Total pages in book: 71
Estimated words: 66767 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 334(@200wpm)___ 267(@250wpm)___ 223(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 66767 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 334(@200wpm)___ 267(@250wpm)___ 223(@300wpm)
“It’s already going to be awkward because I refuse to let anyone eat turkey in Kyle’s presence,” I murmur, prompting Nora to ask, “What was that?”
“I was just thinking about Thanksgiving,” I say, pushing Christian to the back of my thoughts. “It will be here before you know it and Wren and I are going to Barrett’s parents’ house this year. I should start talking the McGuires into serving tofu turkey now. While I still have time. I can’t let Kyle see something like that. Everyone thinks turkeys are stupid, but they’re really not. He’ll see that carcass and know something heinous went down in the kitchen. It could scar him for life.”
Nora shoots me a pitying glance. “Yeah, or you could save your breath and leave Kyle with me for the day. Gram and I are going to do our usual ice cream and popcorn for Thanksgiving dinner tradition. She can’t eat turkey or potatoes or cranberries, so we do our own thing. Probably a safer bet than trying to sway the McGuires over to the soy side.”
“Probably,” I agree. “But are you sure? You’re not scared of Kyle? He can be a lot, especially when he’s in a new place.”
“We’ll let him run around in my backyard,” she says. “And I’ll leave the shed open with the space heater running in case he gets cold. Our fence is higher than Barrett’s so there’s no danger of him getting out, and you can just come to the gate and grab him when you’re ready.”
“Sounds good, thanks,” I say, even though I haven’t completely given up on swaying the McGuires. I’m more stubborn than Nora knows.
I’m also more intoxicated than I realized.
When I stand to walk her to the front door twenty minutes later, my legs feel significantly wobblier than they did before. And when I look in the mirror by the entryway table, my cheeks are flushed a bright pink. My lips are a little swollen—probably from the salt—and my eyes glitter with irritation.
Or is that…determination?
After all, it looks like Christian is on his way out as my employee. And he’ll be moving a good distance from Bad Dog. If things went hideously awry between us, I wouldn’t have to worry about running into him at the grocery store and it’s not like I want love and romance or anything a serial monogamist like Christian can’t give.
I just want sex. Full-on sex. Not the piddly, pawing, almost-but-not-quite-the-real-deal stuff I got from Tyson for the last full year of our relationship. My college boyfriend pretended to be the typical, sex-crazed, beer-loving frat boy, but deep down he was terrified of my vagina.
And my vagina is very clean and lovely and welcoming and does not have any secret hidden teeth or anything. He was clearly just a big scaredy cat.
Or maybe he was gay and afraid to come out of the closet to his very traditional family? Or maybe I’m just the un-sexiest human ever to don a lace teddy on Valentine’s Day.
The memory still makes me cringe. Instead of horny, Tyson had looked horrified to find me half-naked on the bed in his single dorm room. He couldn’t cover me up or hustle me out to get ice cream fast enough.
“But I didn’t want ice cream,” I tell my reflection, “I wanted dick.”
And I still want dick. I’m tired of not knowing what all the sex fuss is about! I’m twenty-three and just generally over being a virgin. No shade to those who aren’t, but for me, personally, it’s time to take the bull by the horns.
Or the peen by the balls?
Hell, if I know. I’ve seen as much porn as the next sex-starved twenty-something, but do men really like it if you fondle their berries while you’re doing other things to their twig? Color me clueless. Tyson didn’t seem to like much of anything I did to him when we were semi-naked, no matter how hard I tried. (Though he did manage to cheat on me with another woman, which only adds to my fears that there’s something wrong with me.)
But Christian would be different. I know he would.
The way he looked at me in that janitor’s closet…
I’m willing to bet my right pinkie finger that Christian would relish anything I wanted to do with his twig and definitely wouldn’t kick me out of bed for wearing sexy lingerie. And with only a month or so to go before he switches jobs, even if he did reject me, I wouldn’t have to deal with the shame of it for long.
I just have to think of the perfect way to approach him.
Or, I could make a drunken phone call and leave a message on his voicemail saying, “Hey, I heard you were leaving town. Should we get naked and have some fun before you do, or what? Just low-key, you and me, blowing off some steam. I don’t know. Sounds like it could be a good time. Let me know. This is Starling, by the way. And I am currently wearing panties, but that’s a situation that could be changed pretty quickly if you wanted to come over. I’m housesitting at Barrett’s for the weekend.”