Page 4

Wren

“I am not spending the night with you,” I hiss, glaring at Archer as the chartered plane catapults us toward DC. The infuriating man made me sit with him and Micah. He didn’t even ask if that’s where I wanted to sit, either. He simply pointed at the window seat and told me to sit there like I was a little girl who needed to be told what to do.

Micah was too busy arguing with Logan about the overhead bin to hear him. And he didn’t utter a single complaint about Archer sliding into the middle seat beside me, either.

There’s a lot more legroom in the chartered plane than there is on a commercial flight, but I’m trapped on a plane with my overprotective brother and the man I married while drunk in Vegas. Frankly, I might as well be sitting in my own personal sauna in hell.

My only saving grace is the fact that Micah passed out half an hour into the flight. He’s been snoring ever since.

“Yeah, you are.” Archer cocks a brow at me. “Or I can tell Micah what we really did last night.”

“You wouldn’t.” I gape at him, shock lancing through me.

His wicked smirk tells me that he absolutely would. What game is he playing? Why would he risk telling my brother that he married me?

Good Lord. Where’s calm, cool, collected Archer? You know, the rational one? The devil seated beside me is not the same man I’ve known for the last year. This one is…intense. Actually, he’s always been intense. But there’s something downright smoldering hot about his intensity now that he’s decided to unleash it all on me at once.

Would he seriously risk everything just to get me to spend the night with him? Judging by the look on his face…yes. Yes, he would.

“Fine,” I growl, giving in gracelessly. “You win.”

He leans toward me, getting all up in my personal space. And I want to be so damn mad at him, but he smells like sin and feels even better. It’s hard to keep it together when I feel his breath rasping against my ear.

“Don’t pretend you didn’t love waking up with me all over you this morning, little bird,” he growls against my skin. “I still taste your joy on my fucking tongue.”

I whimper softly as a heatwave rolls through me. Archer Graves is a dangerous, dangerous man. He may also be slightly unhinged.

I do not love it.

Maybe if I tell myself that often enough, I’ll actually believe it.

He nips my skin and then settles back in his seat with a triumphant smirk. I scowl at him, which only makes that damn smirk grow.

Why isn’t he freaking out about the fact that we got married last night? Micah is his best friend. He should be losing his shit right now. Actually, he should have been freaking out when we woke up married this morning. But did he? No. He seemed hurt when I brought up divorce. Or pissed.

I narrow my eyes on him, my mind rife with suspicion. “How drunk were you last night, Archer?”

“What?” His brows furrow like he doesn’t understand the question, but I’m not buying what he’s selling. Because he tenses ever so slightly and his smirk slips. I’m not sure if it’s guilt or regret or something that might as well qualify as both, but something flickers in his eyes before he manages to school his expression. “What do you mean?”

It’s a simple enough question, and he’s far from stupid. In fact, he’s one of the most intelligent men I know. He had full ride offers from three different Ivy League colleges before he decided to draft instead. He knows what I’m asking, and he’s trying to buy himself time. Trying to think his way out of a corner.

“How drunk were you?” I ask again, my eyes locked on his face, looking for any little sign that he knew what we were doing last night.

My own memory has holes big enough to drive a Zamboni through.

I remember video poker and the way he kept brushing up against me and whispering in my ear. I remember kissing him on the elevator. I even remember saying yes when he suggested getting married. The only memories after that are kaleidoscope flashes of a wedding chapel and him slipping a ring on my finger. And then there’s nothing. No kiss. No signing the certificate. No getting undressed and crawling into bed with him. My memory is just soup and then a void.

And somehow, even though I should regret it…part of me doesn’t. That’s the part that scares me. It’s the part that worries the hell out of me. I married my brother’s best friend while I was drunk in Vegas, and I don’t entirely regret it.

It was a terrible decision. One that may just rip their team and their friendship apart at the seams. And I’m starting to suspect that Archer knew what he was doing the whole time.

I was wasted.

But was he?

“Drunk enough,” he mutters. A muscle in his cheek ticks as his eyes slide from mine.

“You knew what we were doing, didn’t you?” The truth hits me like a freight train. I stare at him with my mouth hanging open and my mind reeling. Oh my gosh. He knew! I know he did. The truth is written all over his gorgeous, lying face.

Micah hits a particularly loud snore beside him, momentarily capturing his attention. He glances over at my brother and then mutters a curse before turning to face me again.

He leans in close, putting his lips right up against my ear. “Yeah, I fucking knew, little bird,” he rasps against my ear. “If that makes me an asshole in your eyes, I’ll accept it. But it doesn’t change the fact that my wife belongs in my home and in my bed.”

The whole world tilts upside down. Or maybe my place in it does. I don’t know! All I know is that he’s not denying it. He knew what we were doing last night, and he did it anyway. He married me anyway.

“Why?” I ask, the word shaking on my lips.

“Same reason you’d been wanting to kiss me forever,” he mutters.

“I…” I stare at him, rendered speechless. There’s no way this man knows I’m in love with him. He can’t know…right? Hesitation slides through me, sending my heart racing. Sending me spiraling toward a full-on panic attack.

No. He doesn’t know. He can’t know , I tell myself. I’ve been careful. This is something else. He means something else.

Sex!

Yes. That’s it. He means he married me because he wants to fuck me. That’s all this is. He didn’t want to feel guilty about sleeping with his best friend’s sister, so he married me.

I hear the desperation in my own thoughts, but I cling to it like a lifeline. I delude myself because…because it’s the only option. Because the alternative is admitting the truth and watching all hell break loose. It means watching my world crumble.

And believe me, it will crumble. Micah will never forgive us. Their team will be torn down the middle. Archer will lose his best friend. And I’ll lose my brother.

