Now.
Gianna awoke with the knowledge that she wasn't alone on the bed that wasn't hers, an awareness that hit her in the chest like a splash of cold water.
It was all shades of strange. From the silky, champagne-colored sheets clinging to her naked body, to the smell of the room itself…
A smell that reminded her of pain, of penury, of death, of the drugs she hadn't taken before she slept. Or rather, the one-night stand she'd tumbled into.
The scent drifted around her like a ghost, causing her once-relaxed muscles to coil and turn restless beneath her skin.
She exhaled softly, her breath shaky. Without turning to see her companion—not bothered, not ready, not willing to know who it was—she swung her legs off the bed.
Her bare feet touched down on something soft, and she blinked slowly. A plush rug. Thick, luxurious. Her one-night-stander must be rich… or had she been the one to book the luxurious suite?
Her mind was heavy, clogged, a foggy swamp of missing memories. She could barely remember anything after watching her best friend get into the helicopter that would fly her and her new husband to their honeymoon spot.
Despite herself, she smiled faintly at the memory, her chest warming a little. She was happy that her friend's love life hadn't ended in shambles.
She had even threatened Ewan—waylaying him on his way to the bathroom during the bachelor party—promising to cut off his balls if he ever broke Athena's heart again. A smiling Ewan had made the vow without mincing words, and she had again been reminded how lucky her friend was.
Gianna shook her head as she bent to pick up her dress, her hair falling in messy curls around her face. Lucky didn't really capture her friend's life at all, not when it had once been pathetic and bruised.
She would say instead that the universe had finally decided to reward her best friend for all the efforts and all the crime fought.
Done with tugging her dress into place, she scanned the room for her purse. When she didn't find it where she had picked up her dress, she clicked her tongue and muttered a curse under her breath.
Slowly, gently, she walked around the suite, her bare feet sinking into the plush rug as she searched for the rhinestone purse. Another curse slipped free when she finally spotted it—on the side table close to the bed, on the very corner where her sex colleague was still sleeping.
Sighing tiredly, she steeled herself and continued her gentle movements toward that side of the bed, every step measured. She wasn't in the mood to chat with anyone.
Gods, no.
She was a public figure now—not the mediocre nobody she had been five years ago. She couldn't afford for her reputation to get damaged.
And even then, even during those three months when she had gone on a drinking rampage, falling prey to one-night stands on a few reckless occasions, she had always slipped away unseen, uncaring about who she had slept with.
What was the need? Men were not worth the stress. They hadn't been then, and the ideology hadn't changed now.
She grabbed her purse and her phone. The glowing screen told her it was just four a.m.
She would have left in the same practiced stealthiness if her eyes hadn't snagged on the white piece of paper beneath her purse—the paper her purse had been keeping steady on the table.
Her mouth went dry. Her heart began to pound, a slow, stunned thud, when she read the first boldened words.
Marriage certificate.
What?!
Her hands shook violently as she picked the paper up, her nails digging into the edges. She hoped against hope that it belonged to someone else, that she hadn't been stupid, that she hadn't snagged herself to a nobody in a drunken night.
How much had she drunk?
This certifies that Gianna Aldo is wedded to…
Her heart stopped. Literally. For more than a second, everything in her froze.
Ice crawled through her veins as she beheld the name on the certificate—when she realized who she had slept with, when she understood where the smell had come from.
Not from her nightmares. Not from the past.
But here. Present. Real.
Her nose had recognized him before her mind had.
She had slept with Zane Whitman. After months of avoiding him like a plague, of pretending he didn't exist simply because he was a good friend of Ewan and Athena?
How? How had she landed here, upon all her efforts?
She held back a pained, breathless chuckle at the cruelty of fate. Her fingers trembled as she stared at the certificate again.
Rage poured into her, hot and steady, pushing away the jitters and nerves. She tore the certificate into two—then into four—then into frantic, angry pieces, her hands a whole network of fury while her eyes blazed.
When she was done, she dumped the pieces into a nearby bin. Then, thinking better of it, she cursed softly again, bent, picked them up, and stuffed the shredded pieces into her purse. She wouldn't be taking any chances.
She lifted her chin and glared at the figure on the bed.
In the dim room, illuminated only by the faint night lights of the city filtering through the window, she glared at the male whose eyes were closed—lying so still, so at peace, so disarmed—that she felt a strong, vicious urge to choke him to death.
But then she remembered the events of the past days and weeks. She let it go with another sharp exhale.
He wasn't worth the effort. And he was dear to her best friend. Better? He no longer wielded that power over her.
Biting back a hiss, Gianna turned around, head held high, and walked toward the door. She rested her hand on the knob, ready to disappear into the dawn…
But just as she twisted it, she heard it—the voice that had tortured her dreams for more than four years.
"Where are you going, wife?"
A slight pause. A shift of sheets.
"Surely, you don't think tearing the certificate will change anything?"