Now Hailey’s browsreallycrunched. “Sure.” She looked around at the rest of the group. “You guys are on board, right?”
Though they looked as puzzled as Hailey, they each nodded in agreement.
Reece slid his hand around Neve’s forearm, surprised he could not only touch his fingertips, but that they overlapped. “Guess we better get a move on, huh?”
They all stood at once, and Hailey held out a blueberry muffin. “Neve, take this. No offense, but you don’t look so hot. I think you need to get something into your stomach.”
“Thanks, but I don’t think I can eat right now,” she croaked. She turned and hustled toward their bank of rooms.
Reece glanced at a dismayed Hailey. “She’s just a little hungover and a lot shocked. You said we each have the video Alma shot?” Hailey nodded slowly. “So that means I have her number on my phone?”
“No, that came from me. But I do have Alma’s number. Do you need me to text it to you?”
“Yeah, I do. Thanks, Hail.”
While Hailey tapped on her phone, Noah shoved his hands into his front pockets. “Why do you need Alma’s number, bro?”
“Later.” He hurried after Neve.
By the time he reached her, she was pacing in a tight circle at the foot of the bed, waving her hands in front of her face as though trying to cool down. But she wasn’t trying to cool down. She was in full-on panic mode.
Her entire body jerked toward him as if she hadn’t realized he stood there. Her eyes went wild. “You need to call Alma right now so we can find out how to undo this … this terrible mistake. If we have to stay behind and fly home on our own later tonight, then it’s worth it to get this resolved.”
He pulled up the number Hailey had texted and tapped it. One ring, and it went straight to a recorded message that told him Alma and Elvin weren’t available until after the Thanksgiving holiday. He could feel free to leave a voicemail, but they wouldn’t be checking messages until theyreturned. In the meantime, if they were looking to get married, her voice cheerfully listed two other chapels that could accommodate them.
Reece hung up. Neve searched his face, desperation etched in her features. He wanted to pull her against him and hold her, soothe away the fright. Instead, he let his hands hang awkwardly at his sides as he worked through the kindest way to break it to her.
In the end, he simply said, “I have some bad news.”
Chapter 12
Not Amused
After Reece filled Nevein on Elvin and Alma’s sudden departure, he stood stock-still and stared at her with that infuriatingly bland expression of his. Like he was waiting for her head to explode so he could pick up the pieces. The whole time, calculations seemed to stream behind his moss-green eyes.
She was racing through a reckoning of her own, trying to figure out how two logical, mature adults let themselves get here and how soon they could untangle this quicksand they had run into willingly. Drunk on their asses, maybe, but with eyes wide open nevertheless.
“Doesn’t appear we’re going to be able to resolve this today,” he ventured. “But I think there’s a more urgent question here that we need answered.” She gave him an encouraging nod, and he rushed ahead. “Are we officiallymarried?”
“I’m pretty sure we are. I mean, didn’t you see the video? And there’s the license. We did this, Reece! I don’t know what possessed us, but that’s irrelevant at the moment. It’s done. And we need to figure out how toundo it.”
He held up his hands. “Why don’t I make a call to the clerk’s office and find out what the rules are?”
Neve threw out a frustrated hand. She needed to dosomethingto dispel the tension crackling in her bloodstream. “It’s Thanksgiving. They’re closed!”
His hands went to his squared-off hips. “You’re right. I guess that means I won’t be able to get hold of an attorney today either. Wait a sec.” His eyes lit up. “How did we get a license last night if we didn’t go to the county courthouse first? Maybe it’snotlegit.”
Her shoulders drooped. “Great thought, but I just remembered something Elvin said when Charlie asked him the same thing. He talked about commercial chapels in Nevada having the right to issue licenses.”
“I take it their chapel is considered commercial.”
“Yep.” Strange how Neve couldn’t remember saying “I do” or that passion-packed kiss, but she could remember Charlie and Elvin discussing state laws around licenses.
Good Lord! Was she blocking out the entire episode?
Reece whipped out his phone. “I’m looking up the chapel right now.” He scrolled, and she held her breath. His shoulders sagged. “They include a license processing service with their wedding packages. Sounds like that license is the real deal after all.” Reece’s voice had been emotionless, a flat monotone, but now it climbed a little higher, grew a little louder as his level of panic seemed to rise.
Neve had been leaning on his calm demeanor to keep her own freak-out-o-meter in check, and she didn’t need him falling off the edge of rational right now. If he did, they would go over the precipice, and there would be nothing soft about their landing.
