Total pages in book: 171
Estimated words: 164705 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 824(@200wpm)___ 659(@250wpm)___ 549(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 164705 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 824(@200wpm)___ 659(@250wpm)___ 549(@300wpm)
That made him bark out a laugh. “I’ve missed you, Cuddlebug.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Why not?”
“For one thing, I’m not very cuddly anymore.”
“Stabbybug?” His eyes lit up as he stumbled backwards. “I can get behind that.”
We reached the elevators, and I punched the button one or five hundred times. I wasn’t going to rest until he was out of this floor – and my life.
I’d managed to piece myself together after his betrayal, but it had taken me years. Years of crying myself to sleep every night, of wondering why, and how, and when it all went so terribly wrong. I was finally in a better place. And that place was wherever Oliver von Bismarck wasn’t present.
“Hey, wait!” Frankie burst out of the presidential suite, jogging after us in her ridiculous heels. “You forgot me.”
I wondered if they were lovers. The thought filled my heart with smothering pain.
“Alright, let’s cut the bullshit.” Oliver ignored her, every fiber of his body attuned to mine. “We need to talk.”
“We do not.” I folded my arms tightly. “We have managed not to do so for fifteen years. Why break a perfect record?”
“I have a lot of explaining to do.”
“Do you?” I swallowed the yelp wedged in my throat. “For all intents and purposes, we’re strangers.”
“You will never be a stranger to me.”
“Funny you should say that, because after how you left things off, I realized you were a stranger all along.”
The numbers on the digital screen above the elevator doors began ascending. Finally.
“So, you do know each other?” Frankie lodged herself between us, yanking off her heels and stuffing them in her purse. She was a very beautiful girl. Emphasis on the word girl. “It’s been seven minutes since you’ve met, and Oliver still hasn’t said something obnoxious to make you slap his face. It’s almost like he is trying not to be himself.”
“If getting slapped around is what he wants, I’d be happy to accommodate his wishes.”
Oliver readjusted the fraternity ring on his pinky. The one I’d given him as kids. He still had that old thing? Why?
You don’t care why. He turned his back on you when you needed him the most.
“We need to talk,” Oliver insisted. “Briar Rose, I—”
“It’s just Briar now.” I smiled sweetly. “Got rid of the Rose. Including the stupid dyed ones you gave me every year.”
“Briar.” He tasted the new name on his tongue, his cheekbones tinting pink. “When do you finish work? I—”
The elevator dinged, and the doors slid open. I took the opportunity to push him inside, shoving along his little firecracker friend and stabbing the close button. “Goodbye, Oliver. Have a nice life.”
Or don’t.
I really couldn’t care any less.
The second the elevator grunted with its descent, the air lightened. I turned around, pressed my back to the wall, and closed my eyes, sucking in a deep breath. It was a fight to stay upright. One that I eventually lost. I slid down to the lush carpet, clutching my head and attempting practiced deep breaths.
Years of therapy down the drain in one simple glance into his eyes.
He’d kept the ten-dollar ring I’d gifted him. My sole possession as a child. Something I’d won at a carnival.
I stared my past right in the eye, and it reminded me of everything I’d lost.
My entire world.
Chapter Ten
Oliver
“You’re letting me drive your Ferrari?” Frankie squealed, clapping her hands together like a seal.
I’ll let you drive a fucking M1 Abrams tank if it means you leave me the hell alone.
“Sure.” I tossed my keys into her hand. “Try not to run anything over.”
“No promises.” Frankie spun the fob ring over her index finger. “But hey, I love your optimism. Why are your eyes rimmed red?”
“Too much pot.”
I did not smoke pot. But I was well on my way to meth if I couldn’t bleach Briar Rose from my memory in the next few hours.
Briar. Not Briar Rose, dipshit.
But she still smelled like Briar Rose. Sweet, and floral, and so damn tempting I’d fought off a semi the second she’d laid hands on me. She was the same girl, down to the chewed-up nails, and yet … different. Fiercer.
Frankie pouted, loitering in the grand lobby. “Are you, like, in love with the intimacy coordinator?” She narrowed her eyes. “Because I’ve never seen you like this.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know … affected.”
Could I really be in love with a woman I had not seen for fifteen years? Logically not. But logic was a foreign concept to me at present. What were social constructs, anyway?
“Go home, Franklin.”
“My home is in Georgia.”
“I said what I said.”
“Wait … can I keep the car?”
“If I give it to you, will you leave?”
“Yes.”
“Congratulations. You’re the new owner of a Ferrari.”
She shrugged, strutting toward the elevators, hips swaying left and right. The moment she vanished between the metal walls, I torpedoed into the bar across the lobby and collapsed onto a stool.