Total pages in book: 73
Estimated words: 73311 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 367(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73311 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 367(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
“I don’t think I want kids,” I told her. “Not after the things you’ve told me this weekend.”
She smiled then, and it was a good smile.
“The infection I got was rare. As was the blood loss. It’s possible, sure, but it’s also not something that happens often,” she said as she gathered up what she’d come out here for. “But you couldn’t convince Booth of that. He’s acting like I am a delicate flower, when all I really want to do is get back on my feet.”
I picked up the other candy bar wrapper from the table and dropped it into the trash can.
“But you feel better now, right?” I teased.
She nodded her head. “I think I probably should’ve stopped at the fourth snack-size Snickers, though. I’m so full I could pop.”
She’d come out here on the pretense of showing me something, and instead had gone to the freezer and pulled out a bag of snack-size Snickers and started to devour them.
Only after she had three did she think to offer me one, which I readily took.
I’d been too afraid to ask her for one while she was stuffing herself, though.
“You stay out here. I’ll tell Aaron where to find you,” she instructed when I went to follow her out the door.
I stopped her.
“You have chocolate on your mouth. Might want to take care of that before you head inside,” I told her.
She scrubbed her face with her hand sheepishly.
“Thanks.”
With that she started hurrying toward the house, leaving me here as I thought about what to do.
Tank followed her, but instead of going all the way inside, he found himself a sunny spot in the middle of Booth’s immaculate yard and collapsed on his side, stretching out fully before letting his head fall to the ground with a groan.
I turned my head away from the big ball of fur and muscle. I couldn’t think about him right now. I had to think about the problem at hand—well, this problem at hand. There were a lot of problems that Aaron was facing right now, this being the current one.
Booth himself had told me that he loved this truck.
And after Masen told me what happened later and how he refused to take it or even drive it anymore, I understood why she would be upset.
The screen door to the back of Booth and Masen’s house banged, causing me to look up in surprise.
“What’s wrong?” Aaron asked as he made his way down the winding brick pathway toward me.
Booth and Masen had a gorgeous house.
It was a one story ranch style house with the most awesome backyard I’d ever seen. It was like a backyard oasis with a huge white gazebo off to the left of the yard and a koi pond that snaked around half of the gazebo like a mini moat.
And the grass was the type of grass that was fluffy underneath your feet. Not that nasty grass with stickers that hurt as you walked through them.
“Nothing,” I told him instantly. “I was told to stay here by Masen.”
When all else fails, settle for the truth.
His brows furrowed, and before he could reply, I turned around and headed back inside the detached garage that they were housing Aaron’s truck in.
He followed behind me, and stopped close to my back, his hand curling around my hip before his entire body froze.
“Masen told me a story today,” I told him. “She told me that you bought this truck when you were sixteen, and built it for three years, since you couldn’t afford the parts on it all at once.”
“I couldn’t,” he agreed.
His voice sounded rough, almost scratchy like he was trying to hold back his emotions.
“Then why, if you put that much love into this truck, do you not want to have it with you?” I asked him, curling my hand around his at my hip.
“Because every single bad memory I have of my wife is buried in that truck,” he mumbled. “The first fight we ever had was in that front seat. Over something stupid. Then when I told her I wanted kids, she told me I loved my truck more than her. Why the hell would she want to share me with something else that would take my time away from her.”
I grimaced.
“Fight after fight was had over that truck, and I can’t think of one single thing that I want more than to forget about everything that has to do with Lynn,” he continued. “And that truck, to me, is everything that I hated about her. The fights. The guilt. It’s all wrapped up in that truck, and though it kills me, I don’t want it anymore.”
I looked over my shoulder at the closed door to the garage, and then an idea struck me.
“It looks pretty clean,” I told him, pulling away. “In fact, I bet that paint’s smooth as glass.”