Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 96513 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 483(@200wpm)___ 386(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96513 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 483(@200wpm)___ 386(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
He sighed and motioned for the bartender to pour us each another shot of tequila. He held one out to me and took the other in his hand. “I’m here to wish you happy birthday.”
I took the shot and sighed. I was taking my anger out on him. Not because he’d actually done anything wrong. I was mad at someone else, and Penn just happened to be here.
We lifted our shots and then downed them, as we’d done hundreds of times together. I swallowed the burning liquid and smiled up at my partner in crime. Exactly where he had always been—at my side.
“Thank you,” I said, dispelling my irritation. “I’m not mad at you.”
“I know.”
“So, what are you really doing here?”
“I actually wanted to wish you happy birthday. And… I saw you taking shots all by yourself. Didn’t seem right.”
“So, you wanted to be chivalrous?” I admonished.
He shot me a look that I’d seen a million times. One that said he could be nothing but who he was.
“Of course you did,” I muttered.
“You know, just because things are different between us doesn’t mean that I stopped caring about you,” he said softly. “You’re still one of my closest friends. We’re still crew, Ren.”
I waved him away. “I really don’t need to hear it.”
He frowned but stayed resolute. He’d always been comfortable with the worst parts of my personality. They used to mirror his own. Before he’d gone all moral.
“And I brought you this,” he said, holding out a red box with a gold ribbon.
I stared at it. My heart tripped over itself. I knew what was in that box.
“You didn’t,” I whispered.
“I missed last year. We were…” He trailed off.
He didn’t have to say it. Besides the fact that I had been on my honeymoon, Penn and I hadn’t been talking a year ago. But every year before that, every year since my father had been arrested and thrown in prison, he’d given me one of these little red boxes.
“I thought you’d forgotten.”
He gave me a half-smile. “How could I forget?”
I didn’t want to accept it, but this wasn’t about Penn Kensington. It had nothing to do with us at all. This was about the little girl I’d been once upon a time. The girl who had believed in love at first sight and big, romantic gestures and happily ever afters who had never thought she’d ever love a man as much as her daddy—the one person who had sworn he would always be there. And I’d believed him. To my own detriment.
I took the box from Penn’s hand, tugged the gold ribbon off, and slowly peeled away the red wrapping. I popped the lid on the box, and nestled inside on red crushed velvet was a small silver ballerina charm. The same exact brand and style of bracelet charm that my father had given me every single year on my birthday. Every year until we’d all discovered the truth about what a vicious liar he was.
Penn, in his unending goodness, had known how much those charms meant to me. He’d given me a new one every year since then, save for last year.
“Thank you,” I whispered, my heart in my throat as I clutched the box to my chest.
He pulled me in for a hug, planting a faint kiss on the top of my head. “You’re welcome.”
“What’s this?” a voice sneered nearby.
I jerked back from Penn’s touch at the first sound of Camden’s voice. He strode across the sand back toward us. His eyes darted back and forth between us, alone on the beach.
“Nothing,” I said, mirroring what he’d said to me when Fiona called on my birthday to talk to him.
“Nothing,” he said, disbelieving. “It’s always nothing with you two, isn’t it?”
“I was simply wishing her a happy birthday,” Penn said. He shook his head at Camden. “I’ll go now.”
“Oh no, stay,” Camden growled. “By all means, wish my wife a happy birthday.”
“Camden,” I said in distress, “it wasn’t like that. He just gave me my birthday present.”
“Of course he did.” Camden snatched the box out of my hand. I made a sound of protest, but he was already opening it. “Let’s see what lover boy got you.”
“Stop it,” Penn said in frustration. “What is wrong with you?”
He plucked the charm out of the box and held it aloft. “I think it looks a little cheap, but what do I know?” Camden asked. His eyes were straight fire. The brown so dark that they were nearly black in the flickering light. Anger swept his body like a tornado, wrecking everything in its path. “Who knew you’d like this better than diamonds? But it comes from him. So, of course you do.”
“The truce, Camden,” I reminded him. Tears were brimming in my eyes.
This wasn’t supposed to happen. He wasn’t supposed to be doing this.