My Fake Christmas Fiance (Kane Christmas #1) - Julie Kriss Page 0,50

I asked her.

Her face went blank again, and she shook her head. “I just think…the sooner this gets done the better, I guess. So it’s fortunate that he’s willing to help.”

I snorted to cover the fact that her words felt like a punch to the chest. “He’s willing to help for a hefty fee.”

“In any case, it’s fortunate.”

“Sure it is.”

“Because we don’t want to be married,” Penny said. “At least, I don’t. Do you?”

I was starting to get used to the hurt, a throb somewhere deep in my chest. Let her go. “No, I don’t want to be married,” I told her. “At all.”

She bit her lip and nodded.

We drove on in silence, because that was all we had to say.

Chapter 22

Penny

I didn’t know what the hell was wrong with me. I wondered if maybe I was cracking up, for good this time. Getting married and then divorced in the same twenty-four-hour span would do that to a girl.

Or maybe it had just done it to me.

My heart was beating tightly somewhere in my throat and my mind was spinning. I was angry and anxious and nervous, and Wes was right there, with all of his masculine gorgeousness and his blue eyes and his tousled hair, his scent and his presence. All I could think about was last night, about how it had felt to be with him. And before that, the party. And the wedding.

All of it. I kept thinking about all of it.

But in contrast to the chaos going on inside me, I knew that on the outside I was choked up. I couldn’t look at Wes, because every time I did, I wanted to throw myself at him. I couldn’t talk, because every time I opened my mouth I wanted to tell him he was the best thing that had ever happened to me and then beg him never to leave me again.

And I couldn’t. He didn’t want to be married to me, or to anyone; he’d made that clear. If I begged him now, if I broke down, he’d only feel sorry for me. And maybe he’d give me a reprieve for a week or two, but in the end, pity wasn’t something to base a marriage on. It was just…pity. It wasn’t love.

I wanted love. I hadn’t known it until this week, but it was true. I wanted someone who loved me, and only me, forever. And since that wasn’t how Wes felt about me, it was best to get the pain over with now.

I blinked hard, staring at the signs for Colorado Springs as they flew past the window. How many more hours did I have before I was divorced? How much longer was my marriage going to last? Two hours? Three? How many minutes was that?

Was it only going to be one hundred and eighty minutes before Wes wasn’t my husband anymore?

Once it was over, he was going to date other women. The thought made me want to curl up in a ball of agonized pain, and it also made me want to dump my coffee over his head. So in typical Penny fashion, I did neither. I just sat there, hurt and frozen and afraid.

Mostly afraid.

It was strange. I’d completely changed my life, moved to a new city, rented a place sight unseen and started at a new company. My father had vanished from my life and my stepmother had left soon after. It had been nerve-wracking and sometimes terrifying. But I’d never been terrified like I was right now, as we entered the Colorado Springs city limits and I got closer to divorcing Wes.

I was terrified of our marriage ending, and of it not ending. I was terrified of telling Wes how I felt, and of not telling him. I’d never been this paralyzed, this unsure of what to do. I couldn’t think of anything, so I did nothing.

It pushed Wes away from me, made him angry. And the minutes ticked by.

The offices of Curtis J. Curtis were in a bland office building in downtown Colorado Springs. The air was crisp and cold when we got out of the car, the sky achingly blue. Fresh snow crunched under our feet. There was no one around, because everyone was home for Christmas Day.

Wes led me to the front doors without a word. God, he was gorgeous. How had I ever thought he was just a shallow playboy? He was the best-looking man I’d ever seen. I was familiar with every expression that