Total pages in book: 58
Estimated words: 55964 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 280(@200wpm)___ 224(@250wpm)___ 187(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55964 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 280(@200wpm)___ 224(@250wpm)___ 187(@300wpm)
I made her laugh a lot, and although she had a thing about guys in my line of work, I had a feeling she’d be begging to get to know me better soon enough.
4
Amber
After that very strange, but surprisingly good night out at the bar, I did my best to hide from him for the next couple days.
When we were sitting at the bar, our legs touching slightly, I felt it: that tingle down my spine, that buzz on my lips. We ate, he asked about me, made me laugh, and toward the end of the night, our fingers touched as we reached for the check, and I stared into his eyes, and I knew in that moment that if he’d kissed me, right then and there at the bar, I would’ve kissed him back.
We walked back together, said goodnight, and I’ve been hiding from him ever since.
I should hate him. I don’t understand what the heck would attract me to a guy like that. He robbed a man in front of me for fun. I hated that sort of thing, hated men that bragged about crime and thought it was exciting, hated that sort of macho arrogant crap most of all, and yet somehow, he was different. He didn’t seem to take himself too seriously, and he made jokes all the time, and of course it didn’t hurt that he was handsome as all hell.
But I’d sworn off men like him. Ever since the accident, I couldn’t handle it, couldn’t risk it.
I wanted to go home, but even home seemed fraught and broken. There was nowhere for me, nowhere at all, except for maybe this small bedroom. Maybe I could hide in here forever and never come out.
That didn’t happen though. Mona came home on Monday, and I found her sitting on the back porch reading a paperback that afternoon. Ren was nowhere to be seen, so I took the opportunity to sit out with her, knees curled up beneath me. The back yard was a veritable garden, and butterflies flitted between the flowers.
“How’s it going?” Mona asked. “Everything okay so far?”
“Great,” I said. “Janine’s been really sweet and helpful.”
“Oh, good, I’m glad. I knew you’d like her. Everyone does, really.”
“How was the city?”
She waved a hand. “Oh, you know. Vincent’s always so on edge and he’s constantly telling me to stay out of town for a while.”
“That must be hard,” I said, trying to keep my voice even.
She laughed. “It’s not, not really. Things are bad right now, so it’s harder than normal, but this is the first time he’s ever really made me stay out here. Normally I stay with him in the city, and come out here on weekends to work on my book or whatever I’m writing at the time.”
I chewed on my lip for a second. “How do you deal with it? The whole— you know, the business.”
“You mean, how do I handle being married to a mob boss?”
I winced. “Yeah, I guess so.”
“It’s not easy sometimes,” she said softly. “He makes it a lot easier. I don’t know how to explain it, but we love each other. I know he’d do anything for me, and I’d do anything for him. When we’re together, it’s like lightning on the sand, everything’s hot and sparkling and we leave glass in our wake. But there are hard times too, when things get violent.”
“My father was barely ever around. Basically left my mom to raise me on my own, and then when she died, he only halfway stepped up.”
“How did she pass?”
“Cancer.” I shrugged a little. “It wasn’t great. I was ten so I remember most of it.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“It was a while ago. Dad took it hard though, and he sort of pulled away from me. He wanted to protect me, but at the same time, wanted to expose me to the life, you know? So he was constantly bringing guys around, then making sure I never spent any time with anyone remotely connected. It was hard, growing up.”
“I can imagine,” she said, and gave me that look, and I knew what she wanted to ask, but for the first time in a long time, I didn’t mind. In fact, I wanted to talk about it, because I thought she might understand. “How did he react when you had your accident?”
I smiled a little. “Everyone keeps calling it that—my accident. I think of it that way too, but it wasn’t an accident, was it?”
“I guess not, no.” She shook her head a little. “I can’t imagine, you know.”
“I couldn’t either, at least until I got shot.” I clenched my jaw and leaned my head back. “He flipped when it happened. I heard he found the guys that did it and killed them or something. I never asked for the details, and I really don’t want to know. But he sent me away because he thought Chicago was too dangerous.”