I wake to a ringing phone.
My head pounds, and the room is too bright even with my eyes closed. I’m still lying in the bed at the Crown Plaza Hotel, the sheets tangled around my legs, otherwisenaked.
But Ronan is gone without a trace.
The hotel phone keeps ringing off the hook. Whoever is calling refuses to give up anytime soon.
It takes me a second to even sit up.
I’m groggy and disoriented, partially hung over from all the wine and champagne I had last night, as I reach for the hotel phone on the nightstand and answer.
“Hello?” I rasp.
“Good morning, Mrs. Callahan,” a polite voice replies. “This is the front desk. I’m calling to let you know you have some visitors here to collect you.”
I blink, trying to make sense of the words. “Visitors? What visitors?”
Before the clerk can answer, there’s a sharp knock at the door.
I rub my eyes, trying to clear the fog from my brain, slide on the complementary hotel robe, and pad over to the door on the other side of the huge hotel suite.
The door’s barely open before it’s being shoved the rest of the way. An older portly woman and three men stride in like this is their suite, not mine.
I scream and back up, my heart doing a flip. “What the?—”
“Calm yourself, love,” the woman says in a thick Irish accent, waving a dismissive hand. “I’m Oona, keeper of the house.” She looks me up and down, unimpressed. “And you’re comin’ with me.”
I stare at her in confusion. “What? No… I’m not?—”
“Callahan House,” she clarifies, as if that explains everything. “You’ll be livin’ there now, won’t ya?”
“I’m going nowhere!” I snap, backing away. “Where’s Ronan?”
But my protests go ignored.
The three men—each as broad shouldered and stone faced as the next—start collecting my things.
My wedding dress. My heels. My veil.
The discarded pair of panties Ronan had impatiently removed.
My whole face warms as I watch them in disbelief.
Oona sighs and digs into a tote bag, pulling out a plain gray sweater and a pair of jeans. She tosses them at me. “Figured he’d leave you with a wet arse and nothin’ else to wear. He’s a Callahan man, alright.”
“Excuse me?” I clutch the clothes to my chest, indignant.
“Get dressed, love. We haven’t got all day.”
Everything’s a whirlwind. I get dressed in a daze, pulling on the sweater and jeans—both of which fit surprisingly well—and then I’m ushered out of the Crown Plaza Hotel into a gold Rolls-Royce parked outside.
The morning air is crisper than usual, even for this time in November.
The city itself is already awake, people rushing past on the sidewalk.
I’m shoved into the back seat, Oona sliding in beside me. The door slams shut, then we’re pulling into traffic.
“What’s going on?” I demand, finally finding my voice again. “Where are we going?”