Page 15

In which we learn about Drunk Logic and just how ill-advised that can be.

Arabella…

Ach. Everything hurts so much.

Turning my head, I groan at the lightning flash of pain that shoots through what’s left of my brain. I’m almost ready to embrace the sweet release of death versus enduring another moment of the thousand tiny heavy metal drummers trying to hammer their way out of my skull.

Oh, god. My breath. It smells like a hamster crawled in there and chose my tongue as its final resting place.

Wait.

Where the hell am I?

The sheets are a luxuriously soft ivory, and there’s so many pillows and a silky feather comforter. It’s a hotel room. A high-end one with enormous, floor to ceiling windows which are - thank the good Lord - covered in blackout curtains.

I stretch my foot experimentally and let out a scream when I touch something warm.

A leg. A blazingly hot, thick, hairy leg.

“Ah feck lass,” a deep, masculine voice groans. “No screaming, aye? I already got someone screaming in my head right now and they dinnae need company.”

“What is happening?” I wheeze, trying to sit up and failing utterly. I’m horrified to find that I’m naked under this nice, soft sheet and the voice belongs to…

Logan fecking MacTavish.

He’s naked, too. No sheet covering what is an alarmingly large dick that’s growing harder by the second and… Is that a piercing? A silver curved barbell at the head of his cock and the flesh around it is thick and an angry red.

“Sorry, sweetheart,” he groans, rubbing his eyes. “Ye might need to give me a minute. He’s ready but I’m needing some ibuprofen.”

“Oh, my god!” I drag the sheet with me as I scramble away. “Why are we in this bed? Why are we naked?” A glint of light from the low bedside table lamp reflects off the gigantic fecking diamond weighing down my left hand.

“Why am I wearing a wedding ring?”

“There now, ye will feel better in a moment, let it out.”

“Oh, please go away,” I moan, “this is so humiliating.” Logan’s holding my hair back as I clutch the toilet in the pristine, searingly white bathroom.

He gently wipes my face with a warm washcloth and then puts a cold one on the back of my neck, it feels so good against my horribly sweaty skin. “Try to relax, aye? I got ye.”

“Why…” I rest my head on my arm, “why aren’t ye sick? This is… oh, god!”

It’s another ten minutes or so before I can wash my face and brush my teeth and Logan has to hold me up while I do it. I can still smell the fecking whisky oozing out of my pores. Getting me back into bed, he settles some pillows behind me and hands me a glass of water and three ibuprofens.

“Please leave me here to die of shame,” I groan.

Even hungover to the point that my blood is 50% alcohol, I can still see that other than his bloodshot eyes, he looks fine. He’s pulled on a pair of sleep pants emblazoned with the hotel’s logo and he stretches his enormously muscled arms until his joints creak.

“I canna do that.” He pulls over a chair and sits next to the bed, examining me with a slight smile. “I believe that’s called spousal abandonment.”

“How did this happen? We were playing a drinking game with that bottle of Glengoyne and…” I frown, trying to put the broken pieces of my memory back together like a particularly irksome jigsaw puzzle. I pull the hotel robe around me more closely. “I remember the bit about the enthusiastic consent-”

“Most enthusiastic consent,” he interrupts.

“But how did we get from there to here?” I hold my left hand up like an accusing visual aid.

“Well, now my feelings are hurt, Mrs. MacTavish. Ye remember the drinking game but not our wedding vows?” He crosses his arms over his thickly muscled chest and impossibly, the sight of his gorgeously sculpted pectorals is making at least part of me - the lower half - sit up and take notice.

“How could we possibly get married?” I ask peevishly, “We’re in Denmark, not Las Vegas!”

“Denmark is sometimes called the Las Vegas of Europe. Ye dinnae have to be a citizen or even stay in the country longer than a day or two. Ye just file the papers and a civil registrar or a priest from the Danish People’s Church can marry ye.”

“It canna be that easy,” I snap, “and when did we decide this was a good idea?”

My disordered memory chooses that moment to reform just enough to remember a room with brightly colored murals and gilded pillars… and an amused, sleepy looking man saying, “I kan nu dele jeres f?rste kys som mand og kone…”

“What did the guy say at the end?”

Logan rubs the back of his head, not looking at all like this is an appalling thing. “He said, ye may now share your first kiss as husband and wife.”

“Ye speak Danish, too?”

“Enough to know the registrar was giving us a proper ceremony.”

“Okay…” My brain feels like it’s rattling around my skull and coherent thought is almost an unbearable challenge. “But how did we go from getting shite-faced to getting married?”

“We were talking about the enthusiastic consent thing. I was kissing ye. Ye had my shirt off and then…”

“And then what?” I ask hoarsely.

He tilts his head and gives me the filthiest possible grin. “We decided to do it right by getting married first. I thought it would be dirtier if we did it as husband and wife-”

“Why would it be dirtier?”

“I canna tell ye what the feck we were thinking but it seemed to make sense last night. Ye know how Drunk Logic works. I called our contact in the DSIS - he owes me a favor, after all - and he called up a registrar and expedited our paperwork.”

“Expedited our paperwork?” I say skeptically.

“It usually takes a week or so.” He shrugs. “But we were in a hurry, so…”

“This canna be happening. You- I- no. This is ridiculous. This is mad behavior! We canna be married!” I’m edging across the bed and contemplating making a break for it. The door to our suite is a fair distance but I could sprint it…

“Hey now, hold on, sweetheart.” He grabs my ankle, pulling me back. “You’re in a state. Give it a minute.”

It’s then that I realize how very sore I am. My center’s throbbing, not in an unbearable way, but clearly indicating my lady bits have seen some considerable action recently.

