Last Name - Dr. Rebecca Sharp Page 0,9

word ‘Bellagio’ to our driver. Somewhere between panting breaths and small moans, we managed to make it back to the hotel without desire bursting us into flames.

And somewhere between beating hearts, I led James back up to my room.

Because if I was going to get one night to live a fantasy, I wanted the whole night.

And I wanted it all with him.

My vision rolled into focus like a slot-machine locking into place.

First, my disheveled hotel room, complete with a half-drunk bottle of champagne and two champagne glasses.

Second, disheveled sheets and a warm indent on the pillow next to me that weren’t from me.

Images flashed in my mind like bright obnoxious signs on the Strip of a gorgeous stranger in a beret.

I reached for my phone, ignoring how my head and stomach protested.

Sure enough, there was photo after photo of us. Laughing. Smiling. Kissing.

In Paris. On The Venetian Canal. In New York.

Oh God.

It was the moment I swiped to our wedding photo that dread landed in my stomach—as though I’d just shoved all my chips at the dealer to go all in—and I pulled my hand away to see the white plastic band wrapped around my ring finger.

I bolted up in bed, my body protesting in ways that alcohol wasn’t responsible for.

Pinching the bridge of my nose, I remembered bringing him up here. Flashes of fantasies… his mouth… that tongue… that confident smile as I came around his cock…

My insides clenched, aching for more of a pleasure I’d never felt before last night.

I’d never felt a lot of things before last night.

But last night was clearly over because James was gone.

I looked at the ring on my finger again, remembering the last task on the list as I padded toward the table with the champagne.

But it was the piece of paper underneath the flutes that caught my eye.

Moving the glasses, I held it up, my eyes widening as I read.

Oh, God.

It wasn’t a consent for or a liability form.

It had nothing to do with the photo we wanted taken.

It was a marriage certificate.

“Oh no…” I groaned. “What have I done?”

My eyes jumped to the bottom. To the two ‘X’ lines. Mine was on the left. A shaking mess of letters that dwindled from ‘Carrie’ into a small scribble of ups and downs that looked like I’d tried to draw my last name rather than write it. Bishop.

But on the right, only the ‘J in James’ signature followed by a distinct ‘A’ were legible, the rest was a stretch of nothing and the shocking truth hit me like the worst kind of jackpot.

I’d slept with a man I’d just met, and I didn’t even know his last name.

But even that wasn’t the worst of it.

I’d come to Vegas for one night of risk. I’d bet everything I had on a handsome, kind stranger. I’d rolled the dice on one-night magic…

And I’d lost it all.

It was only supposed to be a fling, but now I didn’t even know my last name.

“Man, you can’t even make it a few nights in Vegas without being kicked out of town,” the voice of Lars, my younger brother, jeered as he sauntered into my new office Monday morning.

My eyes flicked to him over the edge of my laptop screen where I was currently neck-deep with a private investigator in Vegas trying to find Carrie—my wife.

How the hell did we go the entire night without me knowing her last name?

I cleared my throat at the thought, discreetly tucking the black plastic ring I’d been rolling between my fingers back into my pocket.

I guess, technically, I did know her last name… because now it was mine.

“I told you it was a risk,” I replied, holding back the truth that I would’ve been fine if I hadn’t stepped in to save Carrie from that shithead at the Blackjack table.

“The one night we leave you on your own…” He trailed off with a smile and a sigh.

Lars was four years younger than me, though that gap continued to shrink the older we got. Especially after our father died, we’d clung to each other while our mother tried to sort through the disaster his death left in its wake.

“This is a great spot, James.” He walked over to the windowed corner of my office.

The windows looked out over the turquoise ocean that was really Lake Tahoe. There were a lot of beautiful places in the world, but the clear teal water stood like a gemstone set amid a halo of evergreen forests