Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 85608 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 428(@200wpm)___ 342(@250wpm)___ 285(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 85608 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 428(@200wpm)___ 342(@250wpm)___ 285(@300wpm)
I sighed and sat up too. “What’s going on? You’ve been off for hours.”
“Nothing,” she said automatically.
“Is it about … Marissa?” I asked hesitantly. “Because I didn’t have feelings for her on the one date we went on and didn’t even notice her tonight until Court mentioned it.”
Whitley shot me a strange look. “Who is Marissa?”
I shrugged. “Some girl I went on one date with.”
“Why would I care about her?”
I laughed. “I really have no idea. That’s what I get for listening to Court Kensington. I told him you wouldn’t care. You’d probably be the one to point out who the hot people were in the room.”
“That does sound like me.”
“Well, good. I thought I was losing my mind when he mentioned it. I swore I knew you better than that.”
She tilted her head, as if contemplating exactly what to say to that. “You’re not looking at anyone else?”
“What?” I asked in disbelief. “Of course not. Are you?”
“No, but we really hadn’t said …”
“I told you I wanted to try this. I didn’t think I had to get more exclusive than a ring on your finger.”
She nodded, a pure Whit smile on her face. “Fair.”
“So, are you going to tell me what’s been up tonight?”
“I don’t know, Gavin. Something weird happened, but I shouldn’t have let it bother me that much.” She bit her lip and looked down.
I wanted to ask what exactly had happened, but I wanted her to get it out in her own time. I squeezed her side and pressed a kiss to her temple. “What’s going on up there?”
She leaned her weight into me again, as if she were surrendering to this conversation. “I can’t stop thinking about my dad.”
She hadn’t said more than a word about her dad since that night she’d first found out about his diagnosis and cried in my arms. It was as if she had to compartmentalize what had happened so that she could survive. I didn’t blame her one bit, but I was happy to talk to her about it.
“I’ve been purposely not thinking about the why of our sudden marriage. It’s easier to check lists and make plans than to think about what comes after.”
“That’s understandable.”
“Is it?” She looked so small. “It feels like I don’t want to look at what’s happening. I don’t even want to talk to my parents. I don’t want to find out what’s going on. There’s no way for me to fix it. Even if I’d gone into the right medical field.”
“Where you’d have been miserable,” I reminded her.
Her eyes met mine again, and she softened. “That’s true. I chose what I liked, but there’s so much what-if.”
“You can’t live in a what-if world. You can only live in reality.”
“That’s no fun. I want to be a fairy princess and use magic to make all my problems go away.”
“Does that make me your dark fairy prince?”
She rolled her eyes. “No. You’re a King, obviously.”
Then, we both burst into laughter. The mood lightened considerably. Whatever lingering weirdness that had clouded our interactions was dispelled. I didn’t know what had happened at the gala tonight, but my Whitley was back.
As I leaned her back into the sand, kissing her breathless, I was glad for whatever had brought her into my life again.
25
WHITLEY
Good news and bad news.
Good news: Margaret told Locke. So, I didn’t have to.
Bad news: That meant I couldn’t tell Gavin.
I had never been a good secret keeper. Especially not from someone I was actively sleeping with and spending almost all of my waking moments with. I’d gotten away with talking about my dad in the Hamptons to cover my unease about his cheating scumbag of a cousin, but I wasn’t going to lie to him either. No matter what I’d promised Margaret.
Luck won out though. I wasn’t sure if Margaret was too embarrassed by what had happened or worried that her family would find out, but she backed out of my bridal shower. Gavin thought I’d be sad when he told me the news, but I could barely hide my relief.
“She said she wanted to hang out with Locke this weekend instead,” he said with a shrug. “Newlyweds, you know?”
“Good,” I said automatically. “She should.”
She needed to do a lot more to repair her marriage than stay home one weekend, but it wasn’t my marriage to deal with. I would have left her ass so fast and blown up her entire life on the way out.
But that was the old Whitley. I was trying for something new here. And it was fucking hard to keep my mouth shut and let people deal with their own bullshit.
With Margaret’s absence, the flight to Midland was bliss. I’d been dreading being in her uninterrupted presence for four hours. I wasn’t sure I would have been able to keep it together on that flight if she’d been there. He’d already suspected something was wrong anyway. And now, I got Gavin all to myself.