“We had sex.” I bury my face in my hands.

“Three times,” he supplies helpfully. “On the couch in the main room. This bed. The shower. Almost in the hot tub on the balcony but ye were falling asleep and I was concerned about ye drowning so…” He runs his big toe along my leg and I slap it away.

Ah hell. I can remember it now. Most of it, anyway. Ripping at each other’s clothes with a satisfying level of urgency and the feel of him inside me, huge and hard, angling his hips and stroking that piercing against my G spot. Me bouncing up and down on him and rubbing my clitoris against…

“Ye have two piercings.”

“Aye.” He grins and leans closer. “Top of my cock and one at the base. Ye seemed very fond of that one when you were grinding that perky little clit of yours over it.”

“That’s enough of that, thank ye. This ring, this diamond, it’s bigger than my head! Where did ye find a ring at… when did we get married?”

“Around two am, I think.” He ruffles his hair and unfairly, it looks even better. “I had a jeweler meet us at the city hall with a few choices.” He holds up his left hand, showing off a thick ebony band. “Ye picked this one for me, ye said it was rugged and manly, like me.”

“This is in no way making me feel better,” I moan. “What do we do now?”

“What do ye mean?”

“Well… I mean…” I’m floundering here. “How do we reverse this?”

Logan frowns. “Why would we do that?”

“Because we met four days ago when someone tried to kill ye and then someone tried to kill me and then there was kidnapping and someone tried to kill both of us and then a rescue, ye remember that? Not exactly a strong foundation for a marriage!”

He chuckles and it’s unsettling. “I have to tell ye, sweetheart, our foundation’s a lot more sound than some of the MacTavish unions, but that’s talk for another time.” Picking up my limp hand, he squeezes it gently. “Take this first step with me, aye? Be with me. Anselm’s people are still out there. One strike isn’t enough to take them all out, they’re like roaches. I’ll keep ye safe.” A look of self-loathing crosses his face. “I’ll keep ye safe from now on . No more fuckups.”

“Until we’re sure they’re not coming back for revenge?”

Something flashes in his eyes for a moment. Disappointment? Determination? “I ordered some clothes for ye, along with breakfast. It should be here soon. Go take a shower, aye?” That filthy grin is back. “I can join ye, if ye like. Wash your hair...” His gaze is dropping lower and I scramble ungracefully off the bed.

“I’m going to need a moment.”

By the time I emerge from the shower, I feel close to 75% human again. There’s an outfit laid out on the bed, soft leggings and a pink cashmere sweater that feels wonderful against my skin. The suite is a two-story loft with the bedroom overlooking the living area and those enormous windows. Logan is seated on the balcony in the sunshine, drinking coffee and watching something on his phone.

“How do ye feel, Mrs. MacTavish?” He doesn’t miss my flinch.

“Still trying to adjust to this new reality,” I admit. “And I haven’t agreed to the name change. Maybe you could be Mr. Blair.”

The only thing I can manage to keep down is some dry toast and tea, but he’s plowing through an assortment of croissants, fruit, scrambled eggs and ham. The hotel is a massive thing, with Moorish architecture and a spectacular view of downtown Copenhagen. We’re a few blocks away from the water and I can see the rows of tall, colorful houses lining the bank.

“Your family…” Is there a polite way to ask your new husband if he’s from a crime family? Because the easy access to enormous weapons and an endless supply of hard-faced soldiers and relative ease of murdering people seems to indicate that. “You’re Mafia, aren’t ye?”

Brilliant, Arabella. Just blurt that right out there.

He puts down his fork and gives me his full attention. “Aye.”

“You’re not like-”

“Anselm?” His jaw tightens for a moment. “Victor Anselm loved pretending that he was a businessman who specialized in pharmaceutical research and the maritime industry. He got his first billion from his three luxury cruise lines before branching off into Bitcoin fraud, developing deadly viruses and stealing the research of others and pushing his shite out first.

“That’s how we got tangled up with him in the first place. I retrieved some crucial medical research he’d stolen from our pharmaceutical division. I also took several other medical patents and enough information to feck with his financial fraud. It was quite the setback for the bastard.”

“Good.” There’s a savage satisfaction behind the word. I remember being in that CT scanner. How terrified I was, knowing I was going to be cut up into sellable bits and pieces. “So, that’s why he was targeting you specifically?”

“Aye. He thought it would send a message to my clan, the fecking eejit. But once you were involved…” He shook his head. “I should have been there sooner. I should have kept you from being hurt.”

The rank, coppery taste of that man’s blood in my mouth is still painfully vivid, his nasty breath and the things he and his horrible buddy called me. “Ye did save me. Twice, in fact.”

“Ye never should have been taken.” He’s clenching his fists, his jaw tight with fury, and I squint at the side of his hand.

“Oh, your bandage is gone.” I thought he’d been cut or something during the rescue, but it’s a tattoo; four lines with a fifth crossed over them. “Ye got that tattoo yesterday? Is it a MacTavish thing?”

Logan looks down at the tattoo and his fury seems to drain away. “It’s a me thing.” Before I can ask any more questions, he rises from the table. “If you’re finished, we should get out of here.”

Doing a quick sweep through the suite before we leave, I spot something white, crumpled fabric on the sofa. “What is this?” Holding it up, my face goes up in flames. It’s a dress, ripped down the middle like it was literally torn off. “Oh, sweet Baby Jesus, was I wearing this?”

“Well, not for long.”

He chuckles as I hastily stuff the ruined dress in the garment bag that my new clothes were delivered in. I choose not to think about why my nipples are suddenly insanely hard.