Total pages in book: 23
Estimated words: 20927 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 105(@200wpm)___ 84(@250wpm)___ 70(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 20927 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 105(@200wpm)___ 84(@250wpm)___ 70(@300wpm)
This is Journey though. She’s like a little sister to me. She requested me, so I’ll do it without question. Maybe later, after the festivities are over, I can sneak back here with Piper.
I nuzzle her ear. “I have to go, sweet girl.”
She murmurs sleepily, something about going with me.
“No, you sleep. But I’ll be missing you,” I reassure her. I want her to know that even if I can’t be with her right now, I’m still thinking of her. She’s been the only thing on my mind since the moment she’s arrived. I don’t want her doubting that for a minute.
She burrows back into her pillow without another word and she’s softly snoring again a few seconds later.
I chuckle as I roll from the bed. My body might be exhausted, but I’ve never had more energy. The day has never felt brighter, and life has never seemed quite as beautiful as it does today.
Even after I’ve handled several minor emergencies for the wedding, I’m still feeling upbeat as I stand in front of the bride and groom.
Journey and Cam promise their love for each other. They chose traditional vows, ones I’ve heard a thousand times before. But as I look out over the guests in attendance, I scan the crowd. When my gaze lands on Piper, I can’t help smiling.
I wonder what it’d be like to have her here every night. It’d be fucking perfect to have her in my bed. To crawl into it late at night and know her tight, curvy body is waiting for me. To take her to my favorite bookstore during the mornings and lose to her at air hockey and come back to the lodge to share a meal together. I can see it all at once.
My mouth goes dry and my hands get clammy. I might want that but there’s no way she wants a backwoods mountain man like me. I’m just the vacation fling, the guy she’ll be with before she goes on to find someone else.
I pronounce Cam and Journey husband and wife as cold dread slithers through me. I’m an idiot. I’ve made the same fuckin’ mistake twice in my life.
Piper approaches me at the reception. We need to have a talk and I know this. But right now isn’t the time or the place.
“Want to dance?” She gives me a carefree grin. I’m the funny story she tells her friends before she marries the man that will get to hold her every night.
Swallowing down the bile, I shake my head and manage to mutter something about how much work I still have to do.
Her expression falls and for a moment, I want to believe this is real. I want to believe that she cared about me. But I’m being ridiculous. “Oh, maybe later then.”
Piper
Gray hasn’t talked to me all day. I know he was busy working when I asked him to dance. I know he has a lot going on when there’s an event. But yesterday, he made time for me. He kept chatting with me even as he managed all the chaos of the lodge.
Still as the hours pass, I eventually retreat to my room. I wait for him here but something tells me he’s not coming back to my bed.
Mundy meows at my door and I open it to let him in. He lays something at my feet, and I lean down to pick up the shiny square plastic. That’s when I realize what this is. It’s the keycard for Gray’s room. “You are a little thief.”
He meows as if he’s done nothing wrong.
Taking the card, I slip into the room across the hall. Since Gray isn’t going to come to me, I’ll just wait for him.
It’s nearly midnight and I’ve been asleep for over an hour when I hear the rattle of a doorknob. I spring away and rub the sleep from my eyes. I have to figure out what went wrong. Why was Gray so nice to me earlier and now he can’t stand to look at me?
He pauses when he sees me on the bed, curled up next to Mundy. “You didn’t have to wait up for me.”
I rub the sleep from my eyes and blink at him. Where’s the man from last night, the one who looked at me like I was his whole world? I don’t think he’s still in there because the person I’m looking at right now feels like a stranger. “I missed you.”
He looks away from me, his gaze roaming the room. “Yeah, about that. Last night was…”
I fold my arms over my chest and wait. I’m not rescuing him from this. He can say whatever he wants but he can’t lie to me. I know what I saw on his face last night.
“It was a one time thing. Nothing more,” he finally finishes.