Page 57 of A Prince of Smoke and Mirrors

“Chrismation.”

“Sorry, man. New vocabulary word for me. Yeah, and then the Russian Orthodox priest married us. And then we said our vows.”

Hope sparked. “There is no exchange of vows ina Russian Orthodoxceremony.”

“Yeah, we added them at the end because I wanted vows. The priest said it was okay.”

Hope died.

I’ve never been an idiot.

I have triedso hardall my lifenotto be an idiot.

Why had I beensuchan idiot? “Oh, God.”

“But I wouldn’t let you sign the license.”

I peeked up at her from where I sat on the floor with my face in my hands. “At least, there’s that.”

She scowled at me, her cute little face crunching up like an angry hamster. “I wouldnottake advantage of someone who was obviously so drunk. Maybe other people would. Seriously, there were other people standing out there while you were proposing who would’ve been completely fine with taking advantage of you, which is why I dragged your drunk butt out of there. ButI would never.”

“And then we came back here?” I looked around, aware that this narrow room with nothing but a bed and a tiny breakfast table wasnotmy suite at the Sanctuary club. “Where the hell are we?”

“You wouldn’t or couldn’t tell me where your hotel room was, so I rented us the cheapest room they had at Caesars Palace. I used a little of that money you put in my hat while I was busking, which I gave back to you. I hope that was all right. We neededsomewhere to crash.” Her voice lowered to an embarrassed mutter. “I didn’t think you’d want to sleep in my car.”

I didn’t like Caesars at all. Just the name gave me revulsion-shivers.

I dropped my hands. “And how did we end up at Caesars Palace?”

“I drove down the Strip while I was heading for the cheaper hotels out in the suburbs. The lights were flashing. You liked the pretty lights. Look, let’s just go to the video. Just stay there. I’ll get your phone.”

My phone was over by the ice bucket and champagne.

Lexi rolled across the bed, a maneuver that would have destroyed my little remaining equilibrium, and then rolled back to drop my phone into my outstretched hands. “Here ya go.”

I had over three hundred new text messages and seventy-seven missed calls.

And yeah, we’d livestreamed the ceremony.

I was so fucked.

Scanning through the texts, some of them were exhortations and begging for me tostop,topick up your fucking phone,toleave that fucking church right now, andJesus Fucking Christ on a cracker do not get married you fucking idiot.

Slightly gratifying to know that my friends gave enough of a shit about me to callen massewhen they saw me livestreaming the stupidest moment of my life.

The others were congratulations and emojis of confetti and champagne bottles.

And several unidentified numbers.

I went to the voice mail transcriptions.

Yes, media. Dammit.

Reporters, royal bloggers, and wealth-oriented influencers. How the hell had they gotten my private number?

Everyone,absolutely everyone,knew.

Before I went to the photo roll, I checked the location services toggle, which I had indeed turned off the night before.