Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 71348 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 357(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 238(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71348 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 357(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 238(@300wpm)
Blaise had become my safe place, my home … and then it had been snatched away in a moment. That was hard to adjust to, I told myself. I had trusted him, let myself love him.
He shouldn’t be here. I had to find a way to get as far away from him and all connections to him as possible.
“Why are you here?” My voice didn’t sound detached in the slightest. The emotions he stirred in me were clear. Even I recognized it.
He affected me, and I couldn’t hide that.
“Because staying away from you was killing me, and when Huck called to let me know you got sick this morning, there was nothing on this fucking earth that was going to keep me from you.” He reached up and tucked my hair behind my ear. “And seeing you so thin is breaking me. I can’t deal with this. I’ve never been able to see you like this.”
I frowned. “When have you ever seen me like this?” I asked. I was positive this was the first time in my life I’d ever been so wrecked.
“Hungry? Too thin? Too many times,” he replied. “Too many fucking times.”
He stood up then and held out his hand to me. “Please come inside and eat,” he urged me.
I didn’t take his hand, but I did stand up. Having him tower over me made me feel like I was at a disadvantage. He was also too close. I needed space. Hearing the pain in his voice was more than I could handle right now. It wasn’t fair. He wasn’t fair.
“When did you see me hungry and too thin?” I asked, not sure I wanted that answer.
He looked down at me. “When your father spent his money on his fucking addiction instead of paying the bills. When you were sleeping in a goddamn shelter because you had been evicted from that piece-of-shit travel trailer he moved you into once. When I got pulled away for too long and came back to check on you to find out you had barely eaten in weeks. You had to tie a rope in your jeans to keep them from falling down. When I had groceries anonymously dropped off at your door and you were so damn hungry that you shoved a banana in your mouth before bringing the food inside.” He grabbed the back of my head and leaned in so close that the tip of his nose almost touched mine. “That ripped my soul out. You think I don’t have one, but I do. It’s black, but I was born with it black. You’re the one thing in this world that makes me wish it weren’t.”
I stood there, staring at him. Unable to form words. I’d been told he had watched me from afar for years before I met him, but hearing him recall things I had tried to forget made it feel different. It made it real.
I remembered when I’d thought someone had accidentally dropped groceries off at the wrong door. I was fifteen and hadn’t eaten in over a week. I’d grabbed the banana because I was starving and afraid the food would be taken away at any moment when the person the groceries belonged to came to claim them.
“You can come inside with me and eat, or I can take that mouth. Your choice,” he whispered as his gaze went to my lips, then back to my eyes.
I had to stay focused. We would not be kissing. He would not be taking my mouth in any way. Even if he had just said things that he could have only known happened if he’d been there and seen it. He was the reason we’d had food at times when I didn’t know where it had come from and I was afraid to question it. That didn’t make all the other stuff go away. It didn’t bring my family back.
“My dad wasn’t a drug addict. He was an alcoholic.” I defended my dad. That would keep me focused on the truth.
I needed Blaise to be clear on what he had done. The horrible, unforgivable thing he’d allowed to happen at his command. I had seen the pictures of my father shooting up that were in that file, but that wasn’t something he could have done regularly. We hadn’t had money for that kind of thing. Didn’t Blaise understand that? Had he not considered it?
Blaise inhaled sharply, and his jaw clenched. I expected him to remind me of those photos or argue with me. He didn’t because he knew he had no argument. Nothing would make what he had done okay.
“What’s it going to be? Are we feeding you, or are we feeding me?” he asked as his eyes went back to my mouth.
He was too close again.
I had to keep my distance from him.