A sudden, overwhelming wave of nausea hits me, and I rush out of bed and run to the bathroom. I get there just in time to puke everything but my lungs into the toilet.

Afterward, I slouch down to the marble floor. I’ve never felt more awful and embarrassed and utterly blindsided. It’s like another part of me—the Drunk and Evil Everly—took over my body last night and did things with it that Normal Everly’s brain can barely comprehend. And, unfortunately, as I lie here, I start to remember more of last night: driving in the backseat of the limo and laughing it up with Jaden as we pull up to a drive-through window at one of those small wedding chapels…Jaden slipping the ring onto my finger and then both of us madly falling into a deep, head-spinning kiss…

Okay, that part was awesome, and I revel in the memory for a lovely moment. Then everything else slams me again—the consequences for my absolute stupidity—and I flush the toilet, then crawl to the sink to wash out my mouth and splash water on my face.

I wither back to the cool tile floor. The huge bathroom looms over me. I couldn’t care less about the inviting bathtub or the opulent signs of grandeur like the expensive TV or gold trim. I merely wonder what the hell I’m going to do now.

Married.

To a stranger…

I don’t know how long I lie there, feeling as if my world has tilted so far off its axis that it has no chance of ever righting itself, but then things get even worse.

“You okay?”

A deep, dark voice. The last voice I want to hear.

I look up from the floor to find Jaden leaning against the doorframe, filling the entrance with his massive, gorgeous body. He’s still shirtless, his abs cut, his arms and chest and shoulders like carved granite. And, damn him, the only evidence that he might be even a little bit hung over is the stubble shadowing his jaws and his dark, ruffled, carefree hair that slumps over one of his cool, gray eyes before he lazily pushes it away from his forehead. He’s definitely more put together than I am. He doesn’t even have just one shoe on anymore—he’s barefoot, and that sign of nonchalance makes him even hotter.

I feel the heat all over my skin, caressing it until my clit aches.

He’s running a slow gaze over me, reminding me that I’m wearing only my bra and panties. They’re a cute lacy set of bra and panties, but as I start to remember that I’ve just barfed my guts out, I begin to feel very unsexy.

I press my cheek to the floor, wishing I could burrow into the tile and disappear. “As a matter of fact, I’m not okay.”

I hold up my wedding ring finger to show him.

When Jaden merely shrugs, I unenergetically switch from holding up my ring finger to saluting him with my middle one, then close my eyes and let my hand fall to the floor.

“Vegas,” he says, like it’s no biggie.

I open one eye. “Oh, you often come to Las Vegas and marry random women?”

“Actually, this is the first time that’s happened.” He loosely crosses his strong arms over his wide chest and keeps watching me. “I only vaguely recall getting carried away last night.”

“Carried away?” Both eyes are open now. “That’s what you call it? Because we evidently got married!”

“True. I’ve got some texts on my phone from my hired driver, who facilitated every request I made of him last night. He arranged for the ring you’re wearing as well as our trip to the Marriage License Bureau downtown. He even took care of contacting the chapel for our ceremony.”

“Ceremony. Hah.” My God, my family is going to kill me for getting married in a freakin’ drive-through. “Jeez, how can you be so casual about this?”

He shrugs those amazingly broad shoulders again and loosely stands away from the doorframe. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll put a call in to my team of lawyers, and they’ll start the application for an annulment. It’ll be granted immediately, considering we’ve been married for less than twelve hours and neither of us even knows the other.”

Then, just like that, he saunters into the bathroom as if I’m not lying here like the world’s shabbiest rug. He grabs a shaving kit and toothbrush from the counter and strolls back to the door. “I’ll use the second bedroom’s bathroom and leave this one to you.” He finally gives me a puzzled look, as if it’s just now hitting him that he’s got a dumbass sprawled all over the floor and he doesn’t know how to clean it up. “You sure you’re okay?”

“Sure. I only drank half the vodka supply in this town and found myself married as well as epically hung over this morning. Everything’s just great.”

He chuffs, then jerks his chin at the counter. “All right. Feel free to use anything in here.”

And then he saunters out, just as no-big-deal as you please as he shuts the door behind him.

What was that?

I nearly cry as the answer comes to me. That was my freakin’ husband.

But he said we’d get an annulment. It can’t happen fast enough.

I roll over and take another look around the bathroom and its lavishness. We’ve got to be in a suite, and as I push myself to my feet, I see evidence that we’re in The Venetian, one of the swankiest hotels in Vegas.

Huh.

That’s when I start to piece everything together: this suite, Jaden’s team of lawyers, the driver he had at his beck and call last night, the way he seemed to command everyone around him to do his bidding while wearing those expensive clothes and shoes…

Jaden’s obviously loaded—and he’s got the arrogance to go with his wealth. No wonder he’s so unruffled about our night of heavy drinking and stupidity, because he’s got the money to erase all of it.

God, I wish I could erase everything on my end, but, first, I want to erase how icky I’m feeling after losing the contents of my stomach in the toilet and being so terribly hung over. I slouch to the door, lock it, and then make good use of the complimentary toothbrush and expensive toiletries I find on the marble counter. After I discover my white dress wadded up in a ball near the bathtub, I decide that I’d like to wash my panties in the sink, then dry them with the hair dryer. If I have to put on my party dress again, it might as well be with fresh panties.

I take a quick shower, allowing the hot water to wash away the idiocy of last night. Well, at least most of it, because by the time I slip on my dress, bra, and clean underwear, my mistakes are still clinging to me.

