“Please, as if I’d ever let you wake up alone in your condition.”
Wrapped in a silk robe, Lana appeared from her bedroom, bypassing the couch for the suite’s modest kitchen. Poking around in the refrigerator, she emerged with two tomato-red drinks filling her hands, bursting with vegetables and bacon, an entire crab leg, and several violently speared cocktail shrimp.
Eyes and legs. The shrimp still had eyes and legs. At eight thirty-five in the morning.
Zoey shuddered.
“Did we have fun last night?” The enjoyment on Lana’s face grew. “Whenever I wake up your shade of green, it’s usually because I had too much fun.”
“I have no idea. Do you have to be so cheerful? Shouldn’t you be miserable too? I’m not the only one who made questionable choices last night.”
Lana shook her head. “Trust me, the first thing one learns in the Montgomery household is to hold one’s liquor in public. I’ll rent the Tourist Trap for us one night and show you the difference.”
“You mean that, don’t you?”
“Of course. Graham would love it. He never passes an opportunity to shirk his workload. Does your head hurt? I’ll get you a cold compress.”
Clutching her face in agony must have clued Lana in.
Setting the drinks down far too close to Zoey’s head, Lana disappeared into the bathroom. Shrimp and tomato smells wafted Zoey’s way, making her gag. She nudged them farther away with her fingers, trying not to look directly in the cocktail shrimp’s terrified little face.
“Call room service for a pickax,” Zoey suggested. “Anything sharp and heavy will be fine.”
Lana reappeared with a wet washcloth, carefully arranging it on Zoey’s forehead with motherly care. “Sorry, dearest, I’m all out of ways for you to cudgel yourself.”
Did she have to look like she’d slept for a month, rested and alert, without a hair out of place? Since Zoey loved her, she didn’t begrudge Lana her luck. But as someone who was certain an animal had died in her mouth in the last twelve hours, Lana’s lack of so much as a stray eyebrow hair disturbed Zoey. Deep in the dark parts of her primitive brain, she knew it was wrong.
So very wrong.
“Why are you glaring at me?” Lana sounded amused. “I put the Growly Bear in your hand, but I’m not the one who poured it down your throat.”
“People who wake up happy aren’t to be trusted.” Staying on the floor and squashing the pillow on top of her washcloth was far easier than crawling back up onto the couch. “Or people with hair like yours.”
“Hmm? Oh, that’s my new sleeping scarf.” Hermès, not that Lana would ever be gauche enough to say the brand. “Just wrap and tie, and you wake up smooth as silk. There’s aspirin on the coffee table.” A teasing tone entered Lana’s voice. “A secret admirer left it for you.”
“Sure they did. I don’t even want to know what room service is charging for painkiller delivery.”
Lana sat on the end of the couch that Zoey’s nonsilky, far less cheerful body had recently vacated, her expression smug.
“Trust me, no one in this place would dare bring almost expired aspirin made by—” Lana leaned over, peering down at the worn packet. “Dr. Sue’s Discount Drugs. Hmm. Maybe you shouldn’t take those after all. I have—”
“Nope. Nope nope nope. None of your ‘pick-me-ups’ or ‘right-as-rains,’ woman. You need a better labeling system. I don’t think your baby aspirin last night were baby aspirin.”
“Why is everyone so suspicious of me?” Lana sighed with playful dramatics. “I haven’t drugged anyone in months.”
“You’re joking.”
The woman on the couch serenely picked up her Bloody Mary.
“I know you’re joking.” Zoey looked at the shrimp. “She’s joking.”
The shrimp stared at her in dismay with beady black eyes and tiny legs that couldn’t escape. Zoey stared right back.
“We both deserved a better morning than this.”
“Drink, you’ll feel better.” Taking a sip of one of the drinks and adjusting the second on a coaster, Lana slid it closer to Zoey. “It’s my family’s special blend. Nothing helps a hangover like a Montgomery Bloody Mary.”
“I’d rather take my chances with Dr. Sue.”
“If you insist.” Seeming disappointed, Lana sighed with a little shrug. “Anyway, you know how my cousin Killian is coming in? He just landed in Anchorage. Brace yourself, because Haleigh and Enzo are with him.”
“Why am I bracing myself?”
Lana rolled her eyes. “Because those two haven’t been sober since primary school. It gets annoying. But still, one must play nice with friends of the family. They flew in from Italy this morning and are still on Rome time, so I promised I would have a bite with them. You know how Killian is. He can’t stand to be alone for a single minute.”
