Total pages in book: 30
Estimated words: 28781 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 144(@200wpm)___ 115(@250wpm)___ 96(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 28781 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 144(@200wpm)___ 115(@250wpm)___ 96(@300wpm)
Her frown was brief before she wrapped her arms around my neck, her fingers were warm to the touch, my skin rapidly started heating up as she massaged me. “Yes. Whatever you want to do. Yes. I’ll give you a day of my life just make it good. I’m sad. I’m broke. I’m—“ tears poured down her face. “I’m everything I never wanted to be, so yes, if this is it—”
“It?” I interrupted. “What’s it?”
“I was coming up here to jump, not eat. I lied…”
“No jumping,” I said. “Only standing allowed, it’s in the rules.”
She took a deep breath, it shuddered against her chest like it was hard to actually follow through with inhaling and exhaling. “Then kiss me like there’s no tomorrow.”
“Cheesy.” I nodded, her posture wasn’t as stiff as before. “Very cheesy.”
“Necessary.” Her answer. “So very necessary.”
“Okay.” I leaned in, could smell the air around us whirling, firing. “But you have to promise me you don’t attempt to jump ever, there’s always a way out, even if it’s a sad-looking guy telling it to your face.”
Her smile didn’t falter, she just grinned bigger. “You’re beautiful, though I’ll admit you have Bambi eyes.”
“You’re beautiful too, minus the Bambi eyes.” I added. “Is this the point where I take you on a date and create an insane meet-cute and marry you later?”
“Maybe.”
“Cool. Now step off that mental ledge and let me feed you.”
She gripped my hand softly. “Did you forget about the kiss offer?”
“Never.” I started pulling her toward the rooftop restaurant. “I just think it should be perfect and right now I can hear your stomach growling and I’m a bit terrified that if someone as amazing as myself kisses you, you’ll think that it’s totally fine to just die in peace.”
“Depressing.”
“I have a lot of charms.”
“What’s your name?”
“Ace. Yours?”
She shook her head. “Wow, of course it is… tall, good-looking””—she looked down at our joined hands—“a Rolex, so you’re either in debt or rich.” Her frown deepened. “Sad though, still sad with those eyes.”
“Being sad isn’t a crime.” I squeezed her hand. “Just like meeting a random stranger on an elevator on a rough day can actually happen, I mean it does in the movies, why not live out that fantasy?”
“No wedding ring.” She inspected, tilting our joined hands left and right. “All right, let’s live out that fantasy today and I’ll worry about tomorrow when it comes. Also…” Her smile was kind, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “My name’s Bri. Thanks for helping me stand on my feet.”
I didn’t say anytime.
I was all out of promises, but I did have the best meal of my life with the prettiest girl I’d ever seen.
Things went well until it all went to hell months later, when I fell in love with her and got rejected.
When she told me it was her, not me.
When she walked out of my life after changing her number.
A stain on my jacket was how “rough” my day had been going, I had no clue that my year would end with a stain on my heart and a girl that had no social media who I couldn’t contact who made me open up, only to make me close down the minute she walked out of my life.
A true partner? A mate?
Yeah, that didn’t exist, not in the real world.
Chapter Two
Bri
Two Years Later
Walking up to a crazy huge company in Seattle was not on my bucket list, in fact, the whole plan was to move to some sad farm in the middle of the country think about my life choices, maybe even possibly jump up on farmers only dot com and find a man to take care of me despite his inability to shower every day.
Trust me, I tested it.
Both dates were so bad that I thought it was a joke. Though I couldn’t complain about the tight Wranglers.
So being in Seattle, again, was not one of my life choices, but it was the only job, the only firm that hired me for marketing.
I knew I was good at it, even though it was marketing for a hotel that I had zero care for with all its modern facilities and yoga studios—it was still a job and at this point I was so done after the last few years of being a failure that it made sense.
I mean, everything made sense other than knowing that I had to compete for this paid internship with one other person who passed all the tests.
Apparently, he graduated Ivy League and had a vendetta for all humans attempting to get the same job. Basically, on paper he was an ass, in real life, I imagined he’d be terrifying, but I knew enough and had experienced enough that nothing really scared me anymore.
Not after what I’d been through.
I always thought of the word after as, after him, after that experience, after that moment in my world where things went dark, so why now? Why would I even care about a tiny little bleep on my career trajectory?