Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 75553 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75553 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
I couldn’t dwell on it. I decided to focus on catching up with Isaac instead over lunch and avoid the eyes of both the women sitting opposite us. The weekend was turning out to be even more disastrous than I’d first imagined. I could only hope things would get better. Little did I know.
14
Remy
The rest of the day passed in a bit of a blur. Griff and I barely even spoke a word to each other over lunch and then after that, he disappeared into the crowd saying he had a presentation he wanted to attend. It was pretty clear that he was avoiding me and my mood soured even worse than before. I put on a brave face in front of both Isaac and Kelly, but it wouldn’t have surprised me if they noticed that something was wrong.
In the afternoon, I decided to take a walk around the block to clear my head away from any talk of work. I’d never been to Chicago before and the city itself was beautiful. I didn’t walk very far, but I enjoyed the assorted architecture that clearly defined the metropolis. Despite getting a breather, I wasn’t feeling any better about my issues with Griff. If anything, the time apart from him made me feel so much worse.
I ate dinner out of the hotel at a nearby pizza place so I could get some peace away from Kelly’s assessing eyes. The food was nice, but in all honesty, I just wanted to go back to the hotel and get some rest. Yet at the same time, that’s exactly what I was dreading. Would Griff be back in the room? Would he find somewhere else to sleep for the night and leave me alone? The thought was disheartening, but I didn’t have anywhere else to go.
With a heavy heart, I trudged back to the hotel room. As soon as I opened the door, I noticed Griff’s head of brown hair. It was bent over his laptop at the desk in the corner of the room. I gulped. He didn’t turn around as I entered and I tried to close the door behind me as quietly as possible, but there was still an unmistakable click.
I waited, but Griff didn’t even turn around. I couldn’t believe it. Things between us had gone south so quickly and I didn’t even know where I’d gone wrong. I felt awkward and I knew he was avoiding me, so I grabbed my clothes and headed for the bathroom. Once the door was locked behind me, I fell against it and sighed. At least I could go to sleep and forget about this nightmare for a few hours.
The hot water felt good against my skin as I showered. I took some extra time to thoroughly moisturise and condition my hair. I figured that any time I wasted would make things less awkward for both of us. Unsurprisingly, when I emerged in my pajamas, Griff was still hard at work on his laptop. I could hear him typing away and I figured he didn’t want to be disturbed.
He was still silent when I sat down on the edge of the bed. I began to rub lotion on my legs like I did most nights and realized that sleep might not be as big of a relief as I’d wanted. After all, it had been in the middle of the night that we began our tryst. What if it happened again and Griff regretted it even more the next day? Or worse, what if it didn’t happen again? The thought of lying next to him and being unable to snuggle up to him caused a lump to form in my throat.
Just as I was beginning to panic, Griff turned around in his chair and his eyes met mine for the first time that day. “Remy, I’m happy to sleep in the chair tonight if it makes you more comfortable,” he stated evenly.
His words surprised me. I didn’t think it was so bad that we couldn’t sleep in the same bed. After all, we were both adults. “That’s a bit ridiculous, don’t you think?” I replied with a shake of my head. “We’re both sober, right? We should be able to keep our hands to ourselves.” Though deep down inside, I kind of hoped Griff wouldn’t.
“Okay,” he said and stood up from the chair. He closed his laptop and approached the bed where I was sitting. He grabbed a couple of pillows from the head of the bed and lined them up down the center like a little makeshift partition.
“There we go, a wall made from feathers should be a good enough barrier, don’t you think?” he asked me with a small smile.
I couldn’t help it. The whole thing was so absurd that I laughed. The very idea that two consenting adults needed pillows between them to stop things from getting heated was just ridiculous.