Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 88673 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 443(@200wpm)___ 355(@250wpm)___ 296(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 88673 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 443(@200wpm)___ 355(@250wpm)___ 296(@300wpm)
Apparently, my silence has nothing to do with her eagerness to talk because just a few seconds later, a story about her childhood comes spilling out of her mouth. “When I was a kid these woods were more like my first home than my second. I was mad, crazy in love with horses. Still am, really. Just no time or money to keep that habit going. But as a kid, I had every day after school and all summer long to play as I wished and my parents paid for everything.”
“Must’ve been nice.” I say this absently as I direct her to the right where a mostly hidden path takes us back around to where I actually need to be in order to find my way back to the camp I made before I went to her house and made all these fun times possible.
“It was nice.”
“So you’re like… what? A little rich princess?”
She sighs before answering. “You make that sound like a bad thing.”
“Isn’t it?”
“If you were a horse-obsessed girl, wouldn’t you want to be a little rich princess?”
“I guess.”
“So it’s not a bad thing.”
“You do realize that you’re one of the under one percent, right? Point zero-zero-one, or whatever.”
“I’m really not. My family is Disciple, West Virginia, rich, not like entire USA rich. Of course, Disciple is better off than most West Virginia towns because of the Revival. But they just decided very early on that they would sacrifice for me. They gave up the boats and the trips to Europe so I could have a perfect childhood.”
“Well, that’s amazing.”
“Is this a sore spot? Your parents didn’t do the same?”
“Weren’t you just warning me not to talk to you ten minutes ago? We’re not friends, remember?”
“I never said we were. I’m just passing time. It’s better than walking blindfolded through the woods with a kidnapper in silence.”
“Is it, though?”
“Anyway, I’m not rich now. I used all my Disciple money—we get a windfall when we turn eighteen for all the work we did as children—and I spent all mine on buying the house from my parents.”
“Bet you’re regretting that right about now.”
“No. I’m not. I’m going to open up an event center. For weddings. That’s what I do at the hotel—well, what I did before they fired me. One day it’s gonna be great. All fixed up and beautiful. And every stall in the barn will have a horse in it.”
“That’s your dream, huh? Planning weddings?”
“It’s not a bad dream. What’s yours?”
“To live.” I say this without thinking. It just comes out. And as soon as it does, I want to take it back.
“Wow,” Clover says. “That’s pretty…” She falters for a word.
“Sad?”
“No. I was gonna say… third world.”
I actually stop walking to look at her and scoff. “What?”
“Sorry. That was a very under-one-percent thing to say, wasn’t it?”
“‘Third world’ of me. Wow. I’m actually speechless.”
“I’m just saying, your little underground world must be pretty messed up if your dream is to live. You might as well be a child slave in a lithium mine, Riggs. That’s how third-world your dream is.”
“As compared to your stupid wedding thing? Come on. I’ll take ‘live’ over that any day.”
“You don’t like pretty things and happy days? Because that’s what weddings are. The ones I plan are.”
“It’s just, in the grand scheme of things, kinda stupid.”
“Which part? The pretty decorations? The tear-jerking declaration of love? The fabulous party? Which part of a wedding is kinda stupid, Riggs?”
“All of it.”
“So you don’t believe in love?”
“Ya know, I liked you better when you were locked up in the dungeon.”
“Because I didn’t make you think about your lack of ambition?”
“No. Because I could close the door on your face and walk away.”
“Well, you’ll get your chance to do that again, don’t worry. I’ll be locked up tight in your little bunker soon enough.”
“Which, again, is the best plan ever.”
“Says you.”
“Yeah. Says me. Because the alternative is leaving you to die in that dungeon of yours.”
“I think someone would save me.”
I stop walking again. And once again I scoff. “Is that right? Holy shit, woman. You really do think you’re some kind of princess, don’t you?”
“No. Well”—she chuckles here—“yes. I kinda do fancy myself a princess. But what I meant was that people would be looking for me. Clarissa, my boss at the Yonder, she’s probably been calling me for days. It’s midweek and she’s busy with her own life, so she’s not worried. Yet. But if I don’t answer in the next day or two, she’s gonna come looking for me.”
“You’re sure about that?”
“Yes. And she knows about Lowyn. She’s met her. So she would call Lowyn’s store looking for her to ask about me. And then Lowyn would start calling me, and me being unreachable, this would set off alarm bells. She would get in her car and drive down to my house, figuring I went home after being fired and kicked out of my apartment. Then she would find the Navigator and the trailer and she would go inside and I would have heard all this, so I’d be pounding on the trapdoor—which she knows about because we’ve been best friends all our lives—and she would rescue me. And then, after I told her my story, she’d call Collin and… well, your dream would be over. Because he would kill you.”