Total pages in book: 53
Estimated words: 50759 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 254(@200wpm)___ 203(@250wpm)___ 169(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 50759 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 254(@200wpm)___ 203(@250wpm)___ 169(@300wpm)
I didn’t bother to argue with her on that one. Plus, my mother’s Christmas cookie delivery was famous in town. You had to practically murder puppies in the street to get off the list.
“Trust me, Mom, I’m going to forget about Brody Adams.”
My chin burned from where he touched me for the rest of the day.
I didn’t let myself think about that.
But I dreamed of Brody Adams.
BRODY
It was three in the morning.
I’d woken up with a jerk ten minutes ago.
It wasn’t a nightmare on a battlefield, carrying the weight of my dead buddy that woke me this time.
No. It was a memory of sitting on the bleachers, the warm and dry grip, the comfort I’d needed on a day that I’d scrubbed from my memories.
I didn’t believe in repressed memories. I thought that was shit therapists spouted in order to justify ten extra sessions at two hundred bucks an hour. But there was no other explanation as to how I didn’t remember that interaction with Willow until now. I mean, I remembered the interaction itself, how a shy girl showed me kindness I didn’t deserve. But I didn’t remember it being Willow, and I sure as shit didn’t remember the crap we pulled on her after it.
Shame coated me like oil.
My father hitting me. Speaking to me like that was not out of the norm. It only stopped when I got back, when he realized I wasn’t scared of him anymore and I was someone to be feared.
Not that I interacted with the man. I steered clear of him. Fuck what the town thought. My father, now retired, still held a stellar reputation, and it was the one black mark against me that I didn’t seem to want to take care of him in his old age.
He didn’t deserve it. But I would. When it was time, I’d make sure he was put in a place with great care, where he was comfortable.
“Never let someone drag you out of your character.”
One of the many lines from a letter my mother wrote to me while she was pregnant. Like she knew that she wouldn’t be able to give me advice like that in person. That letter was all I had of her, beyond the photographs around the house where she was smiling, beaming, and the anecdotes everyone in town had about her. A good woman. One, for whatever reason, married to a piece of shit. Maybe my father wasn’t a piece of shit when she was alive. But I figured that a person doesn’t just turn rotten, not a good one, certainly not when faced with their only child growing up without their mother.
Yeah, it was my opinion that my father had always been rotten. He just hid it from my mother, or my mother chose to see the best in him.
I’d always strived to make sure I was never like him. I’d gone through brutal training, had let Uncle Sam strip away all that I was to create something new, someone new. Someone better. Harder.
Then I’d come back here with more memories to repress and the goal of a quiet life. Maybe a family. Though not likely. I was still haunted by the things I’d seen, things I’d done. Still worried that my father’s character lurked within me like a latent disease, ready to flare up at any moment.
Willow was the embodiment of my fears. The hurt on her face, the hurt that she’d carried for years was on me. And I wanted to fix it. But I also wanted to fuck her.
Badly.
Her anger, the way it made her eyes glow, the way it made her cheeks flush, the huskiness to her voice, it all got me rock hard.
Not to mention her sitting at the bar drinking whiskey, trying to hide her wince as she downed it, oblivious to me staring at her for a good half hour until her emerald eyes went wide as they met mine and her full lips flattened into a grimace.
I had not expected her to follow me to the restroom. But I’d known her attempt to seduce me had nefarious intentions. Not that it wasn’t hot as fuck. But she was drunk. And angry. But she’d still wanted me. I’d seen that plain on her face, watched her battle with anger and need. I’d had to fight my baser nature not to take her to the restroom and fuck her just like she’d requested.
It was a good thing I didn’t, now that I truly remembered why she hated me. That would’ve ensured I’d only get to fuck her once.
And I didn’t want to fuck Willow once.
Something told me I’d never get my fill of her.
Chapter Six
WILLOW
I hadn’t seen my brother since I arrived home. My mother continued to craft excuses about his work schedule, about being busy with his three-month-old then barraging me with countless pictures of the new baby. Not that I minded. I did love seeing my adorable niece, even if it hurt my soul to not know her.