Page 7

CHAPTER 7

I t took two days to get an appointment with her cousin. During that time, Justine could only hope Lila had stopped cackling evilly at her expense.

The rotten bitch found the whole situation hilarious—even more so than the time when Justine was seven and Lila tossed her into a clothes hamper, sat on the lid, and made her sing the SpongeBob theme song until she nearly lost her voice. Their mothers had blown the whole incident off because apparently, that’s the kind of crap they’d done to each other growing up.

Which was why Justine had never minded being an only child. If her cousin treated her like that, what the hell would a sister do to her?

But while Lila had been hell on wheels as a kid, she grew into a fiercely loyal teenager who Justine adored. When Sammy Walford put gum in her hair and she had to get an unfortunate pixie cut she did not have the cheekbones to pull off, Lila had stolen Sammy’s clothes in the locker room during gym class. Good old Sammy had been forced to walk to his car wearing nothing but a clear plastic shower curtain around his waist. Lila had made sure the girls’ lacrosse team was there to witness his walk of shame.

And there was a lot of shame because Sammy either had a micro-penis, or he was a grower, not a show-er. That fucker couldn’t get a date for the entirety of his senior year.

These days, Lila put her big, evil brain to good use in divorce court. If you were a woman about to get screwed over in settlement talks, Lila swooped in like an avenging angel in an Alexander McQueen suit to save the day. She was revered—and feared—for the courtroom goddess she was all over the state.

It almost felt like a waste of her skill to talk about an annulment. But Lila had offered her services for free, so Justine could hardly say no.

Sitting on the buttery-soft leather loveseat in Lila’s lush corner office, in front of a mahogany desk that probably cost more than her first year of veterinary school, Justine glanced over at her husband, who sat next to her while they waited for Lila to show up. She wanted to make a joke to lighten the mood.

But what could she say when she had no idea why the mood needed to be lightened? Khill looked like he was waiting for a colonoscopy. That was going to be performed sans anesthesia. On a speeding city bus full of tourists snapping pictures. Through a construction zone.

“Are you OK?” she asked, wondering if one of the burritos he’d scarfed at lunch had turned on him. “You seem…tense.”

As if to prove her point, a muscle in his jaw jumped. “I’m fine.”

“You don’t sound fine. You sound like?—”

Whatever she’d been planning to say was drowned out by the sound of Lila breezing into the office, leaving a trail of Tom Ford Rose Prick Eau De Parfum in her wake.

With a bone-deep sigh narrating her movements, she dumped her briefcase on her desk, tossed her thick auburn hair over her shoulder, and dropped into her office chair. It wasn’t until her eyes fell on Justine, then shifted to Khill, that she finally broke her silence.

By laughing. Loudly. Until she snorted.

Justine wished she could see the humor in this scenario, too. She could use a good laugh as much as the next girl. But since the laughter was at her expense, she held her tongue and just slow blinked at her cousin until the unsympathetic bitch’s belly laughs died down to an occasional guffaw.

Lila wiped at her tear-filled eyes with the back of one well-manicured hand. “Oh, this just makes my day. I swear to Jesus, I thought you were kidding. But you really did it, didn’t you? You drunk married a hot orc in Vegas. I didn’t think you had it in you, cuz.” She slow clapped a few times. “Well done.”

Khill crossed his arms over his chest and glanced over at Justine, one brow raised. “You told her I was hot?”

Fuck. Me. Sideways .

Justine pinched the bridge of her nose in consternation and ignored the question. Mostly because, yes, she had told her big-mouthed cousin that Khill was hot. Absurdly hot. Supernaturally hot. So hot her panties were never totally dry in his presence. But she wasn’t dumb enough to tell him that. “Can we cut to the part of this meeting where you tell us what we have to do to get an annulment?”

Lila blew a raspberry at her. “Oh, boo. I should’ve known you’d suck all the fun out of this situation.” She stabbed an index finger at her. “But at Christmas dinner, when everyone is telling me how I need to settle down and have kids, I’m telling them at least I didn’t drunkenly marry a hot orc in Vegas.”

“Fine,” she said with an eye roll. Like she hadn’t expected that . Besides, she kind of deserved it. She had done an insanely impulsive thing.

Lila leaned forward in her seat and clasped her hands in front of her as she turned her shrewd gaze on Khill. “So, handsome, I have many, many questions for you. But I’ll just start with the obvious so that Justine doesn’t have an aneurysm while we sit here.”

He narrowed his eyes on her. “Shoot.”

“Do you want this annulment?”

Justine expected him to give his enthusiastic consent. They’d discussed this and agreed, after all. Anyone who’d drunk married someone in Vegas would want an annulment…right?

So, imagine her surprise when he did not give his enthusiastic consent. Instead, he shifted his eyes to Justine and muttered, “I want…what Justine wants.”

Justine’s jaw dropped. This was the second time he’d insinuated that maybe he didn’t want this annulment. She’d been sure he was making a little joke when he said he could do worse than her. But she couldn’t ask for clarification now. Not in front of Lila, and not when she wasn’t even sure how she felt about his reluctance to annul their giant drunken mistake.

Lila, however, had no such compunction. “That’s not a yes, pal. Before I waste my time on paperwork, I’m going to need consent from both of you. So, I’ll ask again. Do you want this annulment, Khill?”

And still he didn’t answer. Justine sputtered, “Of course he does.” She turned fully in her seat to face him. “Right?”

A muscle in his jaw jumped. “If that’s what you want, then yes.”

Lila’s eyes bounced between them like she was watching a tennis match. “Jussie? You want the annulment, right?”

Some part of her somewhere deep inside wanted to scream no. Khill was an amazing guy. He was hot, kind, great with dogs, hardworking, smart, and every other thing she could ever want in a husband. But the way they got married was just…wrong. If she ever got lucky enough to actually marry Khill, she wanted to do it right. Or sober, at the very least. “Yes, I want the annulment.”

The longest silence in the history of long silences followed. Not a sound could be heard—not a heartbeat, not a breath, nothing. Until Lila cleared her throat and muttered, “Close enough, I guess. OK, so here’s what’s going to happen. I’m going to file a petition and a summons with the court for an annulment on the grounds that both of you were unable to consent to the marriage. Namely, because you were drunk off your asses, but I’ll phrase it as ‘mental incapacity’.”

Justine frowned at her. “You’re enjoying this a little bit too much.”

Lila nodded. “Fair. Then, we’ll get a court date. When we show up, the judge signs off and grants the annulment. Bada bing, bada boom, you’re all done with each other.”

Why the idea of being bada-bing-bada-boom done with Khill felt like her heart was being curb stomped, she had no idea. “Great,” she said with absolutely zero enthusiasm.

Khill merely grunted.

Justine was suddenly not liking her odds of coming out of this marriage/annulment without someone getting hurt.

Especially not her.