Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 67120 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 336(@200wpm)___ 268(@250wpm)___ 224(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67120 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 336(@200wpm)___ 268(@250wpm)___ 224(@300wpm)
The ride to my grans was short, and by the time I was pulling into the driveway, she hadn’t even finished telling me about a story she was recounting that had happened at the Dollar Store in town when we’d arrived.
My eyes, however, caught on something that shouldn’t have been at her place.
A person.
Two people, actually.
“Who is that?” I asked, letting off the accelerator as my eyes caught on something in Grans’ yard that wasn’t normally there.
“That’s my new renter,” she said. “I rented her the front half of the house since I don’t use it.”
I frowned hard. “You rented someone the main part of the house?”
“Well you sure the fuck didn’t want it,” she countered. “I tried to offer it to you.”
She had.
And I hadn’t wanted to live there because it brought back old memories—the times before I was broken—and I didn’t like thinking of how my life used to be.
Not to mention, those times weren’t the greatest in the grand scheme of things.
My parents had never been the nicest of people, and only after I’d become aware of them giving Maxie to an animal shelter did I finally allow myself to admit that my parents were self-serving douchebags that didn’t think of anybody but themselves.
The only time they thought about other people was when they ran out of money and needed to come suck up to Grans to get some more.
Which was likely the case this time and them coming home.
That was usually how it went.
“I don’t want to live somewhere that I lived with my parents,” I admitted. “It reminds me of how I was before…”
She stayed silent as we processed those words.
I didn’t often talk about my life before.
It was easier to think about it not at all because it usually led to thinking about what happened after I moved out, and things usually spiraled from there.
“Have you talked to anybody about it lately?” she asked softly.
There was a moment of silence as I wondered how much I wanted to tell her, then I decided to hell with it.
If I couldn’t talk to my grans, who could I talk to?
Sierra.
A secret voice inside my head always told me that I could trust her.
The only problem was, I wasn’t sure that she wanted to hear all the fucked-up things that were rattling around in my head thanks to being held prisoner for such a long time.
“I talked to Luca about it,” I admitted. “But since he doesn’t remember shit, it’s hard for him to commiserate.”
“Luca’s lucky,” she stated. “You, not so much.”
Luca was lucky he didn’t remember.
Even if he had to relearn everyone he held dear in his life, even me.
Not remembering would be a blessing right about now.
Maybe then I could get some fucking sleep, and the demons wouldn’t plague me.
My eyes once again strayed to the mirror as I watched the woman pull my grans’ lawnmower over to talk to another woman that was standing on the edge of the lawn.
I couldn’t get a good look at the second woman, but the first?
Holy shit.
She had long, brown hair that was in a high ponytail on top of her head. Her body was fucking beautiful, and she was showing quite a bit of it off.
She was wearing a pair of cutoff jean shorts, a black halter style bikini top, and cowboy boots.
I almost wanted to turn the light bar on in the back of my truck so that I could get a better look at her.
It was getting too dark to make out anything other than a few of her features.
But what I saw, I liked.
“Thanks for the ride.” Grans paused as she went to open her door. “You don’t see another dog out here, right?”
I looked around and shook my head. “No. Why?”
“Because the renter has a dog. I don’t want any fights between Bobo and her dog,” she said.
I frowned hard. “Why did you allow someone to rent from you that has a dog?”
This was sounding weirder and weirder. First, that she had a renter anyway—she’d been saying for years that she didn’t plan on ever renting the front half of the house out to anybody anytime soon. Then she’d gone and rented it to someone that had a dog when she knew that her dog didn’t get along with other dogs?
“I just have a feeling about her.” She shrugged. “I’ll see you tomorrow, boy. Take care of yourself.” She paused halfway out of the truck and turned to look at me. “Talk to your friend. I know that you want to.”
I rolled my eyes but she was correct. I did want to.
The problem was that I didn’t think that Sierra, my pen pal from when I was younger, needed to hear about all the fucked-up shit in my brain.
“I’ll talk to someone if I think I need to,” I said as I gestured to the door. “Get in there before Bobo beats you back.”