Bellamy steps out of the car with flushed cheeks and a little grin. “Thank god we’re back. I have so much planning to do, and not much time to do it.”

I race ahead and open the massive hotel door. If I can only get us behind the walls of our suite... “I’m planning to take you right back to bed.”

In the elevator Bellamy leans into me. “Yes. Bed. Emails first, then bed.”

I’d thought the sex in the car had knocked her big reveal out of her head. “Sweetness, now’s not the time to be emailing anyone. My own head is still spinning.”

She beams up at me. “Mine’s not, Graham. Mine’s perfectly clear.”

The elevator stops at the penthouse level and we climb out, Bellamy’s hand in mine. My skin tingles from her kisses, the bite marks still raw on my neck, and my cock pulses at her rumpled hair. I want her back in bed. I want her to stop this nonsense.

She’s tired. We’re all tired. Andrew dropped a bombshell, but that doesn’t mean it has to ruin our wedding night.

The door swings closed behind us and Bellamy darts for the bedroom. My chest unclenches. That little minx is heading to where she belongs—underneath me, on pure-white sheets.

“Take off your clothes. I’m—”

She’s not on the bed.

She stands next to it, her phone in her hands, illuminated from the bathroom light.

“Are you seriously emailing someone right now?”

“I need to set up an interview. They’ll talk to me. I know they will.” Her thumbs trip over the screen, tiny taps like rainfall. “Once I go in front of the cameras, all this will be—hey!”

I pluck the phone from between her fingers and toss it into a corner. “Now is not the time.”

“That’s my phone. You can’t throw it on the ground, Graham.” It’s the same tone my mother used to use when she would insist on being home before curfew, on taking my keys. You can’t embarrass your father, Graham.

“You’re not emailing anyone.” Bellamy is incandescent with righteousness.

It’s fucking terrifying.

“I am. And then I’m going to sleep. And then I’m going to do an interview. This is simple.”

“This is not simple.” She tries to maneuver around me and I block her in. “This is my family. My brother is the president. You can’t fuck with him like that.”

Bellamy scoffs. “I’m not the one who’s fucking with him. I’m trying to help him.” My head aches. “This is what I was saying in the car, before—” That same little grin plays at the corner of her mouth and my cock twitches. “Before we got distracted. This is the only solution. Okay? I’ve seen this kind of thing happen before.”

“Sweetness, there’s no way on earth you’ve seen this kind of thing before. This is the entire United States government. It’s not some backwater courthouse upstate.”

Her jaw tightens. “Wow. Okay.” She scrambles onto the bed and crawls over it, landing with a soft thud next to her phone.

“Jesus. That’s not what I meant.”

“What did you mean, Graham?” Her head is already bowed over the screen, thumbs working, and my heart zigzags into my throat. It’s too soon. It’s been the longest day in the history of the world. I’m drunk on the ache and the pain in the center of my chest.

“Stop typing.”

“I’ll type whatever the hell I want.” Bellamy darts a gaze toward me. “You can run from this all you want, but it’s happening.”

“Bellamy, stop.”

She swivels her head toward me at the sound of her name, her expression unfathomable. “I’m not going to stop.” Her hands drop to her sides, her phone loosely in her fingertips. “Do you know what it was like to watch my mother get sentenced to serve time because my father lied? Because he and his lawyers lied and she didn’t have the money to fight him?”

“I can imagine—”

“You can’t imagine. You just can’t. That house? That house we visited her in? I bought that house. I worked all through high school and instead of paying for college...”

“You’ve done the impossible. You’re incredible, sweetness.”

“This isn’t impossible. This?” She waves her phone in the air. “This is doing the right thing. I know that hasn’t been your biggest priority, but I know—”

A flare of anger, a flare of pain. And I feel it—the walls coming back up, the bricks reassembling, all the tortuous unbuilding with every sigh from her lips undone in an instant. So fucking causal, the way she dismisses me, even now. So casual.

Bellamy rushes to my side. “I didn’t mean that.”

“You meant enough.” I run a hand over my face. “I’m exhausted. I’m going to bed.”

She breathes in, breathes out. She stands in front of me, alive with her purpose, freshly fucked and ready to ruin us all.

Her shoulders relax.

“Okay.” Bellamy’s tongue darts out to lick her lips. “I’ll send this email and then I’ll come to bed.”

Fury. Sheer, hot fury.

My jaw is so tight it could crack.

“You’re not sending that fucking email from here. You want to send it, you can leave.”

Her mouth drops open. “Are you serious?”

“I’ve never been more serious.” The inferno rages in my gut. “If you’re going to take over, if you’re going to take everything out of my hands because of a wedding ceremony, then you can do that elsewhere.”

“You’re kicking me out?” Her face is the picture of disbelief.

“I’m not the one with a phone in my hand.” One betrayal after another. Bellamy, my parents, Andrew—they always want everything to be picture-perfect, but nothing ever is.

She lifts her chin with that passionate defiance that I loved about her from the moment I met her. “I’m sending the email. It’s my right.”

“Then get out.”

Bellamy snaps her lips shut into a thin line.

She watches me, eyes luminous in the yellow light from the bathroom.

Then, silent as a ghost, she slips out of the bedroom to god knows where.