Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 146548 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 733(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 146548 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 733(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Yeah, he still does that.
Other pictures are from my family’s social media, and then there are paparazzi photos. Like one where we’re on a date at a baseball game. Waiting in the ticket line. Choosing to be normal and not bypass the crowds.
Paparazzi were everywhere, but I didn’t care. Neither did he.
In the photo, his hand is in my back pocket, and I’m laughing. I didn’t see his smile or his expression in that moment, but I look at it now.
Farrow is staring at me with palpable, overwhelming love. Enrapt with my whole essence. Like I’m joy and his happiness.
It knocks me backward.
“Have you seen these articles of us on Famous Now?” I ask Farrow while I take a screenshot of that baseball photo. I like it.
A lot.
I screenshot more pics. I like this site since there’s no malicious intent attached. The intro summary at the top is brief to describe us, and it doesn’t bother me.
Farrow shuffles more papers, and then says, “Alphas Like Us?”
“Yeah.”
That’s the title of the daily series.
Alphas Like Us.
Based off the summary:
Admittedly territorial, admittedly protective, Maximoff Hale and his new boyfriend are the couple of the year. Whether you love them or hate them, they’re everywhere.
“Donnelly sent me a link,” Farrow says. “You should scroll and see if you can find the photo where you look infatuated with me. That’s my favorite one.”
He might be fucking with me, but I scroll anyway. Quickly, I realize that I look sickly in love in practically every damn one. Like I’m sixteen again with a major crush on Farrow Redford Keene, a crush that needs to be restrained.
Immediately.
But I start thinking…
I got the guy.
I’m with my crush.
My crush wants marriage. And kids.
With me.
Eventually.
I rub my face; my cheeks hurt as my grimace becomes a smile. “This must be an imaginary photo,” I tell Farrow because there’s no way in hell I’m admitting to the truth.
“Not imaginary,” Farrow says. “It’s all of them—”
Thwack, thwack, thwack, thwack. My back straightens, and I smack my flashlight that flickers.
“Maximoff? Talk to me.”
“Do you have access to the security cameras outside?” I climb off the bed and leave my phone on the mattress, still on speaker. Then I grab my switchblade in my right hand, flashlight staying in my left.
“No. Not anymore.” Long strained silence passes through the line. I know Farrow hates that he’s not able to protect me, and he’s stuck across the city. “I’m texting Bruno to check the cameras,” he says. “Don’t open the window.”
My floorboards squeak beneath my weight, and I near the blowing curtains. Thwack.
Thwack. That can’t be a rock. It’s all I can think. Not a rock.
Not a brick.
Not a baseball.
“Are you scared?” Farrow asks since I’m not speaking.
“No…” My pulse pounds, but not out of fear. “I just want to know what the fuck it is.” I turn off my flashlight, and I draw open the curtain. Revealing the shut blinds.
Thwack.
A hard object bangs the glass, and I hear something else from outside. Buzzing. But not like a phone vibration. More like whirling…
“Shit, this is killing me,” Farrow says, close to pained. His unsaid words: I wish I were there.
I glance back at the phone on the bed, my stomach coiling. If he were here, he’d be right next to me, and he wouldn’t stop me. We both would do exactly what I’m about to do. Only we’d do it together.
“I’m not opening the window,” I assure him. “It’s probably nothing.”
“Stay on the line with me.”
“I will.” Wind howls, and I use the blade of my knife and lift up a blind. And then I peek out. Thwack. I don’t flinch. The heavy, whirling object…
“It’s a drone,” I tell Farrow as this mechanical helicopter thing flies into the window again. Thwack. “It has a sign. It says…” In big bold letters, someone wrote on a piece of paper. “…I see you.” A chill pricks my neck.
I see you.
Farrow goes quiet.
I back away uneasily, the blind shutting. “I think there’s a camera on the drone.” It could belong to anyone, and I don’t care which human decided it’d be fun to film me in my bedroom.
It’s fucked up.
Flying drones over private property is a gray legal area, but coming onto private property to shoot footage of me is pretty much illegal.
Paparazzi always stay on the sidewalk for a reason. As long as journalists don’t use telephoto lenses to look into my bedroom and don’t harass or trespass, they can get away with a hell of a lot on public property.
“You okay?” Farrow asks.
“I’m going to check on Luna and Jane, and then I’ll call the Tri-Force to handle it.” Anything that veers into lawsuit territory, they deal with.
“Okay, but that’s not what I asked,” he says in that matter-of-fact voice. I miss the face that goes with it.