Married.

Even if I was drunker than a skunk, how did I let things go that far?

As I think about how Jaden kissed me, my pulse picks up speed. Okay, so maybe I was living in the moment. But I’m not usually this dumb. Still, I feel real dumb when I pick up the diamond ring from the counter, where I set it before my shower. God, it’s beautiful, but I just can’t put it back on. Instead, I leave the bathroom with it and go to the master bedroom, setting the ring on a nightstand so Jaden can keep it.

It looks really lonely just sitting there.

So stop looking at it, right?

Yet there I am, still staring at it when I hear a knock on the front door of the suite.

I’m debating whether or not to answer it when Jaden appears in the bedroom doorway, dressed in a new pair of perfectly creased dark pants, barefoot, and shirtless. He’s still got that sexy stubble, but his hair is damp from a shower and slicked back, and the scent of soap wafts off of him to me. It shouldn’t make me think yum, but I do.

“I ordered room service,” he says. “Have some coffee and toast. You’ll feel better.”

“Doubtful,” I mutter as he leaves to answer the door.

My stomach feels hollow as I find my phone on the floor next to my heels. When I turn the phone on, my screen lights up with a blast of missed texts and calls from last night and early this morning from my friends.

Crap.

As I read them, I hear the room service attendant speaking with Jaden and rolling in a food cart.

Each message gets worse, and I haven’t even checked my friends’ voicemails yet.

First, there are the texts that make it very clear that, at one point, I told the girls I’d met a guy. I never mentioned his name. And, even though Rachelle, Millie, Tanya, and Cindy tried to talk me into rejoining the bachelorette party, I was adamant about hanging out with my party boy, even after they protested.

Then I wrote this gem: I’m perfectly fine!!! Catch the flight without me, because I’m living life to the fullest, YOLO style!!!

And then there are their panicked texts from this morning.

Tanya: WHERE ARE YOU?

Millie: Girl, we’re one the way to the airport! We have your stuff because we have no idea where you are!

My flight. Yes, I told them to leave without me, but that was Drunk and Evil Everly talking. Shit. Maybe if I get a move on now, I can still catch my plane…

But as I realize I only have twenty-five minutes before it takes off, I group text everyone to let them know I’m truly okay and it’s definitely fine to leave without me.

Shit. Shit. SHIT.

Their group texts come back in a flood.

Cindy: Dammit, Everly, what happened?

Tanya: YOLO? WTF???

Millie: You’ve got some explaining to do.

Rachelle: Go, Everly!

I tell them again not to worry, and I’ll give them the entire story later. Meanwhile, my heart is slamming around in my chest, because I never screw up like this. Is the airline even going to let me make other arrangements? Will I have to stay in Vegas longer without any of my stuff? Dammit, I’ll have to get someone to cover for me in the salon…

But, worst of all, I’m married.

Feeling like a complete disaster, I put down my phone. I can hear the room service guy in the next room talking to Jaden.

“Thank you so much, Mr. Nash. You’re too generous.”

Jaden must’ve given him a whopper of a tip. Obviously he can afford it, just like he can afford to accidentally get married.

But wait… Did the attendant say Mr. Nash?

That would make him Jaden Nash.

It’s not a common name. I didn’t even catch it while filling out last night’s marital paperwork. But now my stomach fills with leaden dread as I think about that name.

Ally Steel, the business that keeps our town running… Nash Industries, which just bought it with the intention of trashing it and making a profit and, in the process, ruining my small town and everyone who lives there.

Jaden Nash.

Oh, my God.

Oh, my God, oh my God.

Sick dread settles in my stomach and my chest gets to tight I can barely breathe.

My husband is the man who’s set on destroying my town and everything important to me.

With my legs shaking, I walk to the other room, which is decorated like an Italian villa, all lavish open spaces and rustically expensive furniture. It even comes complete with a shirtless god named Jaden who has muscles in his back that flex as he lifts his coffee cup to his lips. He’s staring out the floor-to-ceiling penthouse suite window at the Vegas Strip outside, totally oblivious to my presence.

There’s no way this could be the same Jaden Nash.

I clear my throat, and he glances over his shoulder. For a moment, I could swear his gray eyes light up when they catch sight of me. As he checks me out again in that lazy, appreciative way he has, I heat up all over. I’m a throbbing network of pulsing, buzzing electrical impulses, connected by lust. My clit knots up as I remember how Jaden kissed me last night after slipping the diamond ring onto my finger at the chapel drive-through.

I’ve never been kissed that way.

I’m not sure I ever will be again.

But, even so, I fist my hands, digging my nails into my palms to wake myself up.

Jaden Nash. Nash Industries.

Please, God, no.

“Mr. Nash?” I ask. “Is that what the room service attendant called you?”

He shrugs and leisurely sets the coffee cup down on a table. “That’s my name.”

“Jaden Nash, the new CEO of Ally Steel?”

He frowns, as if wondering why the hell I would know that. Then he turns to face me all the way, and my heart throbs at the full power of his shirtless beauty. God, he’s tight all over, like a sculptor took his sweet time in creating all the sexy ridges of his stomach and the sleek lines of his chest and arms.

“No,” he says warily. “I’m not the new CEO of Ally Steel.”

I exhale with profound relief.

“I’m the new owner,” he says.

My relief turns back to horror because, holy crap, it’s true —somehow I hooked up with the very man who is going to shut down our town’s manufacturing plant and put my family and friends out of work just to increase profits.

And I didn’t just hook up with him—I married him.