Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 76065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 380(@200wpm)___ 304(@250wpm)___ 254(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 380(@200wpm)___ 304(@250wpm)___ 254(@300wpm)
“But that’s a great time to skim some cash,” Bass said.
“I hope it’s not Ricky,” I said, taking a deep breath. “I trust him.”
“Could he be pissed off about getting his face bashed in?”
“Anything is possible. I paid him to stay home. Gave him a stack of cash as an apology. He seems… normal, though,” I added. “Nothing out of the ordinary.”
“Could just be a good liar.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, even if I was still hoping it wasn’t him. The man practically ran the shop. Having to find someone else to step into his shoes would be a nightmare. Worse than that, he had a loving wife and kids. I couldn’t imagine putting an end to him the way I would if it was anyone else fucking me over.
“Alright, look. How about I look into this? Finished my job with Cinna and Dav. Got nothing on my plate right now. I can review security footage, see if I can catch who is doing it in the act.”
“Gonna be a lot of footage,” I warned. “Got cameras everywhere.”
“Eh, I don’t mind. Better me than you. Sure you’d rather be spending your free time with Kick.”
He wasn’t wrong.
The more I spent time with her, the more I wanted to spend time with her. It was strange and new. But I don’t know… unexpectedly comforting.
I held myself back on occasion, not letting myself go over to her place every single night. But, fuck, the nights when I didn’t, it took everything I had not to show up.
The crazy thing was, it wasn’t just the sex. It was the moments after, just holding her, just feeling the way her fingers traced absentmindedly over my skin, how her body went lax as she drifted off to sleep.
It was the moments before things made their way to the bedroom. Sharing food, watching shows, talking about our pasts. We had crummy childhoods in common. While my parents were, you know, present—abusive, but present—her father was in and out of their lives, leaving their mom to work, pay bills, and raise her kids herself. Which, it seemed, turned her mean and bitter.
It sounded like Kick got out of there as soon as she could and cut all ties with her mom.
Having needed to cut my own parents off, I understood what it was like to be without a family.
She didn’t talk much about her brother. And when she did, she looked visibly upset, so I decided not to push.
She’d told me once that she had no one.
It seemed that was true.
That part, I couldn’t relate to.
I had my found family and a few blood relatives like Bass who hadn’t turned out to be like our parents. If I needed help, I had a dozen or more places to go to find it.
I couldn’t imagine being and feeling completely alone. To have no one to lean on.
And, suddenly, I found I wanted to be that person for her. To share my people with her. I was pretty sure it was too early to say shit like that. Though, who the fuck knew? I had no idea what the hell I was doing.
“I appreciate it, man,” I said as I slid open one of my desk drawers, producing my laptop and passing it to Bass. I gave him my passcodes to everything, then trusted him to figure this shit out for me.
While I spent more time with Kick.
Though, when I showed up at her place, she didn’t answer the door. For someone who claimed she was a homebody, she was out a lot late at night.
The third time it happened, I felt jealousy rear its ugly head, worried she was off with some other guy. But when she came in, cheeks flushed red from the cold, her eyes worried, I figured that it was impossible she’d been with a guy. If how she was after time with me was anything to go by, that is.
“You’re far away,” I said when we were in bed together later, having felt her drifting away from me minute by minute.
“Hm? No. I was just thinking about, you know, the holidays,” she said, but the lie wasn’t exactly convincing.
“What about them?”
“What do you do?” she asked, sliding her leg across my hips.
“Depends on the year. Back before the guys started settling down, we usually just hung out together. Had some drinks, some food. Not traditional holiday shit. Don’t think any of us ever even put up a tree,” I added. “Now, though, there’s usually someone doing something.
“Last year, I went to Cinna and Dav’s place for Thanksgiving. Neither of ‘em cook, but they had a full traditional Thanksgiving meal delivered.”
“They’re the two with the adopted kids, right?”
“Yeah. Teenagers.” One had been the kid in Cinna’s old apartment building who needed out of his shitty home life. The other was homeless and living on the street.