Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 72122 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 361(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72122 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 361(@200wpm)___ 288(@250wpm)___ 240(@300wpm)
I waved at those that I knew, and came to a halt at the table of food that was laid out before me.
I went for a cup of ice and the tea, resigning myself to disappointment.
“Grab yourself a plate,” Truth ordered from my side.
He was already filling up his own plate, piling it so high with crab, shrimp, and corn that I worried for the integrity of the plate.
“It’s seafood. It’s good. I promise.”
I knew it was seafood. I also knew that if I ate it, I’d be in the toilet having the fires of holy hell leaking out of my ass because it gave me diarrhea almost the moment the food hit my mouth.
So no, despite knowing they were good, I wouldn’t be eating them.
“No thanks,” I shook my head in the negative.
It was just my luck that the entire get together was based around a crab boil—something that also made my colon want to eject from my body.
I also couldn’t eat the potatoes or corn since they’d been boiled with the crab and shrimp.
“Come on, try it, you’ll like it.” He waved the shrimp in front of my nose.
I bared my teeth.
“If I eat it,” I said lowly so only he could hear. “I’ll spend the entire night on the potty trying not to shit my guts out…okay?”
He clamped his mouth shut, finally realizing that everything here was along the same lines as the shrimp.
“I’ll go get you something…”
I left him before he could finish, heading straight to the table where the ladies were sitting and dropping in next to Aaron’s wife, Imogen.
“Men are stupid,” I told her.
She snorted before taking a drink from her red Solo cup.
“I think you should meet my husband,” Tally said. “He’s an ass on a good day. On a bad day, well let’s just say he’s…”
“Let’s just say what?”
That was Tommy, her husband, and I had to bite my lip to keep from laughing at the look on Tally’s face.
“He’s an even bigger ass,” Tally finished. “Why are you skulking?”
Tommy’s mouth kicked up, and I saw his hand lower behind Tally’s back, and she shivered.
“What do you think he just did?” Imogen whispered.
“My guess is that he just put his hands down her pants,” I whispered right back.
Tally’s eyes, which had been unfocused and distant, finally returned to me.
“But there’s this thing about the man you love,” she whispered, not caring that the man she loved was standing at her back, listening to every word. “They can drive you insane, but at the end of the night, when you’re in their arms, everything that was wrong with that day ceases to exist.”
I found my first smile since I’d arrived.
The happiness that I could see on her face was reflected on his, and I felt a pang of sadness hit me.
Would I ever have that with Truth? Or had I forced myself on him, and we’d never have that?
I didn’t know, but I hoped like hell that one day we would—if only we could get over the Elais Beckett hurdle, I felt like we would have a fighting chance.
Hiding my irritation as well as I could, I settled on nibbling on the cookies that were lining the table as far as the eye could see.
“You’re freakin’ awesome, you know that?”
I took another bite of cookie and smiled at Imogen.
“Why do you say that?” I asked.
“Because you’ve just eaten your seventh cookie, and haven’t slowed down long enough to care about the fact that the men are watching you like you you’re going to go postal any moment.”
I sighed.
Looking down at the cookies with disgust, I shoved the next two into my mouth and made a promise to myself that I’d lose the weight I’d put on since moving into the same house as Truth.
It wasn’t a lot of weight, per se, but it was enough that I couldn’t fit into my jeans as well as I’d been able to do two weeks ago.
I looked over at the man responsible for all my weight gain—all seven pounds of it—and let my eyes rove all over his body.
Even in a pair of jeans, a black shirt, and his cut, the man looked ripped. He looked like he worked out, played hard and had no regrets at all in life.
His eyes turned away from the conversation he was having with Seanshine, Aaron, and Tommy—when had he left?—and caught mine. Our gazes caught and held.
“Have y’all gotten serious?”
I looked up, and realized rather quickly that the ladies were having a conversation around me—one that clearly was about me—and I hadn’t been paying the least bit of attention.
“I’m sorry, what?” I gave Tally a small, apologetic smile.
“I asked if y’all were serious.”
I looked down at my ring, fingering it, and the ladies gasped.
“What is that?” Tally grabbed my hand.