Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 74577 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74577 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
“Kingston said you could use some adaptations to make life easier for a while. I got a bunch of rails for the bathroom. And some other shit. I know it’s early, but I wanted to get it done before AJ left for the day. Hey, AJ,” he said.
“Hi,” AJ said, gaze lowering. “I, ah, I’ll get out of your way,” she said, rushing back off to the kitchen.
“She’s real pretty,” Mark said with a devious little smirk.
“Don’t even fucking start,” I demanded.
Mark Mallick was known for a few things. Being a loanshark enforcer. Running his own lawn service and handyman company to wash the dirty money from the loansharking thing. And, of course, running bets. Only within the family. Usually about who was gonna get hooked up next, or who was gonna have a baby, or what gender the baby might be.
Mark had a pool going for everything.
Even though he literally never fucking won a bet.
“Start?” he asked, lips twitching. “Already got all the bets placed. Heard the set-up, and that AJ is gorgeous. It was a natural progression from there.”
“I’ll put my money on It’s not gonna happen.”
“Oh, come on, man. Even I’m not that stupid,” he said, grabbing his shit, and making his way down the hallway.
The rest of the day was eaten up by Kingston coming back over and taking me to the orthopedic doctor, who mostly agreed with the Swiss ones, but gave me some hope that my ribs would feel a decent bit better in another week and a half.
My fingers, he thought, would take three or more months to get their strength fully back.
Four to six weeks in the sling for my rotator cuff, since it was minor.
The pinched nerve was subjective with some people getting mostly better in weeks, while others had flares for years.
And the leg, yeah, the leg was going to keep me down for a while. Then take a while in rehab too.
It seemed like we were looking at three to six months recovery.
“You could at least try to act like it won’t be a complete nightmare to be stuck in Navesink Bank with us,” Kingston said as I stared out the window on the way home.
“That’s not it,” I said. Though, yeah, to some extent, I guess it was. Being stuck. That had never been a good feeling for me. It wasn’t about my family. It was just the entire concept of putting down roots.
“You could get to really know your nieces and nephews,” he said. “Sit at Charlie and Helen’s table again. Talk to your siblings for more than five snatched minutes before you catch a flight.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. While, inwardly, I knew that all of those things would make it harder to leave when it was time.
But that was shit I didn’t want to think about.
So I focused on what AJ might be making for dinner instead.
And if I might see her walking around pants-less and braless again.
Fuck.
Maybe I was going to lose money on that bet with Mark…
CHAPTER SIX
AJ
We fell into a comfortable kind of domestic partnership. One where I would go to work, then come home to find that Atlas had done an online grocery order to save me from having to go out and do it, just bring it in and put it away.
Then I would make dinner.
And he would usually work at my puzzle or toss Samson’s toys across the house for him while I cooked.
I helped him transfer from the couch to the chair and back again, so he didn’t fall.
Some days, his family perceptively had come around when I was gone to help him get in and out of the shower because he was clean and changed and there was a new shower chair in the hall bathroom.
Occasionally, there would be food in the fridge that his loved ones had dropped off. Some of them even came with cards with little scribbles or sketches from, obviously, the children.
Each time I saw one of those things, my heart squeezed a bit in my chest, seeing how big his circle was, how loved he was.
I wondered if he appreciated it. Because I constantly found him on a laptop that appeared one day, scouting out new trips to take, ones that wouldn’t be as physically taxing on him as he was still weak and recovering.
He was in such a hurry to get well… just to leave again.
I couldn’t wrap my head around it.
But, I guess, we came from different lives. And I couldn’t begin to understand why Atlas lived the way he did. Not without details about his life.
“What are you doing?” I asked, coming into the kitchen to find Atlas on his office chair with the back door opened, letting in the cool air.
“Christ,” he hissed, wincing as he looked over at me. “Seems like your old lady hobbies are rubbing off on me.”