amazing to swear while angry. I didn’t have a lot of experience with the emotion. Anger and its blaring red was too much my father’s shade. I avoided it whenever possible, filling my palette with the softer hues of annoyance and irritation.
Today it was not possible. Today was bright red words and bright red volume. “When the fuck did you even start drinking to be hung over at four in the fucking morning?”
“On the plane.” He held up a victorious finger in the air. “That’s what I’m trying to say! Let me go back to then. The airport. I was at the airport and you didn’t come.” He enunciated the last phrase, pointing his finger now at me.
Oh, hell no. “I was dealing with my fucking father! It’s not like you gave me much fucking time in the first place. And I never said I was even coming, so it’s your own damn fault for making fucking assumptions.”
He waved his hand, as if trying to wave away any wrong implication he’d made. “I know, I know. It wasn’t enough time. But it was all I had.”
He laced his hands and put them behind his head. “Look, I’m not blaming you.” He dropped them again to his sides. “I’m telling you what happened. You didn’t come and I got on the plane and I started drinking.”
“But you don’t drink.”
“I was upset. I drink when I’m upset.”
Upset because I hadn’t come. He didn’t come right out and pair the two ideas, but it was understood.
“I was drunk by the time I landed. I remember coming here. Checking in. Then I went to the bar and kept ordering.” He wished he hadn’t. It was all over his face—the regret, the misery.
Regret didn’t fix shit, and frank
ly, I didn’t give a damn if he felt miserable. “And Tamara?”
“Who?”
“Your. Wife?”
He cringed and I wasn’t sure if it was because I’d spoken too loudly for his sensitive ears or because he didn’t like what I’d said. The door next to us opened long enough for a woman in a bathrobe to glare at us then shut again.
JC lowered his voice. “Can we talk about this somewhere else?”
“I’m not going in that room with that woman.”
He let out a small sigh but didn’t try to change my mind. After scanning the hallway, he said, “Over here.” He reached to grab my arm.
I pulled away. “No. Don’t. I can walk on my own.”
He frowned, but again, he accepted it.
I followed him down the hallway and stopped at the vending room. He held the door open and gestured for me to go in. It was more private at least. And dark, the only light coming from the soda machine. And where else were we going to go? JC wasn’t wearing a shirt or shoes, and I certainly wasn’t waiting around for him to get dressed so we could head down to the lobby. I knew that the time I gave him now correlated with how strong my resolve was. Every second that I allowed him weakened my determination.
Leaving my suitcase in the hall, I went in.
He shut the door after him. We stared at each other.
“Well? Tamara?” My voice cracked. Shades of blue slipping in.
“I don’t even remember meeting her.” His tone was frustrated, but I sensed it was with himself more than with me. “The last thing I can clearly remember is sitting at that bar, thinking about you, thinking that if you would have just married me, it would have solved everything.”
The image pinched in my chest.
Then I realized what he was alluding too, and all compassion dissolved. “Are you trying to tell me that you got drunk over me and somehow married someone else?”
He said no words. His expression said it all.
“Jesus fucking Christ. I’m out of here.” Nice plan coming in the room first—now he was in front of the only door out. “Let me through.”
Free Me Page 28
