Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 71911 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 360(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71911 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 360(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
Would I introduce Brielle to my family? She was younger than Rush and Blaire. Not that Rush would be surprised by my fucking a woman her age, but I’d never dated one. I didn’t bring women around my family. I was thinking ahead again. There was plenty of time to work this out. No reason to make it all fit now.
thirty
brielle
“Is Dean coming to dinner? I got great news, but I want to tell you both at the same time,” Cam announced as he bounded into the kitchen, full of energy.
“Yes, he’s coming,” I replied, already knowing his good news. I’d gotten a call from his band teacher today.
I hadn’t told Dean about it. I wanted to save that for Cam. I knew Dean would be here tonight.
For the past two weeks, he’d been coming here for dinner, or I’d been cooking dinner in his penthouse. We had been spending every night together. We had even learned how to have sex quietly in my bedroom. Although, more often than not, Dean covered my mouth with his hand.
I kept waiting for Dean to grow bored with me … us … the routine that was our life. He hadn’t yet.
While I was at work, he texted me often. Most of the time, it left me blushing and smiling. That hadn’t gone unnoticed by the others in the office. When they asked me who it was, I always said it was just a friend. What more could I say? I couldn’t tell them the truth.
Most days, Dean had Cam come up to his penthouse to work on the drums until I got home. Cam rarely finished a sentence lately without Dean’s name in it. That was something I was dealing with internally. I hadn’t expected this day would come, and now that Cam was living in a world with Dean in it, I grew more anxious with every passing minute. What would happen when this ended? How would I explain things? Should I? Would it cause more harm for Cam than not?
Having your mother date your idol was a dream come true for a boy, but what did it become when he found out that his idol was his father?
October 16, 2012
Bradley hadn’t waited on me. I didn’t know if I should be hurt or not, but it wasn’t my boyfriend’s fault I didn’t have a phone. I hadn’t been able to call him and let him know I’d be late. My foster mom, Gail, had refused to let me come tonight. She would have had to cook the kids dinner and get them ready for bed. Heaven forbid she help them with their homework. It was the only reason I didn’t think she’d kick me out next month when I turned eighteen.
Gail made her living off the state. She was a foster parent, and the checks she got for it were what paid her bills. Right now, she had five kids under the age of ten, and three of those were under the age of five. She needed me to take care of them.
I had asked that she just let me go this once to a concert.
Bradley had gotten Slacker Demon tickets and was going to take me for an early birthday present. I’d never been given a birthday present before, and this was the best gift ever. Today, he’d acted strange, but then again, he had been doing that the past few weeks. He was hot or cold. It was confusing.
Most of last year, he had pursued me. Begged me to go out with him. When I’d finally given in and started sitting at his table at lunch, things had progressed quickly. Bradley was popular, and suddenly, so was I. Problem was, I didn’t have a life like the others in his clique did. I was expected to go home and work. There were no parents buying me a phone or a car.
I’d overheard Jilly Connor, who was supposed to be my friend, tell Hannah Matthews that the only reason Bradley was dating me was because of my body. He liked my boobs, and she didn’t see why. She said they were too big and that I dressed trashy. I wore the only clothes that I had, and, yes, they were getting too small, but Gail wasn’t going to replace them with ones that fit me properly. She would have to spend money to do that, and she saved her money for her cigarettes and wine.
The only real friend I had was Natalie Brock. She had been my friend for years. Well before I started dating Bradley. She was the only one who understood what my life was like. Natalie wasn’t a foster kid, but she lived with her stepmom, and her father was often absent. She struggled to fit in too. The others would never understand.