Total pages in book: 171
Estimated words: 167204 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 836(@200wpm)___ 669(@250wpm)___ 557(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 167204 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 836(@200wpm)___ 669(@250wpm)___ 557(@300wpm)
His deconstruction of marriage is fascinating to me. He ignores the romanticism that makes it appealing to most people and finds the commitment aspect appealing without the romance of it.
My baby has some deep abandonment issues.
I can relate, I think I’ve just been more honest with myself about mine, so they don’t have as much power over me.
I want to dig a little deeper with him, but we don’t have time right now.
Especially because we really do have to get to class. At this point, I won’t have time to do my hair or makeup, and I can kiss my hope of getting to school early so I could cram a bit before class goodbye.
“Well, you give me butterflies,” I tease right back, “but you can still count on me to show up for you. You seem to believe love weakens commitment, but those two things aren’t mutually exclusive. They can go hand-in-hand.”
“I don’t believe love weakens commitment, I just think people who don’t use their brains to make decisions… their commitments hold very little weight.”
I lean in to give him a kiss. “I want to return to this conversation later when we have more time.”
His hold on my waist tightens, apparently anticipating my attempt to escape. “We’re skipping class, remember? We have all the time in the world.”
“We absolutely are not,” I say, shooting him a playful warning look. “Now, let me out of this bed so I can get dressed.”
He tightens his grip even more and tilts his head to kiss the side of my mouth. “Make me.”
Pouting, I ask, “Why do you have to make this so hard? I want to stay here, too, but I’m going to fail my class and fail out of school and then I’ll end up panhandling. Are you trying to ruin my life?”
He smirks. “Maybe.”
I sigh dramatically, but he finally releases me.
“Fine. Get dressed if you must.”
Before he changes his mind and grabs me again, I roll out of bed. I expect him to follow me since he needs to get dressed and head to class, too, but he just lies there, one hand resting on his chiseled abdomen as he looks up at the ceiling.
A frown flickers across my face. I thought he was playing before, just tempting me to play instead of work because it would be more fun, but looking at him, I’m starting to wonder if there’s more to it than that.
Maybe it’s just the stuff we were talking about weighing on his mind, but he truly doesn’t look like he wants to get out of bed.
It makes me want to climb back into bed with him and blow off all our responsibilities, but I can’t, so… reluctantly, I leave him in the bedroom and slip into the bathroom to get myself ready.
Chapter Twenty-two
Brynn
Inevitably, I’m on the brink of running late by the time we get to school.
I hate being late.
I feel out of sorts and stressed as I fall into my seat at exactly 10:30. The professor glances my way since I’m never running late like this, and I shoot her an apologetic grimace as I settle into my seat.
It’s a test day, so the good news is my entire day isn’t irreparably thrown off. This is the only class I had to panic about getting to. Now I’m here, I can take my test and probably leave early, and I like to hit the athletic center and get in a little gym time on Wednesdays. Between that and lunch, it’s the perfect way to fill the gap until my humanities seminar at two.
I also know if I don’t work out on Wednesdays, I probably won’t do it at all. I usually do a short pilates routine on my mat at home on Mondays, but this week with Killian, my routine has been thrown off a little.
Thankfully, I feel well-prepared for the test, and despite almost being late to class, I do get to leave early.
I feel a thousand pounds lighter now that the test is over.
Now that I’m finally in my tiny slot of scheduled free time, I start making my way toward the gym, but I pull my phone out so I can text Stacie. Last I heard, the locks on our apartment were being replaced today, and I should probably see if she’s heard anything because I haven’t.
I’m surprised to see a couple of notifications of missed texts from Victor, and it takes me a second to remember I changed my mom’s name to that in my phone. The visible message says, “Are you okay?”
Probably because I never responded to her other text, but you’d think she’d know I’m not going to by now. I swipe the screen clear and go to my texts, tapping the text two beneath hers and pulling up my message with Stacie.