Micah isn’t reasonable. Okay, he is reasonable. He’s sensible and logical and all of that crap too. Most of the time. But he won’t be about this. He never is about me.

I’ve spent most of my life telling him that I’d never date a hockey player. That I didn’t want the chaos that came with this kind of life after living it for so long growing up. And he was always so relieved to hear it because he thinks this sport nearly killed me once.

Maybe I should resent how much of my childhood we spent focused on his passion. From the time I was born, hockey was his whole life. It became mine out of necessity. I never minded, though.

I always loved watching him on the ice. I loved curling up in the stands with a blanket and my jersey and cheering him on. I even loved being cramped in the van with all his equipment while we drove all over the place for games. Some of my happiest memories are in our old van, with our mom singing along to the radio.

And then he drafted when I was ten. Everything changed. I rarely saw him anymore because he was so busy. Our parents were arguing. We never traveled for games anymore. My classmates hated me, and I had no friends. I decided I was going to learn to play. I thought if I got into hockey like he was, it’d make everything go back to normal. Micah would come home to teach me. Our parents would stop fighting. I’d become just as good as him and we’d go back to how things had always been. My life would be perfect again. Magical thinking makes sense when you’re a scared, lonely ten-year-old.

It didn’t work out like that, though. Instead, I fell through the ice. I was clinically dead for a few minutes. When I woke up in the hospital, Micah was there. Furious. Devastated. He blamed himself, made me swear not to make hockey my life. And I promised because I hated that look on his face. I hated the tears on his cheeks. I hated the guilt in his eyes.

It's never gone away entirely. He still feels guilty, like I wouldn’t have been out there that day if hockey weren’t his entire life.

Finding out that I married his captain last night will send him over the edge. Especially if he ever finds out that I was wasted, and Archer wasn’t. He’ll never forgive a betrayal like that.

“Micah is going to kill you,” I finally mutter weakly, sinking back against my seat. I don’t know what else to say when Archer’s looking at me like he doesn’t regret it at all and part of me loves that a little too much.

“What’d I tell you this morning, baby?” He arches a brow at me. “You let me worry about Micah.”

I snort, closing my eyes as if that’ll change reality. It doesn’t. Instead, I feel his hand on my thigh.

My eyes flutter open.

“What are you doing?”

“You look cold, little bird. You should cover up.”

“I’m not cold, Archer.”

His hand creeps higher, his gaze tangling with mine. Intent glitters like cerulean sin in his eyes. “Trust me, Wren. You’re cold. Get your blanket.”

“Don’t you dare,” I hiss, glancing over at Micah. He’s still snoring…and I don’t really mean no at all. Archer knows I don’t, damn him.

His lips curve upward as his hand journeys higher.

I glare at him. He smirks at me. We’re locked in a silent battle of wills, neither willing to bend, and neither willing to break. Until he reaches the apex of my thigh and shoves his hand between my legs.

I break, grabbing the blanket and flinging it over myself like I’m on fire and the damn blanket is salvation. It might be because he’s already shoving his hand into my pants, tugging my panties aside. And greedy, greedy little me doesn’t stop him. I spread my legs, making it easier. Giving him room.

He keeps his eyes locked on my face as his thumb grinds against my clit in torturously slow passes.

“I like watching you unravel for me,” he says, voice pitched low. Gritty. “I like how you whimper and squirm while I wreck you.”

“I hate you so much.”

He sinks a finger into me up to the knuckle. “Yeah? You sure about that, little bird? Because it feels a whole lot like you’re fucking dying for this just as much as I am.”

“Am…not…” I gasp. I lie. And God help me, I whimper and squirm, too. We’re surrounded by his teammates with my brother right beside him. And I shamelessly rock against his hand anyway, letting him fuck me with his fingers.

What is he doing to me?

“You’re so fucking beautiful when you need to come,” he murmurs, his eyes drifting across my face like he’s trying to commit the sight of me like this to memory. “Does it feel as good as it looks, baby?”

“Yes.” I can’t lie this time. Not when he’s looking at me like my answer is the most important thing in the world. Not when it feels this damn good. And not when I’m already on the verge of losing it and coming all over him.

He leans forward, tipping his head down. “Then be good and come all over my hand, wife,” he growls, his breath hot against my ear. “Let me spend the rest of this flight with your juices all over me and your sweet little whimpers ringing in my ears. That’s heaven, Wren. It’s fucking nirvana.”

Something about the way he speaks to me like he’s spilling truths he’s been dying to let loose, like he’s been dying for this, has me unraveling with his name whispering from my lips. And maybe that’s my truth. Maybe he’s my inevitability. With his lips against my skin and bliss pumping through my veins instead of blood, he certainly feels like it.

And in this moment, even with Micah sleeping beside us…that doesn’t scare me nearly as much as it probably should.

Not until Micah grunts, sitting upright.

Archer slowly slips his hand from between my thighs, his lips against my ear. “Beautiful,” he whispers before straightening my blanket as if that’s all he was doing.

I slam my eyes closed, trying to steady my breathing.

“She sleeping?” Micah asks, voice rough with sleep.

“Yeah.” Archer sits back in his seat. “She’s still hungover.”

“Bet she won’t want to party in Vegas again anytime soon.” Micah chuckles, and then I hear him shifting around. “I’m going to hit the head.”

I wait until I’m sure the coast is clear before opening my eyes. When I do, it’s to find Archer watching me. Our eyes lock, something unspoken passing between us. Something terrifyingly vast.

“Archer, I…”

He touches my cheek, cutting me off. “Get some rest, little bird. You didn’t get much last night.”

I hesitate, determined to say…something. But I don’t know what. So I nod instead, letting my eyes drift closed. And somehow, despite the anxiety still churning in my stomach, despite everything, I sleep.