Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 77018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
I took about twenty photos before I heard the first click of his shutter.
“Blake? Turn around.”
The moment I spun to face him, the flash went off.
He stared down at the glowing screen as he took a step toward me. “Can I just…” His gaze landed on mine as he swept a stray tendril of my hair behind my ear, and I leaned into the soft caress of his fingertips along my jawline.
Then he moved back, aimed the camera, and took a few more pictures before he repacked his equipment and motioned me toward the security entrance. “Come on, Sid the Sloth.”
“You did not just refer to me as the sloth from Ice Age?”
“I did.” He started toward the security entrance. “And before you say anything, it’s not because he has a wonky eye. It’s because he’s slow.”
Wonky eye? What the hell was that supposed to mean? The guard checked my purse and then waved me through. While Vance’s backpack was being searched, I turned on my front-facing camera. I took a stealthy photo to see if maybe one of my peepers was, in fact, bigger than the other, then rolled my eyes at myself. What in the hell was I doing? Like it mattered if the attractive, not-such-a-massive butthole thought I had a wonky eye.
“What are you doing?” Damn, he’d caught me.
“Texting Margot.”
The man was really turning me into a liar to save face.
We walked underneath the massive structure, both staring up in awe on our way across the brightly lit esplanade. Vance directed us to the entrance of the elevators, passing our tickets to a worker. The man didn’t even bat an eye before waving us toward a group of people gathered around a set of stairs.
“See, no one cares if you’re late,” I said.
Smiling, Vance handed me my ticket. My attention narrowed on the admission time printed at the bottom… the admission time which was thirty minutes from then. “You lying sack of…”
“Consider it payback for the whole Louvre ticket incidence.” He smiled over his shoulder when we stopped behind the small crowd. “Besides, not only are we on time, but you got in some cardio.”
Gears clunked as the yellow, double-decker elevator glided down the tower’s pillar, finally coming to a stop right in front of us. The doors slid open, and a mass of people poured out before one of the Eiffel Tower workers signaled our group to board.
When our time came, Vance motioned me ahead of him. “The chronically late before the prompt and timely.”
I glared up at him as I shuffled inside, one hundred percent certain I’d have a crick in my neck by the time this trip was over.
“Or maybe I should have used the word tidsoptimist,” he said.
Tidsoptimist. Be still my vocabulary-loving heart. It was such a good word, even if he was using it to insult me for being perpetually late. “Look at you and your growing vocabulary.”—And my lessening hatred.
Passengers continued to cram inside the elevator. I glanced around, hoping to locate a weight limit sign. Between my getting stuck in the Macy’s elevator and my mishap in New Orleans back in October, I felt I had a knack for getting trapped in things. At least this elevator was spacious.
“This is more the size of a mausoleum than a coffin,” I mumbled, not expecting Vance to actually hear me.
Based on the disturbed look he’d shot down at me, he evidently had. “What is it with you and things that house corpses?”
“They’re good measures of size.”
“Cups and grams are good measures of size. Coffins are not.”
“Look, you spend the night in a creepy, dank New Orleans mausoleum and see if you don’t start judging things you could get trapped in the same way. It’s life-altering, Vance.” It was true. It had been one of the single most horrifying experiences of my life.
Passengers continued to cram inside, pressing Vance and me against the side window.
“How did you end up locked in a mausoleum in the first place?”
The root cause of it: bad luck and a desecrated voodoo shrine, but the man already thought I was crazy enough. Cables creaked and groaned as the illuminated crisscross design of the iron structure slowly passed by the window.
“I made it a few feet inside before I noticed a cauldron of bats hanging from the ceiling and—”
“A cauldron?”
“Yes, that’s what a group of bats is called, Vance, a cauldron, and my presence evidently pissed them off. They started shrieking and swarming, and I can assure you, there is nothing as terrifying as screaming, flying rats flapping their leathery rabies-tainted wings at you in a mausoleum.”
Vance pressed his lips together while a twinkle of pure amusement danced in his eyes. “So, the cauldron of bats locked you in?”
“Do bats have opposable thumbs?” I could only hope the scowl I gave him said he was an idiot. “I knocked myself out when I attempted to escape, but instead of sprinting through the small gap in the doorway, I ran into the corner of the stone door. I guess the groundskeeper had closed it up while I was unconscious.” Luckily for me, the first tour group that came through the cemetery the next morning heard me screaming and banging on the door.