In front of her, the world shimmered into focus.
Bright light glared.
Avery’s condo . . . commando stripper . . . it all came back in a breath.
Fuzzy pain sat in the back of her neck and threatened serious pain if she didn’t change position.
She shifted and closed her eyes.
The guttural sound of someone attempting to empty their stomach shot her into action.
Lori zeroed in on the noise.
Avery, God love her, had made it halfway to the stone and lacquer bathroom before losing the previous evening’s indulgence.
Choking back the involuntary desire to follow Avery’s stomach, Lori swallowed hard, moved past the mess, and grasped the girl’s hair as she found the toilet.
“Oh, God.”
Lori wasn’t sure who was praying to the porcelain throne, Avery or her . . . but one of them was exclaiming something.
“I got ya,” Lori said as she closed her eyes and thought of rainbows and unicorns.
Avery emptied her stomach, the hard way, into the pristine white Kohler toilet.
Just when Lori thought the worst was over, it wasn’t.
“Oh, damn.”
Lori sucked air in through her mouth.
Only when the sound of the toilet flushing hit her ears did Lori open her eyes. “You good?”
Avery heaved.
Nope.
Two minutes later . . .
For every day she sat at her desk charging five hundred dollars an hour for her efforts, this wasn’t one of them.
Nurses, Lori decided then and there, deserved a half-off deal when they showed up looking for representation.
“One too many tequila shots.”
Avery’s comment had Lori grinning. “Or five.”
Avery leaned against the tub, head in her hands. “You said my divorce wasn’t going to be painful.”
Laughing, Lori said, “Your divorce was final before Patrón and Detective Dan.”
Avery opened one eye. “Was that his name?”
“I never got his name.”
“He was firm.”
Lori grinned, thinking of the fake stripper cop. “Everywhere.”
They both laughed.
“Stop, it hurts.”
“C’mon.” Lori helped Avery to her feet and down the hall.
“I need to clean that.” Avery turned her head away from her own mess.
“I got ya.” Or she’d call someone from an emergency maid service with combat pay who would get it.
After placing Avery on her sofa, Lori turned to the open kitchen. “Coffee.”
Avery moaned.
“For me. You get crackers and ice chips until noon.”
A fancy single serving coffee dispenser was a divorce gift from one of Avery’s friends. Lori had cracked it open after midnight in an effort to sober up a few guests before they left.
Most of them went by way of overtipped Uber drivers.
“That party was epic.”
Lori felt five years past the epic days of her life. “It was memorable.”
A coffee cup made it under the stream of hot cappuccino. Just the smell helped her headache.
“I’m really divorced?” Avery asked on a sigh.
“Yep.”
“And my bank account has five million dollars in it?”
“Yep.”
Avery’s laugh started low and built. Lori smiled as she lifted the coffee cup for her first taste.
“Bernie’s a nice man, he just needs . . .”
“Someone closer to his age?”
“Yeah.”
Lori avoided conversations with her clients during their marriages unless something legal came up. And since most of the time she represented both parties in these “arranged marriages,” from prenup to divorce, it was best to stand clear.
Alliance, a successful marriage-for-hire service for the rich and famous who needed a spouse quickly and quietly, was Sam’s brainchild. The marriages were designed to be temporary, twelve to twenty-four months, including a six-month uncontested divorce grace period. Sam often fostered the relationship with the payees, mainly women, where Lori dealt with the payers, often men. Lori wasn’t an employee of Alliance per se, but she did financially benefit from every prenuptial agreement she wrote up, and again when the couple split.
Once the divorces were final, Lori often took on the role of transitioning the divorcées from “married to a rich man” to “cast-off wife.” And yes, Sam paid her for that service as well.
Even though her role with Alliance went beyond the professional scope of a divorce attorney, she didn’t mind. Her involvement kept her clients out of the papers and on the path to the happiness they sought when they entered into their counterfeit marriages.