Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 74604 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74604 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Or waking up with him every morning, drinking coffee in bed while we discussed our days ahead.
Or sneaking off to an Italian villa for a week or two.
The thing was, objectively, even if that was the wish for both of us, it didn’t work in practical application.
His life was in Navesink Bank.
Mine was in the city.
Sure, yes, it wasn’t that far, but it was over an hour out of our days in both directions when we wanted to spend some time together.
And some cynical, jaded part of me knew that over time, it would get tedious, then old, until it eventually became untenable. Then fell apart.
It probably wasn’t great that my mind went to the end when we were just limbering up at the starting line.
But it was a defense mechanism. If I could look at all the potential ways things could get really ugly and painful, it made it possible for me to save myself from that. Or, at least, that was what I’d found so far in my life.
I hadn’t had much opportunity to try to apply that skill to relationships, seeing as I just… hadn’t had one in a long time.
Still, yeah, it seemed smart to hold myself back from being too needy, too clingy, too over the top with my feelings.
As a whole, I was someone who liked to lead, who enjoyed setting the pace and allowing others to fall behind. Just this once, though, I was going to follow Brock’s lead.
I guess it came down to not wanting to make a fool of myself. I didn’t want to get vulnerable, have him shoot me down, and need to live with that embarrassment.
It was better to take it slow, to feel him out.
So it was good that I was taking a little time to myself, away from him, before we spent the night together.
It didn’t even occur to me that it was weird that Mitchell hadn’t come out to open my door. I guess I figured maybe he thought that Brock was with me, so he would get my door.
It wasn’t a big deal.
I could get my own door.
And my mind was on the menu at the restaurant that we were heading to, since I hated the pressure of having the server waiting to take your order, and not being ready.
So I didn’t immediately look up toward the front.
“Traffic is awful today,” I murmured as I took a long sip of the coffee that was waiting for me. Mitchell didn’t always grab me coffee, but when he was getting himself one, he always grabbed me one. “It might be smart to just leave the car parked, and take off on foot if you need to go run some errands or get food,” I added, drinking more.
It wasn’t until then, when I still didn’t get a response from Mitchell, that I looked up.
And like some damn horror movie, the doors clicked lock as I realized that the person in the driver’s seat wasn’t Mitchell at all.
Mitchell, after all, was a little on the shorter side with wide shoulders and reddish-brown hair.
Whoever this was, was tall and narrower with kind of shaggy dirty blond hair.
It didn’t click, not for a long moment, that I knew the driver. All I could focus on was the panic building in my system as my hand went to the door, and found that the child locks were on, and I couldn’t escape. And that I was likely trapped in a moving car with my stalker and would-be murderer.
“Let me out of this car,” I shrieked, slapping my hand on the window as if anyone could hear me, let alone see me with the dark tint on the windows. “You don’t have to do this!” I added, my heart hammering in my chest as a cold sweat broke out across my whole body.
“No, Miranda, I don’t,” a voice said. “But I want to.”
I was so consumed with my terror that I didn’t realize immediately that I recognized that voice, that I’d heard it many times over the past few years.
When it finally did click, though, my gaze shot to the rearview mirror, where I found his eyes looking back at me, crinkled at the edges like he was smiling, like he was taking pleasure in my fear.
“Ritchie.” His name hissed out of me as my mind raced with this new information.
Ritchie?
In what world could it be my assistant and best friend’s boyfriend who wanted me dead?
I mean, yes, I had fired him. But that was a while ago. Had he been festering this whole time? Over a small advertising job? When Cam was making the kind of money he was making, the kind of money that meant that Ritchie didn’t even need to work anymore. And, as a verified slacker, that should have been exactly what he wanted. To sit around and do nothing, but enjoy the fruits of someone else’s labor.