Page 35 of Bridesmaid By Chance
“I mean, I was kind of hoping you’d treat me to some ice cream,” Stacey says. “After all, you made your husband believe that you were plucking me minutes before your wedding.”
I chuckle. “Right, not my best moment. You know what, I will treat you to ice cream.”
“The good ice cream, none of this grocery store bullshit.”
“Lady, I got married today, we’re getting the?—”
“You’re coming home,” Hudson says, drawing both of our attention.
Nervously, I chuckle and pull on my ear. “Oh God, I thought he just said I was going home, like his home.”
“No, I think he meant our home, like you and I are not getting ice cream. We’re to just go home. Maybe it’s a marriage curfew or something.”
“Oh, is that a thing?” I ask.
We both turn to Hudson again, whose jaw is tight and who is looking none too entertained. Seems like someone lost their sense of humor when they saidI do.
“You’re coming home…with me.”
I stand there, stunned, blinking as Stacey leans toward me, and from the corner of her mouth, she says, “I think he said you’re going home with him, like to his home.”
“I think that’s what he said too,” I whisper back, still staring at him. “I can’t tell if he’s serious.”
“Dead serious,” he says.
“Ha, okay.” I chuckle. “Good, uh, good one, my man. But you know”—I yawn and stretch my arms above my head—“it’s getting late,and that ice cream is not going to eat itself, so why don’t we put this wholeBeauty and the Beast,you stay with meact to rest because, frankly, it’s slightly outdated.”
“I told you to read the agreement,” he says.
“I did. I skimmed it. The legal jargon was a little much, if you ask me. Like, why be so fancy? You can use regular English. Nothing wrong with simple sentences.”
He takes a step closer to me and says, “In the agreement, it states that you are to live with me.”
“Where?” I ask. “Where on earth did it say that?”
He picks up his copy of the contract that the lawyer left “for his records,” brings it over to me, and points to the very sentence. I read it three or four times, mouthing the words before looking up at him, dread filling me. “Why on earth would you put that in the contract?”
“Because we need to get to know each other, and the best way to do that is to live with each other.”
“Uh, hey, captor, I work with you. Remember, I’m your devoted assistant again? We can get to know each other here.”
“This is the workplace, not a place for me to get to know and understand my wife on a deeper level.”
“Wow, okay, the way you saidwife, sheesh, it sounded like you really meant it.”
“It did,” Stacey whispers. I wouldn’t be surprised if she were to pull a bucket of popcorn out of her pants and start shoving handfuls in her mouth as she watches the drama unfolding. And there is some good reasoning for that. We have known Hudson Hopper for a while now through Jude, and he’s always been quite…intense. Add in what his father did to their family and that has simply made his gravity balloon. But living together? He doesn’t mean?—
“I did mean it,” he says, his serious tone never faltering, his eyes never straying. “Our car is waiting for us downstairs.”
Stacey taps me on the shoulder and whispers, “I think he means it. I think you’re supposed to go home with him.”
“That’s what it seems like.” I lift my chin in the air. “Okay, Husband, if I’m supposed to go home with you, then where am I supposed to sleep? Huh? What about clothes? A toothbrush? Going to tell you right now, I’m very keen on dental care. No way in hell am I going to go to bed without brushing my teeth. That’s nonnegotiable.”
“Everything you need is at our house.”
Our.
He just saidour house.
