Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 74655 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 299(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74655 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 299(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
I ignore her and walk off, fists clenched.
Fuck me.
This fucking sucks.
I should never have put my cock in her.
Because now I can’t get her out of my head.
And worse.
My heart.
-16-
NOW – CHARLIE
I sit on an old wooden post surrounding a paddock at Scarlett’s ranch. I hate admitting it, more than anything, but I’m hurt, gutted even, at what I heard Koda telling Maverick this morning. That I’m just pussy. Nothing special. Last night, I felt something, deep inside me. I felt, for the first time in forever, a warmth and affection for another person outside of my mother.
He got in.
And then he crushed me.
I’ve been a lot of things in my life but hearing someone I gave a tiny piece of myself to calling me just pussy hurt.
I fight back the tears because I’m horrified by them. I rarely cry, rarely. In fact, I honestly can’t remember the last time I did. So, the fact that I’m letting some asshole make me feel any less is frustrating me and making me angrier and angrier by the second. I didn’t deserve that, especially not from him.
“Hey.”
I take a shaky breath and look to my left to see Scarlett climbing onto the railing beside me. She leans over, tucking her arms on so she doesn’t fall back, and stares right at me. Those intuitive brown eyes digging right into my pain and stirring it around. She knows something is wrong. She’s far too clued on not to.
“What happened between you and Koda?”
I hate what happens next.
I hate that I feel so hurt that my eyes burn and my lips shake.
I don’t cry, I refuse to fucking cry, but it takes a lot to fight it off.
“We had sex, last night ... twice.”
Her mouth drops open, and she puts a hand up. “Whoa, wait, what?”
“It kind of just ... happened. I don’t know. But it was incredible, Scarlett. I felt something, something I haven’t felt in such a long time. It was real. We talked. He opened up about his brother. We connected on a level I’ve never connected with another person, and then this morning I heard him telling Maverick I was just pussy. Nothing special.”
For a moment, Scarlett doesn’t say anything, and a million thoughts flitter through my mind. Like, is she thinking it’s my own fault for sleeping with him, when I knew he was hard? I mean, she would be right. I did know he was hard, and broken, and twisty, and everything I probably shouldn’t have slept with. I know all of this, very well. But even though all of that, his words still hurt. A whole lot. Because I didn’t truly expect it from him.
“I swear ...” Scarlett’s voice is angry, shaking from the frustration. “I’m going to go in there and rip his balls off. Then I’m going to rip Maverick’s balls off for not doing it when he said that.”
I smile through the burning that has now moved to my nostrils. “Maverick was good about it, I heard him sticking up for me.”
“He should have done more, he should have knocked Koda fair on his ass. I’m so angry. How dare he? Who the hell does he think he is? If he wants just pussy, he could get it from anywhere and he damn well knows it. He chose you, and he has the ...” She clenches her fists. “Nerve. The nerve! To say something like that.”
“It’s okay. I’m just shocked, I guess. I didn’t realize it meant so little. But maybe that’s my own fault, maybe I shouldn’t have thought it was anything more than it was. Maybe I’m to blame.”
She spins around and stares at me. “Do not let me hear you say that again. Koda has a big stick up his ass. I don’t think he remembers how to be a decent human being anymore. We’ve all had a past, but he’s letting his control who he is now and everything he is going to be. He is making that choice, and it’s a bad one.”
She’s right about that, I can’t argue.
Everyone has something in their past that bothers them. Everyone. The problem is, it either guides your path and makes you a better person, or it puts cracks in it, and makes you trip your way along. Koda has chosen to trip, when really, he could stop, stare at the mess, and choose another path. I had a hard life, too. But I refuse to let it define me.
But Koda lives with a deep guilt, something he seems unable to let go of.
“Now I’m going to be stuck with him, alone out here, until you guys come back again.”
Scarlett purses her lips. “I could see if Maverick might let me stay. I mean, there is a bunch of stuff I could be doing on this ranch. I’m going back on tour in a few months, once we’re finished with this album, so it would be nice to have some time out, ride my horses, things like that.”