Total pages in book: 158
Estimated words: 145803 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145803 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
She didn’t like the way her heart reacted to his declaration. His voice might ring with truth and sincerity, but he still worked the same job. He still needed to be able to disappear for months at a time. He would still walk away, and she wouldn’t know where he was or even if he was alive. Sam had quit. It wasn’t the same thing. Stella had met Sam after he had decided he was done with his work for the government, or whatever agency they worked for. Zale was still very much working.
Vienna pushed the dessert away and looked at the man she thought was really the perfect man for her. She hadn’t thought any man would ever suit her—but for whatever reason, Zale did. Wasn’t there always a major flaw?
“I appreciate that you would tell me that, Zale, when you didn’t have to.” She rubbed her finger along the duvet cover. The sheets in the hotel were the best she’d ever slept on. The duvet was the same brand and just as heavenly. “The thing is, you’re still working for whatever company you work for. Nothing really has changed. If we hadn’t met in this hotel, you wouldn’t have come looking for me, would you?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I was getting to the point where I was feeling desperate. I made a couple of mistakes on the job. So, yeah, I might have, but I don’t honestly know. But I would have eventually, just maybe not right away.”
“Even if you had, you have no intention of quitting.” She made that a statement, watching his expression closely.
“I signed a contract,” he admitted. “Sam was smart enough to quit signing them. It was far less money, but it also gave him the ability to walk out whenever he wanted. He was concerned about his father, although he didn’t speak to him, but at least he had a family to worry about. I don’t have anyone. That meant I just socked the money away for retirement—if I didn’t die before I got that far. I knew I was locked into that contract and wasn’t about to compromise you in any way. Loved ones can be used to put pressure on us. If enemies find family, they can be turned into weapons against us. Most of the time, when I was alone, thinking about you and trying to find a solution so I didn’t have to give you up, most of what came to me were the worst-case scenarios.”
Loved ones can be used to put pressure on us. She couldn’t hear things like that. That was the trouble when she’d been alone. She was too vulnerable around Zale. She wasn’t so ridiculous with anyone else. She wasn’t his loved one. They’d only had six weeks together. Okay, six and a half weeks. It might have been an intense six and a half weeks, but it was still only a few weeks. Yet they were the best weeks of her life.
She was pragmatic. She might look like she didn’t have a brain in her head, but she was more than above average in intelligence. She didn’t need a man to lean on, or to think for her, or to make her happy. She didn’t fall hopelessly in love in a few short weeks, and neither did a man like him.
“Zale.” She said his name and then didn’t know what else to say. She pushed the dishes away from her. She was a woman of action. She didn’t sit in a bed, exhausted, barely able to lift her arms up. She climbed mountains, hung off cliffs, skied down steep slopes and planned tricky rescues into very dangerous gorges others would give up on.
He stalked across the room and cleared the bed and then his dishes as well, restacking them on the cart before wheeling it out of the suite. For a moment, she thought he was leaving, and she didn’t know whether to be relieved or upset. She told herself her reaction was only because she wanted, once and for all, to be over him and they needed to sort things out. Only deep down, she knew there was no getting over him.
To her consternation, Zale came back into the bedroom and sank onto the bed, on his stomach, stretching his long body out so that his head was close to her belly. He caught one of the pillows and positioned it under his head.
“What did you have planned for your stay in Vegas? I know you’re here for a good week or more. Your posse is joining you after the tournament, aren’t they?” He turned his head to look up at her.
“They’ll come after, yes. We’re going to do some bouldering and then explore Red Rock trails. Do a little trad climbing. That sort of thing. We want to go to all the small coffee shops. It’s a thing we do. And then we’re taking an all-day kayaking trip on the river starting at the Hoover Dam.”