Total pages in book: 118
Estimated words: 107118 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 536(@200wpm)___ 428(@250wpm)___ 357(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107118 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 536(@200wpm)___ 428(@250wpm)___ 357(@300wpm)
“Cher,” Cowboy said. “You don’t need to go there right now.”
I held out one of my hands and ran my finger down Cowboy’s handsome face. He was beautiful, achingly so. His eyes were so open and kind. I wasn’t sure I had ever seen such kind eyes before. My hand dropped away. “I had a friend, Michelle.” I sucked in an agonized breath. I shook my head, like I could erase her pretty face from my mind. Rid myself of the guilt I felt whenever I thought of how she was left behind. But I managed a smile as I thought of her wild ways. “She hated where we lived. She was always getting me to do crazy things . . .”
There was a knock on my window. I kicked back my comforter and drew back the curtains. Michelle’s face was smiling up at me. I pulled up my window and she climbed through. The second I turned around, she whispered, “You. Me. Mexico. This Friday.”
I blinked in surprise. “What—”
“You wanna leave this place. So do I. I got us passports.” I opened my mouth to ask how, but she waved me off. “Those photobooth pictures we took weren’t just for shits and giggles, girl. As for the rest . . .” She shrugged. “Forging your shitty scrawl weren’t hard. The rest was a piece of cake.”
I burst out laughing, my heart begging to race in excitement. Michelle dragged me to the bed. “It’s all organized. All you need now is your bikinis and your sunglasses.”
I thought of my poppa and how he couldn’t give a fuck about what happened to me. Ky almost never saw me now, and my aunt was away with work more than she was here. I had my horse . . . but when I thought of getting the hell away . . . thought of the sandy beaches, and the fact that it wasn’t fucking Texas, my decision was made.
“I’m in,” I said. Michelle squealed and launched her arms around me.
“You won’t regret it, Sia. It’ll be the best fucking thing we ever do!”
“We ran to Mexico.” I closed my eyes, remembering crossing the border and feeling so fucking high with freedom. With the idea of a new beginning away from the club. Then I remembered—
“I met Juan Garcia two days into our trip.” His face flashed into my head. His dark eyes, olive skin, and beautiful black hair, short at the sides and perfectly styled on the top. I laughed a single humorless laugh. “I was smitten the minute I saw him.” I pictured his toned, lithe body in shorts, walking across the beach to where we sat sunbathing. “I was seventeen; he was twenty-five. I had never been in love before. I’d barely even had a boyfriend before. I hadn’t really come to grips with who I was as a person. At how I’d been kept from my father and brother all my life. And I wasn’t really ready to face the shit I knew would be waiting for me at home. So when Juan swept me off my feet, I went willingly.”
My hand shook as it fought to keep its grip on the towel. “It was obvious that he became as obsessed with me as I did him. We were never apart. He took me to dinners in restaurants I could only ever have dreamed of eating in. The locals worshipped the ground he walked on . . . and in no time at all, so did I. I loved him to death . . . until . . .” I shook my head. Just remembering that day made me nauseous. “Only a week after I’d met Juan, Michelle left me a note to say that she’d moved on to where we were supposed to travel next. She understood I’d found Juan and she wanted me to stay with him. She said she would see me again in a few weeks.” I blinked, seeing the letter so clearly in my head. It was her writing. I recognized it. “It was just like her. Leaving me to get laid while she flitted to the next thing she wanted to do. It was typical Michelle, so I never doubted it.” A quick sob came from my throat, catching me off guard. “Only she never came back. I asked Juan for help. He was a businessman, a rich man with contacts. But there was nothing we could find about where she’d gone.” I took a deep inhale. “That was, until I went looking for him one day at his work.” I smiled humorlessly at my own stupidity. “And found . . . found . . .”
“Enough, cher.” Cowboy got up from the couch. “You’re fucking shaking. Don’t do this. You don’t need to tell us.” I turned my face to look at Hush. His jaw was tight and he was gripping the blanket so hard I thought it would rip apart.