Total pages in book: 130
Estimated words: 121990 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 610(@200wpm)___ 488(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121990 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 610(@200wpm)___ 488(@250wpm)___ 407(@300wpm)
Zane snorted and pushed Roach’s messy hair into place with a few gentle strokes. If Roach didn’t want to talk about the past anymore, he would not push. “Can you actually play poker?”
“I’m not good at it, but I know the rules. It wouldn’t matter if I have experience since we’d be cheating anyway.” Roach kissed him on the bridge of the nose.
Zane pressed closer, toppling over the cliff as he dove into the green depths of Roach’s eyes. “And if we don’t manage to get the curse off, we could always join the circus.”
Roach laughed, and despite the slight headache, Zane felt perfectly cozy with him in the comforter cocoon. “As what? Freak show? Magicians?”
Zane lay his head on Roach’s arm and glanced at him, rolling his fingertips up and down the thick neck. “I’d be the magician, and you’d be my beautiful assistant.”
“Me? Maybe if you gave me a mask and I went to the gym more.”
Zane stilled, his heart thumping in his chest like a wild animal. “You’re kidding. As the hotter one, you must be the assistant and distract people with your naked chest when my tricks don’t work out.”
Roach just laughed. “Everyone who looks at us knows you’re the hot one. With all that hair, and those cheekbones, even now, with your nose all red. You took my breath away when I first saw you. I didn’t know how to talk to you.”
Zane chewed on this in silence. Of course he knew he was hot—people hit on him all the time—but so was Roach with his sweet bad boy charm, and the sturdy body Zane had been greedy for since day one. Even if the curse affected his emotions now, he still remembered how attractive he’d found Roach upon their very first meeting, regardless of how that had ended.
He swallowed hard and pressed a kiss to the underside of Roach’s jaw, savoring his warmth. “You don’t give yourself enough credit, Roachie. I mean it.”
The spark in Roach’s eyes made Zane’s heart pound faster. “You sayin’ I’m a catch?” He stroked Zane’s side tenderly under the covers.
Zane pulled on his beard, arching his head for a kiss. “Damnit. Maybe I shouldn’t have told you. Now you’re gonna find yourself a rich boyfriend and run off.”
“What did you think would happen? It’s not like I’m gonna wait for you to kill me.” Roach chuckled, but had to face away when he started coughing again.
Zane pulled him close, patting Roach’s back to the rhythm of the coughs. “I think I’ve strained you a bit too much.”
“I… was asking… for it,” Roach mumbled between one cough and another.
Roach was… rough around the edges. An ex-biker who’d been to jail, and lived paycheck to paycheck at a cheap motel. Inked, bearded, big, drank too much, and didn’t shy away from a fight. And yet, right now, shivering in tune with his coughs, so tender with Zane, so eager to please, all Zane could consider him was cute. Which was ridiculous. And scary.
Zane had walked into a cigarette-scented trap and didn’t even want to find a way out anymore.
Roach’s phone rang, prompting them both to groan. “It’s your day off,” Zane complained when Roach rolled off him, reaching for the cell.
“I am alive, and we need the money,” he said, but when he picked up the phone, his tone made it obvious Culver wasn’t the caller. “Hey. You okay? You need anything? Sure, I’ll come have a look at it—no, really, it’s no problem, I told you to call me about anything. Gimme ten minutes.”
“Was it Gale?” Zane asked, stretching into an X that took up most of the bed.
“His kettle’s broken. I’ll go have a look at it.” Roach was already sitting up, out of reach. The eight skulls tattooed on the broad back should have put Zane at peace, but the moment he saw them, he knew he didn’t want to stay on his own and slid off the bed, gravitating toward his drawer despite the change in position making his head spin.
“Okay.”
“You don’t have to come, I won’t be long. What if you make yourself worse?” Roach asked despite being ill himself. Ridiculous man.
“No, it’s fine. It’ll be good for both of us to stretch our legs,” Zane said as if Gale’s room wasn’t a stone’s throw away. “I’m bored,” he said, putting a fresh T-shirt on his overheated body. Ugh, he wanted to shower again.
“We can watch a movie when we’re back.”
Roach was dressing quickly, but didn’t bother with jeans, and just put on a pair of sweatpants along with a hoodie.
He looked delicious even when his eyes were all puffy, but Zane put his hair in order again. He couldn’t help the itch to take care of Roach somehow. “We could binge that new show about the guy who shifts into a wolf and has to uncover a conspiracy in his hometown.”