Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 77715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 389(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 389(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
“I don’t know how to cook,” I admitted, but the sad look on his face made me suddenly wish I had the sort of mom who would have taught me that vital skill. “But we could, you know, order…”
“You hear that, Rosita and Marie?” Dezi asked, looking down at the pig. “Mommy and Daddy have another date planned. And you two can entertain each other while Daddy and Mommy have some grown-up alone time,” he said.
It was a ridiculous way to phrase it. Still, desire moved through my system until I damn near wanted to find a deep corner of the woods to get it on in.
“I’ll do a lot of reckless shit, baby,” he said, giving me a devilish little smile, “but I’m not risking a sex offender title just ‘cause we couldn’t keep our hands off of each other.”
“I guess that’s probably a good idea,” I agreed, following along as he turned and started walking again. “Should Marie be in there this long?” I asked.
“The instructions said it was suitable for a couple of hours at a time. She seems happy,” he said, looking down at her.
“Where did you even get her?”
“The wife of one of the OG members is known for rescuing and adopting out a bunch of animals. She happened to have a litter of kittens.”
“You really should ask people before you bring animals into their lives.”
“You look in her big blue eyes and tell me you don’t want her,” he demanded, moving into my path and puffing out his chest to try to make me look at her closer. “You can’t, can you?” he asked, smiling. “I have a trunk full of shit for her too.”
“Of course you do,” I said, shaking my head at him.
“And a kitten subscription box,” he added. “Which is delivered on a different day than the piggy box, so you have to see me at least twice a month.”
“I dunno. That might be too much for me,” I said, clucking my tongue.
“I know. This is a lot of concentrated fucking amazingness. I promise you will get used to it. Soon, it won’t even burn you to be basking in the glow of my bright star.”
“You’re ridiculous,” I said as we made our way back around the pond, getting closer to the parking lot once again.
“Rosita looks tired. Maybe we should take the girls home, tuck them in for a nap, then talk about the mortgage.”
“Talk about the… what?” I asked.
“Seth said that was his parents’ way of sneaking off to fuck. They always said they had to go discuss the mortgage, so Seth and Vi left them alone for a while.”
“Must have been nice that they at least attempted to hide the truth from them,” I said, inwardly still cringing at how many times I had to sneak into the room where my mother was in bed with another random guy.
If or when I inherited the fortune my father wanted to leave to me, I figured I was going to need to drop a hefty chunk of it on some serious fucking therapy.
“So, how about we order delivery, then eat it back at your place?” Dezi suggested as I got Rosita back into the SUV, then strapped in Marie’s backpack as well.
“Sounds good to me.”
It did, too.
A lunch date.
With a guy I was interested in, one who genuinely seemed to be into me as well for a change.
It was all so… normal.
I mean, as normal as things could be when you were involved with an arms-dealing biker anyway.
With that, I got in the car that was practically mine now, with the pets that were manifestations of childhood dreams, driving back to the house that didn’t have roaches or rats, and waited for a man I was sort of seeing to show up with food.
It was like a fairy tale.
I just didn’t know at the time that with a fairy tale, there was always a bad guy working behind the scenes to fuck it all up.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Dezi
I knew she’d love the kitten.
Who didn’t like kittens?
It was like not liking puppies.
Only sociopaths and narcissists didn’t like animals.
It even managed to help her loosen up and let me in a bit.
I expected her back story to be kind of ugly. You didn’t typically grow up to be so prickly that you made anyone who reached for you bleed unless there was some dark shit that happened in the past.
As someone with their own parent issues, I got it. Maybe not the stripper and john shit, but the general helplessness and the anger that created as you grew up.
And, eventually, going through all that shit was going to mean life was handing her the golden ticket to her very own chocolate factory.
Sometimes shit just shook out.
When I finally got back to her place, I walked in to find the three of them on the pig’s bed.