Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 74949 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 375(@200wpm)___ 300(@250wpm)___ 250(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74949 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 375(@200wpm)___ 300(@250wpm)___ 250(@300wpm)
This was the guy who had always been just like Rex, had hardly ever seen anything through, graduated by the skin of his teeth, and not because he couldn’t do it, but because he hadn’t cared. When he was working on this house with us, he seemed to care.
But then, maybe it was more that it was a condition of his parole than anything else, and he simply didn’t want to be locked up again.
As we finished out our third day, Wayne again asked Riven if he wanted to hang out, and again he was told no. That was just the way Wayne was. He was a people person and struggled to keep his mouth closed. If he could, he would go out every night just to shoot the shit with people.
I waited for Riven while the other guys left, following the same routine from the last two days. He never asked me to sign his paper in front of Wayne and Smitty, and I didn’t push it. Riven was a dick, but his business was his business, and I wasn’t the type to share it around.
I watched as he approached me. Despite just getting out of prison, his skin was golden. He had a light dusting of dark scruff along his jaw, his nose was slightly pointed, his lips a sexy bow shape.
Silently, he handed me the paper. I couldn’t help noticing the way his black hair, dripping with sweat, stuck out from beneath his dark ball cap. Riven was only thirty-one, but he looked… I wouldn’t say older than that, but like he’d seen a lot of life—hell, we all had around here. Freckles dotted his skin, brows pinched together like he was always pissed or in deep thought. He wore a small silver hoop in each ear, which he’d had before getting locked up too. Had his holes stayed open, or had he pierced them again when he got out? I didn’t know why I wondered, but then, his brown eyes told stories that made me hate myself for wanting to know.
“Why are you staring at me like that?”
Shit. I had been, hadn’t I? But it was a blast from the past, seeing again the first guy I’d ever jerked off to—someone who, if I let myself remember, had been kind to me in a way my own family hadn’t. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t trouble. “Now, is that any way to talk to your superiors?” I said, just to get under his skin.
“Fuck off, Parrish.” He tried to pull the unsigned paper out of my hand, only I held on and the damn thing ripped. Without looking back, he began stomping toward his truck, proving that he was still the same hothead he’d always been. Neither him nor Rex could ever control their tempers.
“Is that all you know how to say to me?” I called after him, but Riven didn’t respond, kicking up dirt as his feet hit the ground. “Jesus, Riven. I assume you need to show these to your PO when you meet with him.”
He jerked open the door of his old truck, the same one Rex used to climb into with him before they went out to cause trouble. At the time I’d wished I were in the seat beside Riven, partly because of my crush, and partly because, for some strange-ass reason I couldn’t make sense of, I’d always looked up to Riven. I’d thought the sun rose and set on him, and my head hadn’t cleared until he’d admitted to killing someone.
“Riven!” I called out again, but he slammed the door, started his truck, and peeled out of the driveway like he was on fire. He was lucky as shit Harold hadn’t been here to see it.
Typical Riven. If he didn’t care about getting into trouble with his PO, then I sure as shit shouldn’t care about it, so I headed to my truck and went home.
My fingers drummed against the steering wheel as I drove, the flash of anger I’d seen in his eyes playing in my head. Had it really been anger, though, or something else? At first it seemed like it was just Riven being Riven, but then there’d been something more. I was pretty sure he’d also been embarrassed, which made me feel like shit, then made me pissed at myself for feeling like shit because Riven McKenna was a dick who didn’t deserve for me to feel bad for him.
When I got home, I brought the paper inside and set it on the coffee table.
I took a shower, then changed into another pair of jeans and a T-shirt, my attention still drawn to his PO form. What if he had to turn them in daily and got in trouble for it?
“Ugh!” I groaned, tugging at my hair. It was his choice. He was the one who couldn’t control his temper. Given what happened, I’d have thought he’d learned that actions have consequences.