Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 126840 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 634(@200wpm)___ 507(@250wpm)___ 423(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 126840 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 634(@200wpm)___ 507(@250wpm)___ 423(@300wpm)
He gave her number, and then there was the beep.
“Bryan, it’s Hellen. I wanted you to know I got your call. I appreciate you giving that to me. It means a lot. I’m glad to have the man who made that call to remember when I think about you. I’m sorry it didn’t work out between us, but you’re a great guy, and I know you’ll find someone who will make you happy. I wish that for you. Our time together had meaning for me. Thank you for that. Take care.”
I ended the call and continued to stare at my phone, reaching for some feeling.
I cared about him enough to be sorry he hurt because we were over.
But for me…
Well, there was nothing.
I knocked on the door of Marcy and Kyra’s apartment that evening, it swung open, and Kyra nearly gave me whiplash after she latched on and dragged me in.
“Drop a cocktail on her,” she ordered Marcy, who was standing at their kickass brass and glass bar cart, a piece of furniture they had that I envied.
However, not only was a bar cart low priority on my build-my-life list, I didn’t have room for it in my small pad.
I had to admit, whenever I saw their setup, I wondered about going back to the roommate days. Sharing rent and utilities, they were able to live in a newer development that had a pool and a clubhouse. They had the needed two bedrooms, but they also had an open plan that featured space for a dining table and a bigger kitchen and living room than mine.
I could get a one-bedroom in their complex that would give me four-hundred extra square feet.
It’d also cost five hundred extra dollars.
So, yeah…
Their setup might be rad, but a-little-goes-a-long-way-because-you-work-a-lot-and-you-play-when-you-aren’t-working-so-you-don’t-need-more was the way for me.
For now.
“Sock it to us,” Kyra demanded as she shoved me into their plush couch. “Don’t leave anything out.”
Marcy plonked a fancy glass in my hand (I hadn’t gotten to the full set of fancy glasses yet in my build-a-life plan either, though I had pretty wineglasses).
Marcy was our appointed mixologist and had been since my sophomore year.
I looked at the yellow concoction in my glass then up at her in question.
“I don’t know what I call it,” she answered. “It has pineapple juice and rum and some passionfruit puree with soda water to cut it. It’s tart and it’s sweet. It tastes like a tropical Starburst. I’m undecided if it’s a keeper, since, I’ll warn you, it isn’t my best effort,” she judged herself honestly.
I sipped.
No, it wasn’t her best effort, true, but it was tasty.
“It has my approval,” I shared.
She smiled.
“Okay, hellllloooo,” Bree called. “Details on the date with the biker Jax Teller threw out of the Sons of Anarchy because he was way hotter than Jax,” she prompted.
This sounded impossible, but it was true.
Core was way hotter than Jax Teller.
“We had dinner at Wendy’s.”
Bree and Kyra both looked sick, and Marcy made a noise like she was in pain.
I started laughing.
Then I gave them the details.
When I was done, no one looked sick anymore.
“I am never going to be able to drive by a Wendy’s again without my heart beating a little faster,” Kyra declared. “I mean, it takes some chops to make Wendy’s romantic, but Lord, that man did it.”
He sure did.
“I get it, with all that talk about the Baconator, now I need one,” Marcy said.
I started chuckling, such was the power of the Baconator.
I stopped laughing when I saw how Bree was looking at me.
“What?” I asked.
“This isn’t a rebound,” she remarked.
No, it was not.
Or, at least I hoped it wasn’t.
“No,” I confirmed.
“You know, B,” Marcy cut in, her tone mildly peeved. “You can start drifting out of a relationship while you’re in said relationship. It wasn’t like everything was going perfectly, they had a big blowup, Hell ended it, and now she’s just moving on. Bryan wasn’t right from the start, it just took her a while to get to that understanding.”
“I called him and thanked him for calling me,” I put in, just in case Bree was worried I hadn’t done the right thing by Bryan and that was why she looked so weird.
“That’s nice,” she said before sipping, though it sounded like she didn’t mean it.
“What’s your deal?” Kyra asked.
Yes, I wasn’t the only person who read she didn’t mean it.
“Okay, don’t get all mad at me,”—she visibly braced in her seat—“but I mean, this sounds like it’s the start of something. Not just some fun you’re having after a long-term relationship ended. That means you’re trading an attorney for a biker. I know that sounds bad, but Marcy,”—she turned to Marcy—“you told me his club makes their money by selling marijuana. I mean, am I the only one who thinks this might not be a great idea?”