Total pages in book: 152
Estimated words: 156146 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 781(@200wpm)___ 625(@250wpm)___ 520(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 156146 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 781(@200wpm)___ 625(@250wpm)___ 520(@300wpm)
“I’m not playing any games,” I returned.
His eyes dropped to his coat then came back to mine.
“Your mom’s a movie star and still, I spent time getting to know her tonight, finding out she’s one of the most down-to-earth ladies I’ve ever met. Even in red satin. What’s your excuse?”
“I hardly wore this for you,” I scoffed.
“Who’d you wear it for? Shasta?” he retorted.
Shasta was Bowie’s husky dog, one of three dogs and two cats (and a rabbit) in his (and now Mom’s) menagerie.
But oh no.
He did not.
He did not get to think anything I did was for him.
I straightened, which meant his coat that I happened to be wearing brushed his chest.
“I don’t dress for men,” I hissed.
“Coulda fooled me,” he fired back.
“You have a high opinion of yourself.”
“Not really. Though I didn’t think he was, turns out tonight my buddy Rix was my wingman. ’Cause he tells me, when I wasn’t looking at you, you were looking right at me.”
Rix.
This indubitably was his rough-hewn, handsome friend.
Damn it all.
When I was on my game, I could sniff out a wingman from twenty paces.
But even not on my game…
What was I thinking?
He read my face, I knew he did when he grunted, “Yeah.”
“I’ll have you know, Judge Oakley—”
“Know my last name, do you?” he inquired drily. “You pretend you weren’t into me to someone, even though you asked about that?”
Oh my God!
He wasn’t to be believed!
“Yeah, babe, I get this shit,” he declared. “Been here, done this kinda crap too many times.”
“You could have kept far away,” as you have all night, I did not finish.
His brows rammed down. “When you floated out here wearing material that has zero insulation properties? I know an invitation when I see one.”
Oh…my…God!
He wasn’t to be believed!
“I didn’t come out here as an invitation to you, Judge,” I snapped.
“You also didn’t refuse my coat, or my company,” he returned. Then punctuated that with the highly effective, “Again.”
I lifted my hands toward the coat to do the first in order to move on to the last.
“Don’t even fucking think about it,” he warned low.
I stopped moving because no one had ever spoken to me like that.
No one.
And I detested it.
Just about as much as it turned me on.
God damn it.
“Seriously, you’re gonna freeze to goddamn death,” he snarled.
“It isn’t your concern.”
“Chloe—”
I shook my head. “No, Judge. Whatever you think this is—”
“I know what it is.”
All right.
I was getting angry.
“You know nothing,” I bit.
“I know you laid me out at Wild Iris, but if you hadn’t done that, and instead gave me some time, we could’ve shared our coffees that day. Stopped the bullshit and got to know each other. And maybe made plans to do that some more. And probably made more plans. Until you shared what was behind your big speech and I could have been there for you in whatever way you might’ve needed me. That didn’t happen. You assumed I was an asshole. You assumed I had no intentions other than to get me some. You assumed I treat women like trash. And then you left me with nothing but worry for you. And tonight, when we could clear things up, you made a bullshit play.”
The worst part about that?
I had.
I’d assumed, even so far as accused him of being all those things.
I said them right to his face.
“Instead,” he went on, “I found out from some gossip bitch on freaking YouTube, for fuck’s sake, about all the heavy you’ve been dealing with, your family’s been dealing with…”
My mind froze and so did my body as I stared up at him.
But he didn’t seem to notice.
Ten!
“…and I spent the time between then and now concerned for you because that heavy is really fucking heavy. I get here tonight, hoping to clear the air and see where you’re at, but I find you’ve got no intention to be real. I suspect you’ve got a quota of how often you’re real, really real, and you hit that when you spouted all that shit to me at the coffeehouse.”
Six!
“Now who’s making assumptions?” I asked.
Five!
“Correction,” he gritted. “Educated guesses that come not only from your behavior, but experience.”
Four!
“Well, it seems you should steer clear of a woman like me.”
Three!
“Seems that way.”
We glowered at each other.
Two!
“It also seems like it’s going to be another banner year,” I remarked sarcastically.
One!
Happy New Year!
The shouts and squeals and hoots came from inside, so happy and loud they were barely muted by the double-paned glass.
And Judge’s hand came out of nowhere, curling around the side of my neck, his thumb under my jaw pushing up, tilting my face to his.
Then his mouth was on mine, warm and firm.
Now, I would spend a great deal of time on a great number of occasions from that moment onward wondering why I did what I did next (it was weak (and inaccurate), but I blamed New Year’s).