Page 32 of Ridin’ Dirty

Maybe he was right. Maybe this was the best option. I honestly didn’t know, and I was too tired and confused to sort it all out. There was only one thing I could be sure of—this was my escape hatch. Not merely from the room, but from underneath the burden of the truth.

As his wife, he was offering me a place to hide. Even if it was insane, he wasn’t giving me any other choice. And if I was honest, there were worse options than getting married to a man who looked like him.

‘Now, you’re mine.’

It was stupid. It was so totally stupid—but all night, it wasn’t him I was afraid of. It was whatever would come next that freaked me out. Now that I understood what next looked like, I wasn’t so much scared of the future as much as I was rattled by my willingness to follow him blindly into it.

And I was willing.

Not only that, it wasn’t all about self-preservation.

There was a small part of me that wanted his statement to be true.

Before last night, Pistol had been invading my thoughts for days.

I wanted him. I longed for him.

He killed a King, but he didn’t kill my inner vixen.

Now, the man in front of me—scary, tatted, hot, and rough around the edges—was claiming me as his. All I had to do was agree.

I didn’t see this coming, and it was insane, but I couldn’t see any way around it.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

Without giving it another thought, I grabbed the paper sack with my breakfast and followed after him. We were halfway down the hall when I told him, “I hope you don’t think I’m getting married in yesterday’s clothes.”

He glanced over at me with a frown. “You look fine.”

I stopped dead in my tracks, my hunger and exhaustion getting the better of me again as I blurted, “I get that you’ve been busy, but I can’t possibly have to remind you that you’ve had me locked in that room all night. My teeth aren’t brushed, my hair’s not washed, and I’m in yesterday’s clothes. I don’t care if it’s a courthouse and not a cathedral—if you want a blushing bride and not a bitchy one, a bagel sandwich won’t cut it. The least you could do is buy me a dress for this impromptu elopement.”

He stared at me silently for a beat. “You’re joking,” he said flatly.

I wasn’t.

The more I thought about it, the more attached I became to the idea. I could use a few more minutes to wrap my head around the insanity of what we were about to do.

“Not even a little bit,” I told him matter-of-factly.

His scowl deepened. “Courthouse closes at five.”

“Not a problem,” I assured him as I continued toward the exit. Slipping by him, I said, “Take me to the mall. We’ll be in and out in an hour. Ninety minutes, tops.”

I heard him sigh as I passed, and there was something in the sound that told me I was going to get what I wanted. For the first time since I walked out of Viv’s, I almost smiled.

“Hour. You have one hour,” he grumbled.

He stood impatiently with his shoulder propped against the wall in the narrow hallway, each side of the back corridor lined with closed dressing room doors. The overhead music was poppy and annoying—all of it mind-numbingly repetitive. Sliding his phone out of his pocket, Pistol checked the time.

Eleven thirty-seven.

Fifty-six minutes.

He was dog tired and bored out of his mind. Lyla was running out of time. He’d entertained her for long enough—a concession he made on account of she put up less of a fight than he anticipated. But he was done.

Seeing as it was not even noon on a Monday, the mall was far from crowded; but they had been to four different stores, and she spent no less than two-hundred dollars of his money. He was still walking around with their rings in his pocket, and somehow he found himself swiping his credit card for her like he’d been doing it for years.

Another minute ticked by, and his good humor dried up completely.