Total pages in book: 225
Estimated words: 218500 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1093(@200wpm)___ 874(@250wpm)___ 728(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 218500 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1093(@200wpm)___ 874(@250wpm)___ 728(@300wpm)
“Should I venture into madness with you instead? Is that what you’re suggesting?” she fires back.
“Why not?” I shrug. “It’s not like you have a choice since I’m so relentless. Why not try madness on for size and see how it fits? Come on, Chloe, let’s go see our house. I haven’t been inside it yet. I wanted to do this with you.”
She hard-blinks. “You bought a house you’d never stepped foot inside of for a hundred grand over the asking price because I bookmarked it?”
“And visited it online forty-six times. How many times you drive by?”
“Twice,” she whispers, staring at the house.
“You stopped dreaming for yourself when Hallman’s accident changed everything. It’s time to start dreaming again, beautiful. But you don’t have to just dream about this. It’s yours. Come on in and see it.”
She doesn’t move.
“Come on, baby. Let’s go fuck inside our new house.”
I get out of the SUV and round it, then open her door and click her seatbelt undone.
“Derek, I…” She lets that hang.
I lift her into my arms.
“I can walk,” she says, irritated.
“You’re getting carried over that threshold.”
“No. I don’t want to go in there,” she protests.
“Why?” I ask.
Her eyes are brimming with tears. She looks away from me, chewing her lip.
“What is it?” I ask.
She dashes tears from her eyes, still holding the keys.
“You gonna clue me in?” I ask after a long beat of silence.
“I can’t clue you in. I can’t make sense of anything right now, especially you. You’ve swept my life up into a tornado.”
“To fix it,” I tell her, setting her down.
“And I … I feel like I’m having a nervous breakdown.”
“Because you’re thinking of trying this with me? Go ahead. Have a breakdown. I’m right here to look after you.”
She shakes her head.
“Not now? Okay, have it later. Come on in, then.” I tug on her hand. “Come walk around and then I’ll run you a bath. I bet you’ve dreamt of using that big tub in the master while staring out at all the trees through that big picture window, huh? Thought you’d never see it outside of photographs, right? Let’s go.”
She follows, not pulling her hand out of mine.
When we get to the door, I lift her up into my arms again.
“Derek,” she grumbles.
“Hearing you say my name always gives me a little thrill, Chloe. Even if you say it like that.” I press my lips to her jaw and take the keys from her.
As I unlock the door, she pulls in a breath and holds it while being carried over the threshold.
I crave her throwing her arms around me and squealing. I crave a smile, happiness from her. I’m so looking forward to when her feelings for me are on the surface. But it feels like something is brewing. Simmering. Maybe.
To the left is a living room and to the right is the dining room. A staircase sits straight ahead but doesn’t take up the full space. You can walk up a few steps to a landing where the stairs continue up right or walk past the staircase to get deeper into the house, where I remember from the online brochure is a powder room, laundry room, and the kitchen, which opens up into the massive family room and a covered part of the back porch.
The formal living and dining rooms both have fires burning in their fireplaces per my instructions. Furnishings are okay. It all looks new. The former owner furnished the place but was barely here.
We walk past the stairs, down the hall and stop in the kitchen that looks out to the sundrenched family room extension, a rounded space with soaring ceilings overlooking the back yard through the two-story back wall of mostly windows and fireplace. Past that would be lush greenery if not for the fact that we’re at the tail end of autumn and winter is imminent. There should also be a fire roaring in the fireplaces upstairs per the directions I left. I wanted lit fires in all of the fireplaces for us as well as to make the place smell like lemons, which it does. Chloe used lemon cleaner, lemon dish soap, even lemon hand soap when I watched her in that rowhouse on camera, so I want it to feel like home.
“Whoever designed this certainly loved fireplaces,” I remark.
“That’s one of the reasons I loved it,” she says hoarsely, looking emotional.
I set her on the counter beside a waiting bucket of chilled champagne and a dozen red roses in a crystal vase.
“Please, God, not another mimosa,” she mumbles, staring at the counter with horror.
I laugh and she half smiles, but it slips as soon as our eyes connect. I pass her the card from the rose bouquet.
Welcome home, baby.
Love, Derek.
She sets it down, nibbling on her bottom lip.