Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 104239 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 521(@200wpm)___ 417(@250wpm)___ 347(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 104239 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 521(@200wpm)___ 417(@250wpm)___ 347(@300wpm)
I believe him. “But you don’t want anything to do with it?”
He scrubs his hands over his head, still pacing. He reminds me of myself, angry and uncertain, full of energy he can’t vent how he wants to. “Listen. You know there’s no love lost between that girl and me.” Something dark stirs in me when he lifts his lip in disgust. “But she’s not some criminal genius either. The only reason she’d have to get that close to Nathaniel Brookshire would be if he forced her. She didn’t seek out and murder him in cold blood, though that’s what everyone wants to make it sound like.”
Yes, they would. Yet another thing I’ve always known would be the case. “So he’s going to try to get to her while she’s here?”
“He’s dead set on it.”
Fuck! I force a few deep breaths to calm myself a fraction. The fresh whiskey bottle in the cabinet is calling to me, its sweet song tickling my ears and promising release. Something tells me there wouldn’t be any measure of control once I got started drinking, and I can’t have Q knowing about that. He’s not the kind of person who’d run off and tell everyone I’m spiraling, but that doesn’t mean I want him to see me like that. I’m not exactly proud of myself right now.
He rambles on, oblivious to my reaction. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t even know why I came to you. I can’t talk about it with Aspen because we both know how she’ll feel about it, and the last thing I want to do is make my wife upset, but when my father is set on something, he’s set on it.”
“We don’t need her helping Delilah escape again,” I murmur.
“Good luck if you think she’ll ever truly be sorry for that, though she feels sorry for what happened to Delilah afterward. She knows if she hadn’t freed her, things would have gone a lot differently, but still thinks she should never have been locked away in the first place.”
“Hindsight is 20/20.” Is it ever?
“What a shame foresight can’t be.” Again, he scrubs his hands over his head, blowing out a sigh that puffs his cheeks. “What am I supposed to do about this? It feels wrong, and I never thought I’d say that about anything involving Delilah.”
There’s only one thing to say. “Don’t worry about it.”
He looks at me like I lapsed into Greek. “Really? That’s all you have to say? Don’t worry about it?”
“I’ll take care of it. All I need you to do is worry about yourself and Aspen. Enjoy being together, like you should be. You shouldn’t have to worry about what your father may or may not do.”
“But—”
“That’s an order.” I know how impossible it is to be in his position. It’s one thing for me to tell Xander to fuck off, but his own son? That’s a very different story. And while Quinton is fearsome and even dangerous, family loyalty is what matters most in this world. He loves Aspen, and I know he’d kill anyone who thought to hurt her, but he can’t go to war against his father. It’s not possible.
He shakes his head as he leaves, obviously perplexed. Let him be. That’s better than going against his father and possibly jeopardizing Aspen somehow. I wouldn’t put it past that son of a bitch to hurt her somehow in retaliation against his own son. He’s that cold-hearted.
I’m about to close the door when Quinton doubles back before reaching the hall. “I don’t know what you plan on doing with Delilah, but you’ll regret it. I just know it.”
It’s all I can do not to burst out laughing. “I already do.”
He scowls, puzzled, before leaving for good.
Like he has to teach me about regret. Like I don’t have enough regret to fill a book. Maybe a library full of them.
Now that I’m alone again, the temptation is too much to resist. I read once not long ago that the human brain only has so much room for willpower on any given day. What I read was in relation to self-improvement and physical conditioning. Get the hard shit out of the way early because you might not have the willpower later after exercising it all day long.
My willpower? It’s all being spent on avoiding Delilah. How can I be expected to resist the urge to drink, too? My fingers close around the bottle, and I unscrew the cap, skipping over the simple act of pouring it into a glass in favor of pouring it down my throat.
The familiar heat races through me, spreading across my chest. I take another gulp, and another, connecting with the pain burning in my throat. Relishing it, even.
The jangling of the phone makes me snarl. That goddamn Lauren. When is she going to take the hint? I storm over to the desk and consider tearing the whole phone from the wall and smashing it, but instead, I lift the receiver and bark into the mouthpiece. “This better be good.”