I refused to give in on this one.
“I see you’re already practicing your legal jargon, Jelly?” That was meant to be condescending. Her entire family called her “Jelly,” which she’d always hated, and I knew that. Anytime I had ever used it, it had been meant as more of an insult than an endearment. And I could tell by the way she squinted her eyes at me that she knew it, too. “Listen, if you can’t afford a lawyer, then maybe you shouldn’t push this. I don’t suggest representing yourself. There’s a reason officers of the court go through so much schooling. Not to mention…are you really prepared to tell your family all about the drunken night you don’t remember? I can’t imagine you’d be eager to let them know specific details, but hey…if you want them to know, I’d be more than happy to fill them in on the parts you don’t remember—oh, wait…that’s everything.”
“I don’t get it, Holden. Why? Why would you fight this? It’s not like we’ve been together this whole time or have some fairytale romance. We’ve never dated. We had sex once—”
“Four times,” I corrected, making sure she had the right information.
“Four times?” She rolled her eyes and waved me off before plopping down onto the couch across from me. “Regardless, it was one night. But if saying it was four times makes you feel better, then okay, you win. We had sex four times, and I can’t remember a single one of them. What does that say about your performance?” Her claws were out. And it’d be a lie if I said those grazes didn’t hurt. “I don’t understand why you’re so opposed to signing these papers so we can put an end to this.”
“I’m not signing them because I refuse to allow you to marry a guy you met two months ago.”
“So you’re saying if he were someone I’ve been dating for the last however many years, you’d have no problem granting me a divorce? You just want to be stubborn and act like some overprotective big brother? Well, guess what? I already have one of those, and you’re not him.”
I swallowed harshly and licked my lips, needing the extra time to rein in my thoughts and feelings regarding this whole situation. When I first opened the door and saw her standing there, I couldn’t deny the way my heart had slammed against my ribcage at the mere sight of her. For a second—a millisecond—I thought she had come back. To me. Then I’d noticed the rigidness of her posture, the way she’d clenched her hands into fists, and the tightness of her lips. That’s when it dawned on me that there was no way she had remembered anything, and even less of a chance that she had returned to me.
Then I’d reminded myself I didn’t want her.
“This is pathetic, Holden.” She dropped the envelope onto the coffee table. “You don’t know him. You know nothing about my relationship with him, so you don’t get to have an opinion. You don’t get to have a say-so regarding my life—the one you’ve been estranged from for the last five years. You’ve shown no interest in me over the entirety of our marriage, so you’ve lost every right you’ve ever had to have input in what I do.”
I absolutely hated how she had placed all the blame in my lap for what had happened all those years ago. As if she had nothing to do with any of it. Aside from briefly seeing her a few times while she was in town after she left for college, no, I hadn’t seen or spoken to her. But that wasn’t all my fault. She was the one who took off. She tucked her tail and ran. Granted, I didn’t chase after her, but then again, that had been the deal. Standing on the strip in Las Vegas, that’s what we had agreed upon. So really, I stuck to the plan. It wasn’t my fault she couldn’t remember it—or the existence of one.
“What’s his name?” I asked through clenched teeth.
“Connor.”
“Last name.”
She blinked a few times, and I knew immediately that she had no idea what the douchebag’s last name was. Once again, she couldn’t hide anything from me, and I began to doubt the reality of this guy. For all I knew, this was nothing but a ploy to make me sign the papers.
“Don’t lie to me, Janelle.” No matter how righteous I felt right now, knowing I had the upper hand, I couldn’t seem to hide the doubt and festering anger from taking over. They riddled everything from my stern words and raspy voice to the sudden rigidness in my spine, giving away how I truly felt. “Is there even a guy, and if so, who is he really? And are you seriously marrying him?”
“I told you…his name is Connor, and yes, we’re trying to get married, but there’s this tiny little problem preventing us from doing so.” Using two fingers, she slid the envelope across the table, closer to me. “If you’ll just sign these, I’ll get out of your way, and you won’t ever have to deal with me again. This little mishap will be behind us, and we can both move on with our lives as if that night in Vegas never happened.”
I tried to swallow, but it was as if my esophagus refused to work. My breathing hiccupped in my lungs, and I had to force myself to not rub the center of my chest, where it felt as though I had been hit with a professional curve ball. And I wouldn’t have been surprised if my heart skipped a few beats—or a hundred.
Rather than speak right away, I stared at the envelope in hopes of hiding my reaction from her. I abhorred the notion of Janelle marrying this guy—or any other guy—yet I couldn’t figure out why. She hadn’t been in my life, and it wasn’t like I’d lived the last five years in limbo, waiting for her, so I couldn’t decipher why this bothered me so much.
Once I felt confident that I had my reaction under control, I lifted my gaze and held her stare. “I’m not about to give you what you want just so you can run off and marry some loser you don’t even know. Why are you marrying him, anyway? Are you pregnant? Did the fucker knock you up? Is that what’s going on?” The second the idea of her being pregnant with that asshole’s bastard child came up, I about lost it. My face flamed with unimaginable heat, and my forehead felt so tight it ached.
“Again…you know nothing about it.”
“So tell me about it. Make me understand.”
“I don’t have to.” She tilted her head defiantly to the side, and after a moment of us both doing nothing but staring at the other, she started to laugh. “We aren’t five, Holden. This is ridiculous. We somehow managed to get married while both under the influence, and for reasons I still don’t comprehend, you’ve kept that a secret from me. We haven’t once, since our drunken vows, lived as husband and wife. We haven’t shared a single thing…not even a conversation. So what’s there to fight for? Tax breaks for technically being married? Find someone else. It doesn’t have to be me.”
“Do you love him?” Raw pain hung in my voice, but I couldn’t waste the energy to care. If it worked in my favor, I’d take it. “Just tell me the truth. That’s all I ask.”