breathless.
In the bedroom, I closed the door and leaned against it. What was going on between us? When I slipped out of the thong panties, they were wet.
----
J ustin
Kayla came out of the bedroom dressed in one of my T-shirts and a pair of cotton boxer pajama shorts, clearly signaling no sex was going down between us tonight.
"I'm going to bed." She grabbed my face, tipped it up, and, to my surprise, pressed a light kiss to my lips.
"What was that for? There's no one here." I searched her face for some clue to whether she was teasing me again.
She shrugged. "Method acting. My parents always kiss each other goodnight."
I squeezed her hand. "Goodnight, Kay. Sweet dreams."
She smiled and walked away. I watched Kayla until she disappeared. Then I sat on the couch until I was sure she was in bed, waiting until I was confident she'd had time to fall asleep. For the record, my parents didn't kiss each other goodnight. There was no way in hell I was telling Kay that. I enjoyed that tiny peck way too much. As desperate as I was, it might even become the highlight of my day.
How was I going to survive the year? At the private conference Harry and I had at the divorce meeting, he'd asked me, "Why a year, Justin?"
Why? Three main reasons. I'd only given him one—there was something about giving anything a year that was entirely respectable. If you took a new job and hated it, but stuck with it a year, you could move on without a future employer questioning why you left so soon. Without them thinking you're flaky and uncommitted. Hey, he gave it a year. How many pounds of flesh do you want?
Leases ran a year. School ran in years. Give anything a year and that was giving it a decent try. You were a hero.
The second reason, that I wouldn't tell him, or anyone, was simple—I figured I needed a year to catch that identity-theft bitch who'd duped me in Reno. I wasn't made a fool of lightly. Billions were at stake here. Sending me a text message had been that thief's first, and possibly fatal, mistake.
It came from a burner phone. So she wasn't totally stupid. She wanted something. Money was the logical assumption. And plenty of it. The threat of blackmail hung in the air, as close and dense as fog.
Since Saturday morning, I'd been racking my brain, trying to remember anything at all about that fateful night and the loss of my bachelorhood. Most of it was a blank. Bits and pieces were slowly coming back. Some on their own. Some with the aid of the private investigator I had secretly working for me. He uncovered little things that helped jog it.
Harry knew about the PI. Kayla hadn't asked, and I hadn't told her that I was still employing him. I was going to bring that identity-stealing bitch down. Silence her forever.
Until that text, I'd held out a small, irrational hope that I'd somehow married the real Kayla. As if she'd been mistaken about spending the night hugging the toilet. Or was lying to cover her mistake. The thought was no balm on my wounded vanity. But it would have made life simpler. Kayla, obviously, didn't want to bilk me out of my billions. She wouldn't take a hundred-thousand-dollar ring, even when I begged her and told her it would help my reputation.
I fantasized about having met up with her later that night, when she finally realized she was crazy for me after all. Yeah, me, the guy who sweeps girls off their feet with his sheer animal magnetism. I was confusing myself with one of my brothers. In my fantasies, being stood up by her was all a misunderstanding. She was too embarrassed, or too drunk, to remember it. That she was covering. That there was no crazy, criminal third party to deal with. Though that didn't say much for my prowess and magnetic sex appeal, did it? So much for false hopes and crazy fantasies.
There was another thing, something that Kayla had reinforced since we'd reconnected—she wouldn't have left me without a word. Or at least a note.
My memories of the event began with seeing