Total pages in book: 93
Estimated words: 90475 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 452(@200wpm)___ 362(@250wpm)___ 302(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 90475 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 452(@200wpm)___ 362(@250wpm)___ 302(@300wpm)
He laughs skeptically. “Yeah? Why’s that?”
“Blood and gore and fear? It doesn’t quite align.”
“Course it does. I play hockey. We’re all about blood and fear,” he says, then flashes me his cocky grin—a grin that I’m beginning to recognize as his trademark. Then he sighs, like he’s letting down his guard. “So,” he says, scratching his jaw. “I was kind of…flat after my dad died. I felt…nothing. Which in theory sounds good for an athlete, but in reality is pretty bad. I was a little unmotivated. And that wasn’t going to cut it. I couldn’t afford to be unmotivated. Fortunately, I picked up a horror novel at the time, and the fear and the adrenaline in the story sort of jolted me. Made me…feel again.”
That actually tracks surprisingly well now that he says it. “I get that.”
“And I got hooked. The stories kind of get my blood pumping. Keep me keyed up.”
“I could send you some horror recs. Some new novels that are good in audio. Horror isn’t my specialty, but I have to know the whole store.”
His smile is magnetic. “That’d be cool.”
Briefly, I wonder if it was the dog he craved when he asked me to move in for the week, or if it was the chance to talk about life and stuff while walking a dog.
21
MY DIGITAL STYLIST
Ryker
It’s lunchtime and I’m not due at practice for two more hours. Gives me plenty of time to handle this task with Trina. Should be a quick and easy errand.
But as I walk up Fillmore Street toward An Open Book, I don’t feel the same way I’ve felt the previous times I’ve headed into this bookshop. All those other times, I was stopping by alone to pick up books from the wish list at the library. This time, though, it almost feels like a date.
With her.
But that’s a ridiculous feeling. We’re not having a date in the middle of the day. This is just her lunch break on a Tuesday and she’s helping me out. Still, as I pass a quirky gift shop a block away, I double back to check my reflection in the window, adjusting the cuffs of my Henley then running a hand over my beard. And maybe through my hair too.
There. I’m ready to see Trina.
I resume my pace, and I try to ignore the way my pulse speeds up as I near her store, because that’s a dumb reaction to a fucking store.
Game day attitude on, I push open the door, swing my gaze around the endless shelves, teeming with stories and information and history and words that I just want to gobble up, till I find her. She’s in the romance section, near the front of the store, and she’s adjusting a sandwich board sign. It’s for the Page Turners Book Club. There’s a lipstick-mark design on the sign, and it says this week, they’re meeting Friday at six. Trina tugs the board an inch or so, then pushes her red glasses up the bridge of her nose and studies it.
Damn, she’s adorable.
I kind of just want to watch her in her element for a minute, but that seems stalkery. Especially when she peers toward the door, then spots me and shoots me a smile that makes me feel things I shouldn’t be feeling.
Like, possibility. Such a dumb, dumb thing.
I try to shuck it off as she raises a finger, letting me know she’ll be just a minute. I give a nod because it’s not a big deal. This is just her helping me with a little project. An image makeover—that’s all.
She heads behind the counter then calls me over, reaching under the counter and grabbing some books. “Here are the books you picked out. I pulled them for you.”
“Oh. Thanks,” I say. I sent her the list this morning, but I guess I figured we’d go around the store and grab them together, and now I’m hoping this doesn’t shorten our not-date. But even if it does, it’s fine. It’s completely fine.
“And when I ring you up, I’m going to take a picture of you,” she says, walking me through this whole image thing she mapped out the other night. “And you don’t have to smile. Or look like you’re posing. It’s just a candid shot.”
She makes it sound so easy, but my shoulders still tense. I roll them, trying to let go.
“You can do this,” she says, encouragingly.
“Just don’t make me look like a jackass,” I mutter.
She tilts her head. “Ryker, I know you don’t want to tell the world, but you really do want to help, and this is what your picture will do. It lets people know how they can help too.”
Fine. She’s right.
She breaks out her phone and shoots a picture of me buying the books. After she drops them all into a canvas bag then thrusts it to me, she hustles around the counter, telling a woman in a cardigan near the self-help section that she’ll be back in a little bit.