Total pages in book: 133
Estimated words: 126589 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 633(@200wpm)___ 506(@250wpm)___ 422(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 126589 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 633(@200wpm)___ 506(@250wpm)___ 422(@300wpm)
“We’re adults, we’ll be fine,” Gideon told his friend, voice level, expression neutral.
“Right,” Cam snorted in response, and Gideon cuffed him on the back of his head.
“Hey,” Cam protested, punching Gideon’s bicep in response. “C’mon, man, not the hair.”
“You’re right, I shouldn’t have touched your hair,” Gideon agreed, wrinkling his nose, and wiping his palm on his tight, denim-clad butt. “How much product do you have on there? It’s gross.”
Cam glared at him and carefully patted his dark blond hair back in place.
“Let’s get going, Cat wants to sit around sipping wine or some shit before we eat. You know how she gets sometimes.”
“Is it just us today?” Beth asked, smiling when Cam held the door for her. She had to wait until both men were also in the car before Cam replied.
“She invited that guy—Adam?—from the thing yesterday. She says he’s hot for you.”
Gideon—who’d been in the process of buckling up—went tense in response to Cam’s words. His eyes shot up to meet hers, but she couldn’t quite read the expression in their hooded depths.
“Need help with the belt?” he asked gruffly, breaking eye contact, and Beth blinked. She felt vaguely disoriented after that odd interaction.
“I don’t thi—” He leaned back and removed the strap from her hand, and had it clipped in before she could even complete the sentence. “Thanks.”
“She also asked Luce to come around so that we could have even numbers,” Cam was still talking, oblivious to the exchange that had taken place between his two friends.
The other man went on to describe in great detail and with no small amount of relish what had happened between Kylie and Kyle the day before. It was easy to keep him going with small encouraging sounds, while mentally disengaging from what was actually being said. Her phone buzzed discreetly and she removed it from her purse.
It was a text from Gideon:
There was no response for a while and she watched the back of his bent head as he stared at his phone for a long moment.
Beth chewed the inside of her lip as she considered what more to add to that. There really was nothing else to say about it. If Adam Reece asked her out, she would go, and decide from there if they could have something worth pursuing. She couldn’t allow the stuff that had happened between her and Gideon to cloud the issue. Especially as they’d both agreed that it had been a mistake.
She wrote instead
She saw him tuck his phone back into the front pocket of his jeans and put her own device back into her purse. Cam was reaching the climax of his story, something involving a bowl of custard and Kyle’s head—it seemed like the break-up had been a lot more dramatic than Cat had let on last night—and both she and Gideon chuckled right on cue.
Lunch was precisely as awkward as Gideon had expected it to be. Everybody coddled Beth and he could tell that her patience was wearing thin. That Adam guy was every bit as nice as Beth had said he was.
Too fucking nice.
Creepily, stalkerly, serial killerly nice.
Okay, so maybe Gideon was villainizing the man a smidge, but surely it wasn’t normal for anyone to be this…pleasant? He smiled a lot, said agreeable shit, liked puppies, kittens, and babies. Complimented Beth within an inch of her life and Beth, disappointingly, was eating it up with a spoon.
Gideon had expected his Lizzy-bit to be a little saltier around the guy. To be skeptical of his too-good-to-be-true façade, to approach with caution. But apparently that wariness was reserved only for Gideon.
No, with Adam Reece she was all blushes and smiles.
They were all out on the patio and afternoon was bleeding into evening. Sunset came earlier these days, and while there was a crispness to the evening air, it was still warm enough to be pleasant outdoors
“Really?” the man was saying, sounding ridiculously impressed by whatever Beth had just told him. “First place?”
“Yes,” she confessed shyly, and Gideon frowned. What was she talking about? He had been so busy staring daggers at Reece, he’d missed whatever Beth had been bragging about this time.
“A national contest?”
“It was only a high school thing, not that big a deal.”
“You’re joking, right?” The guy asked incredulously. “Not that big a deal? I’ve never known anyone who could play the violin, much less win contests.”
The violin? She’d never told Gideon she played the violin.
“I didn’t stick with it, it was just a hobby,” she said, her voice even softer as the flush of pleasure threatened to make her fair complexion go nuclear.
“But why? When you were clearly good at it?”
“Our Lizzy can do everything. Once you learn that about her, you’ll realize that the violin thing really isn’t that special,” Gideon intervened in a snide tone, which he immediately regretted when the light went out of her eyes and the glow in her cheeks paled until she was left looking ashen and a little sick. Christ, he had fucked up again. What the hell was wrong with him? So much for new beginnings.