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Tonight, we all get a fresh start.

25

DELILAH

There are hangovers that make you regret drinking.

Then there are hangovers that make you want to go back in time, find the first son of a bitch who fermented a grape, and put your fist through his face.

I wake up on the first day of the first year of the rest of my life with my tongue glued to the roof of my mouth and an ice pick wedged behind my forehead. The space heater is blasting to my left, which means half of me is becoming beef jerky while the other half is slowly turned into a cryogenic popsicle.

For several deeply confusing seconds, I don’t know where I am.

Then my shoulder shifts against the vinyl cot and emits a very familiar squeak.

Right. The bakery.

Home sweet commercial kitchen.

I’ve slept here every night since Christmas Eve. To make it sound less depressing, I’ve been calling it Chateau du Boulangerie in my head.

Pretty exclusive joint. Guests receive one complimentary saltine on arrival. Recent upgrades to the plumbing mean that, when you bathe in the sink, you get almost six full minutes of hot water.

For reasons I cannot fathom, the waiting list really isn’t very long.

Only Priya knows I’m living here. To everyone else—insofar as I’ve spoken to anyone else—my whereabouts remain pleasantly vague.

I keep my eyes closed and wait for the night’s memories to return. I’m sure they will remind me that everything went swell, I conducted myself with the grace of a princess, and there’s not one single solitary thing I need to feel embarrassed about this morning.

Erroneous.

Erroneous on all counts.

The memories consist of the following:

Kane’s mouth on mine in the coat closet. Hot. Greedy. Insistent.

The blinding white of a camera flash.

Connor’s signatures blurring across page after page of an expedited divorce agreement.

That’s the major events in chronological order.

Too bad none of it makes any dang sense.

The man kissed me like he’d never get to do it again. Would he give me one single scrap of information as to what he’s thinking?

Uh, no. Duh, of course not.

But would he stick his tongue in my mouth and drag me against his hard body ‘til the cows come home (or ‘til the photographer comes in, as it were)?

Sure would!

Then, boom—here you go, have a divorce for Christmas.

The last part at least wasn’t a surprise. Well, not completely a surprise.

I did ask for the divorce. I simply expected to pay Skye Brewer several thousand dollars for the privilege of having her argue with Connor’s attorneys over who got to maintain custody of our Ninja blender.