Total pages in book: 177
Estimated words: 173392 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 867(@200wpm)___ 694(@250wpm)___ 578(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 173392 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 867(@200wpm)___ 694(@250wpm)___ 578(@300wpm)
For a moment, there’s an invisible cord pulling at me, pulling him to me. He’s going to touch me. He never really saw me as a kid, did he? I’m not too young for him.
But he grabs his wet T-shirt and leaves, the pain low in my belly almost unnoticeable compared to the cold I feel everywhere else.
Jesus, what’s wrong with me?
We could’ve gotten a room? Did I actually just think that after everything he’s going through?
I head upstairs, seeing him close his door just as I dive through Liv’s. I drop my dress to the floor and peel off my wet underwear. Pulling on a black cropped T-shirt and some sleep shorts, I pick up my dress and head to the bathroom.
Throwing it over the shower rod to dry, I grab my brush from a shelf and start smoothing out the wet strands as I work the hair dryer over them.
Chills break out over my legs, still cold. The temperature was in the seventies all day, but add the rain, the wind, and the bare minimum attire, and I felt it more than Macon, who at least had on jeans and a jacket.
I think he enjoyed himself today, though. He just kept going and going, looking around once in a while and taking in the view, same as me. Trace rarely had me on his bike. He preferred to ride alone.
And Dallas was trying to scare me, going fast and testing me on the way to the Bug Jam.
Does Army have a bike? Iron does. It’s all he drives.
They’re not a gang, but they kind of are. I should get them all patches to put on their jackets as a joke. The idea makes me smile.
But then Macon walks in, and I lose the smile, finishing my hair and turning off the dryer.
I set it down and comb out my hair as he comes to the sink and wets his toothbrush. I glance at him, dropping my gaze to his sleep pants, and then turn away again. I stow the hairbrush and get my own toothbrush ready.
The room fills with the sound of brushing and water running, but he finishes quickly, rinsing out his mouth.
“I told you to get warmed up,” he says, cleaning his toothbrush. I spit. “I’m tired,” I say in a low voice.
I rinse my mouth, and he slips his toothbrush back into the holder. “Get your pillow.”
I watch him in the mirror as he leaves behind me. I don’t know when it became a thing that I sleep with him all the time, but sleeping is now my favorite thing.
I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand and walk out, shutting off the light. Diving into Liv’s room, I grab my pillow.
But his words come back to me from that day in the shower. My woman is out there …
I think about that a lot. How he wants things and refrains from taking them because he thinks the cycle will end with him.
But he wants me in his bed because he remembers how good warm things feel. He doesn’t want to be alone.
I’m going to let another man have her …
I drop the pillow back to the bed and pull my T-shirt over my head. Slipping my shorts down my legs, I pick up my pillow again and hug it to my naked chest. Underwear still on, I try to slow my breathing as I see his room through the hair hanging in my left eye as I cross the hall.
Stepping inside, I watch him stand at his bedside table, his back to me as he sets his alarm.
I almost can’t talk for a second. “You’re … you’re warm,” I say in a soft voice.
He turns, his gaze dropping to the pillow over my naked skin. “Right?” I swallow. “Like a shower?”
He can warm me. My heart pounds in my ears.
The slight pinch between his brows digs deeper, and I’m not sure what that means. He doesn’t look as if he likes what he sees.
“You’re bold,” he says, arching an eyebrow. “For a teenager.”
Yeah. He’s pissed. He thinks I’m spoon-feeding him. Pitying him.
I whip around to leave, but he’s on my back and shoving the door out of my hand as soon as I start to open it.
“The last Saint on my bed got off without punishment.”
Clay. I breathe hard.
We broke into their house last spring, and she lay on his bed while Callum Ames took her picture.
As a joke.
She was fully dressed, of course. And Macon wasn’t here.
I wet my lips. “I never want to leave your bed,” I whisper. “And I want you to take that woman’s number out of your phone, too.”
His fingers play with locks of my hair at my back. “You want to do for me what she wants to do?”