Zoey blinked as her brain tried to keep up. “What am I supposed to know?”
“You’ve met him. The race car Killian, not the polo Killian, although why I have to have two cousins named Killian is ridiculous to me. My aunts are determined to outdo each other, but really, that went too far. Opening Christmas presents was an absolute nightmare of Freudian proportions.”
“I don’t think you’re using Freudian right.”
“Besides,” Lana continued blithely. “Everyone knows polo Killian is far superior to race car Killian. You met Killian at Killian’s polo match. He was so much better, right?”
“Seriously, if you don’t stop talking, I’m going to have to murder you. I mean it, Lana. This is an actual threat.”
Lana patted her limp, hungover foot. “You remember. We were in Greece.”
“Nope. I have been to zero polo matches with you, and I most definitely have never been to polo matches in Greece. That’s one of your other post-inebriated friends.”
“Are you so miserable?” Offering a true look of sympathy, Lana patted her again.
“I don’t even remember my own name right now.” Zoey unscrewed the water bottle top, wincing at her breath as she tore into the worn aspirin package with her teeth, then popped the pills. “Did I make an idiot of myself last night?”
“You’re asking the wrong person. Something tall, dark, and handsome brought you home.” Lana waggled her eyebrows. At Zoey’s horrified expression, she laughed. “It wasn’t like that. Graham Barnett would rather sit naked on a lake in winter than have a one-night stand with a tourist.” She emphasized the word as if she’d said Zoey was a pile of moose poop. “Although the hotel is positively dying with the gossip of it.”
Which was exactly what Zoey needed. She already felt entirely outclassed by the other clientele, and being the drunk moose poop girl was not on her dream list of Alaskan experiences.
“So, brunch?” Lana nudged the Bloody Mary closer with her manicured fingernails.
“You’re serious.” Zoey hid her face back in the pillow, where it was dark and nothing spun or stared at her with shrimpy eyes. “She’s serious,” she muttered to no one specific.
Lana’s phone chirped and she reached for it, quickly scanning her incoming messages. “Meatball in my party in an hour? What?”
Zoey’s dull brain couldn’t help working through that puzzle. “Sounds like his phone doesn’t like his voice,” she grumbled into the pillow. “That must translate to ‘meet me in the lobby in an hour.’”
“I can’t believe he’s texting through dictation. Yes, I will be there when I’m ready. You have fingers, Killian. Text like a human being.” Setting her phone aside, she turned her bright, disgustingly cheerfulness Zoey’s way. “You’re coming to brunch, right?”
“With your crazy rich cousin and his friends still on Rome time? Oh no. Not a chance.”
“But, Zoey—”
“Nope. I am too…what’s your word for it? Peaked. I’m too peaked for brunch with the whosits.”
“Oh, these are definitely not the whosits. Haleigh and Enzo are firmly in whatsits territory. New money is always about what they are, not who. Don’t worry. You’ll perk right up. A little smoked trout and toast and you’ll be right as rain. The brunch here is absolutely divine.”
Now, for the record, Zoey wasn’t the pickiest of eaters. But in the last twenty-four hours, she’d only consumed a gummy bear drowning in alcohol and a hot dog made of Dasher or Dancer.
There would be no smoked trout and toast. Not over Zoey’s dead body.
“Give the whatsits my regards. I’m going to go barf for a while.”
“Oh, love. You really are unwell, aren’t you?”
“Not really. Just dramatic and embarrassed.”
Smiling with sympathy, Lana scooted closer and smoothed her hand over Zoey’s head. “Graham’s drinks can drop a tank. If you hadn’t gotten tipsy, I’d be shocked. Drink your Bloody Mary.”
“Lana? Why did Graham bring me home?”
“Because he lit up like a Christmas tree when he set eyes on you. And since you’re on vacation and haven’t been on a date since—what was his name?”
“We don’t say his name.”
“Since no-name, I thought it might be fun to see what he’d do about it.”
“And that didn’t seem like…I don’t know…a potentially dangerous situation to you?”
“With Graham Barnett? That boy is as sweet as they come. Besides, I was watching you through the diner windows the entire time.” She waggled her eyebrows again. “And then I followed him to the hotel. It was tons of fun, all sneaking about like a Hamburglar, watching him sweep you up in those masculine, rugged arms. Would you like to see the pictures?”
“I don’t want to hear any more.” Zoey covered her face with the pillow. “There’s too much wrong with all of this.”