Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 71212 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 237(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71212 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 237(@300wpm)
“I’ve got you, you’re okay.” Gabe’s voice in my ear, mooring me to reality. I breathed him in, not caring that my ribs were being squeezed tight.
After a few more seconds, the chaos seemed to calm. Gabe unraveled around me, his weight lifting. I got back up on my feet and turned to the doorway.
“Eric?” I asked, shocked.
And Noah, standing at his side. The two of them looked shaken but relieved. Noah turned on the light, and Eric lowered his gun. Behind me, Steven groaned against the wall, clutching at his bleeding shoulder. Mason helped him apply pressure while Gabe quickly snatched away the needle and the knife.
“When you didn’t come back from the bathroom, I knew something was up. Noah reminded me you were sharing your location with us, so we followed you back here.” He shook his head, gun still aimed at Steven. “I’m starting to think I need to find new friends. Ones that don’t have me using my gun every other month.”
Miraculously, somehow, the cheery sound of broken laughter bubbled up from somewhere far, far down in my chest. Noah was already on the phone with the police, Jake and Colton barreling down the hallway and into my bedroom.
Gabe helped me out into the living room, where Tia, Jess, and Yvette were waiting for me. Yvette tossed a blanket over my shoulders, and Jess handed one to a still-half-naked Gabriel. The rest of the night whirred past in a blur. I couldn’t tell which way was up and which was down. The cops came and took Mason away in handcuffs while the EMTs wheeled Steven away on a stretcher. They collected all the toxins and needles as evidence and left me and my friends alone after about an hour or two of rummaging through my house.
“So,” I said, looking around at the tired faces of the people I loved the most in this world. “Where y’all from?”
The group broke into a smattering of laughter and smiles, and I knew in my heart of hearts that everything would be okay.
31
TRISTAN HALL
The sunlight beamed in through the window, shining off the freshly mopped hardwood floors. The clean scent of Pine-Sol filled the living room as Gabriel fluffed up a mint-green pillow, and I folded a fluffy beige blanket, placing it in a messy (but still neat) wicker basket with the rest of the blankets. I looked over at Gabe as he bent down to pick up a rogue sock I had left under the couch. He lifted it in the air and shook it, eyebrow arched.
“Whoops,” I said, snatching it from his hand before moving in for a quick kiss.
The quick kiss turned into a heated one, well, pretty quickly. It never failed. Feeling Gabe’s hard, muscular body against mine always got my engines revving. I wrapped my arms around him and held him against me, my head on his chest, his heartbeat working a familiar rhythm.
Padam. Padam.
I closed my eyes and let myself drift off on a lazy river of pure love.
God, how I loved this man with every single fiber of my being. He was a part of me, a part of my history and my future. The shit we’d been through was enough to fill up a five-season arc on the wildest soap opera on TV, and somehow, we had made it through unscathed. It was a testament to how we were meant to be, how our happy ever after was always written down in the pages of our story.
Between us, both of us were getting way more excited than a hug usually entailed. I could feel him stiffen against me. If it wasn’t for the fact that we were about to entertain guests in our new home, then I’d have dropped to my knees and taken him in my mouth about forty-five seconds ago.
Instead, I reached down and gave him a playful squeeze, kissing his neck and peeling myself off him before we both got carried away.
“I think Noah said he was like five minutes away.”
“I can do it in three,” Gabe teased, grabbing himself before kissing me again. The doorbell rang, earning a playful eye roll from him. We took a second to cool off before I went over to the door, opening it and seeing a smiling Jess and Tia. They held out two bottles of bright pink rosé, yellow bows wrapped around their centers.
“You guys didn’t mention you moved into Mariah Carey’s old estate,” Jess said, stepping inside with her jaw slack.
“Seriously. I think we had to give a drop of blood just to get through security.”
“It’s not that intense,” I say as I grab the bottles and thank them both with hugs. “The retinal scans are a little weird.”
Gabe chuckled at my joke. “And that’s after I complained to the HOA that the rectal scans were a little too much. Thankfully, they took those out.”