Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 105825 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105825 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
Wow.
The McBride Building was a New York icon. Its colossal square base rose for twenty floors before tapering up for another thirty. Hundreds of businesses had their offices here but most famously McBride Construction itself—their offices took up the top seven floors. And above that, right up in the penthouse, was the McBride family home. As the sun sank below the horizon, it turned the building’s stone to gold and the thousands of windows to molten, blazing orange. I shielded my eyes and craned my head back. The top of the building really did seem to brush the underside of the clouds. Skyscraper was right. Even my dad, who wasn’t much for words, would have admitted that the McBride Building was a heck of a thing.
I walked through the massive lobby with its coffee stands and sandwich stalls, gazing up in wonder at the silver ribbons of escalators that climbed to the offices above. There was a private elevator that led up to the penthouse, and Lorna buzzed me up. As soon as the doors slid closed, the thing rocketed skyward, leaving my stomach behind. I cursed, almost falling. Everything really did move faster in New York.
Just as I was recovering, the elevator stopped and I went weightless for a second. The doors opened and I stumbled out into a hallway filled with bright, natural light. Directly ahead of me was a set of massive double doors in polished red oak that I figured led to the penthouse. I started forward, but glanced left to see where all the daylight was coming from—
My steps faltered and then I stopped and just stared.
The wall was floor-to-ceiling glass and all of New York was laid out before me. At first, it was like being a giant, buildings that I knew were immense reduced to tiny models I might accidentally step on, the cars like swarming schools of colorful fish. Then I looked down the side of the building, to those dots that were people on the sidewalk. I’ve never been bothered by heights but it made even my stomach flip over. Good job Colton isn’t here. The poor guy hated heights.
I couldn’t get my head around how tall the building was. How does the lobby not get crushed under all the weight? The place was incredible. And now Lorna was designing even taller buildings. The woman was a goddamn genius.
I turned back towards the doors…and found they’d opened. Lorna was standing in the doorway, watching me.
She’d changed out of the black dress she’d worn for the funeral and put on a pair of faded blue jeans that hugged her legs and looked incredibly soft, and a big, baggy sweater the color of vanilla ice cream. Comfort clothes. She bit her lip, like she was a little ashamed. Then she lifted her chin defiantly: I don’t care, it’s my house.
She didn’t need to worry because I thought she looked amazing. The sunset made her gray eyes blaze like fire and threw amber highlights into her shining black hair. And maybe the big, baggy sweater was meant to hide her body but it had the opposite effect: it gave just enough of a hint of the lush bounty beneath that all I could think about was pushing her up against the door, kissing her hard and sliding my hands up under her sweater to fill my hands with her breasts.
I had it bad for this woman.
And it must have shown on my face because she flushed and did that thing where she ducked her head, embarrassed. Then she stepped back from the door to invite me in. I passed her, inhaling the scent of her, and I suddenly flashed back to all the times women had invited me into their private space. That heady excitement, do you want to come in for coffee?
This ain’t that, I told myself firmly. I’m here to guard her. That’s it.
She gave me the tour and I tried to look where she was pointing, and not at her. But it was difficult. It didn’t help that her jeans hugged the cheeks of her magnificent ass like a goddamn second skin.
The place was huge. There was a big, open-plan living space with floor-to-ceiling windows giving amazing views of the city, a grand piano, and some fancy art. But it felt like a home, not a catalog picture: the black leather couches look like they’d actually been cuddled up in for movie night, and the bookshelves were filled with a chaotic mix of paperbacks, not leather-bound volumes designed to impress.
There was a scale model of Manhattan, the buildings in white and the McBride projects in blue. I spotted the McBride Building straightaway: it felt weird to be looking at it while standing in it. And there was the marina I’d visited and, behind it, Hudson Tower, the skyscraper designed by Lorna. “What’s this?” I asked, pointing at a square blue slab.