Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 130380 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 652(@200wpm)___ 522(@250wpm)___ 435(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130380 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 652(@200wpm)___ 522(@250wpm)___ 435(@300wpm)
“Honestly, kid — I’m not sure this is the career for you. I just haven’t had the heart to say it.”
Kid.
He was saying anything he could to kill me now.
I tongued my cheek, shaking my head and trying to find the will to speak. “Please, Nero. Don’t do this,” I croaked when I finally found it.
He sniffed, shrugging. “Sorry, I just think this is best.” He paused to look at me one last time. “Oh, and if you were thinking about any other shops in the area, I’d be careful about what you say about your time here.”
It was a threat and a promise both, the assurance that if I ran my mouth, I’d never work in Boston. He’d see to it.
Nero didn’t look at me again. Not as I stood there in disbelief, not as I numbly dragged myself out of the office, and not as I put my coat and scarf back on and slipped into the cold.
In the span of twenty minutes, I’d been promoted, assaulted, fired, and denounced by a man I’d looked to as inspiration for years.
I took ten steps toward my car, and then I vomited.
Leo
Driving home from campus, I had a hard time not speeding with all the excitement flowing through me. Coach had called me into his office for a quick meeting before class, one where he told me the Minnesota Vikings had their eyes on me.
Now, I didn’t know one fucking thing about Minnesota other than it was damn cold, but the fact that a team knew my name, that I was on their radar, that I could be the missing piece in their offense that took them to the next level… it lit me up like nothing else in the world could.
The only thing I could think about was telling Mary.
I knew she’d have good news, too — a permanent position at the shop. And while I still had Nero on my radar for being a creep, he’d left her alone ever since that first time she’d told me he’d made her feel some type of way, and I knew this job was one Mary wanted more than anything.
I couldn’t wait to meet her good news with my own, to collide at the door as we both burst at the seams to tell the other every single detail. I couldn’t wait to take her upstairs and celebrate afterward, too — and I’d take my sweet ass time, regardless of the early wakeup call waiting for me in the morning.
My tires squealed a little bit when I pulled into the drive, and I noticed Mary’s car was already parked across the street. I all but skipped through the front door, hiking my bag up my shoulder and taking the stairs two at a time. I slung my bag into the corner as I opened the door to my bedroom — our bedroom? — and kicked my shoes off before pouncing on the bed where Mary was curled into a ball.
“Wake up, sleepyhead!” I started kissing all over her neck and shoulders, making them obnoxiously loud with my grin against her skin. “We have celebrating to do.”
But when Mary rolled over, everything inside me turned to ice.
She didn’t meet me with a face-splitting smile. She wasn’t jumping up and down and throwing herself on me as she spilled every detail of her job offer.
Instead, her face was red and puffy, eyes swollen, lashes wet.
She’d been crying.
And instantly, I was ready to kill.
“What happened?”
She shook her head, trying to pull me down into the sheets with her. “Forget it.”
“Absolutely not.” I pulled her gently until she was sitting up, her legs folded underneath her. I took her hands in mine and waited.
“He fired me.”
“What?!” I shook my head, jaw slack. I was completely dumbfounded. “How… why would he do that? You’ve been an apprentice for over a year. You’ve been killing it with your own clients for two months!”
“Which is why he offered me a chair of my own,” she said.
I blinked, confused. “Huh?”
She bit her lip against a wave of tears, finally meeting my gaze after taking a deep breath. “He offered me my own chair. Then, he gave me a hug, and proceeded to grind his erection into me and say he could think of a way or two to properly thank him.”
My soul left my body.
It hovered above us, listening as Mary continued, saying that when she’d turned him down, he’d taken everything back and fired her. I thought I also heard her say she kneed him in the balls, but I couldn’t even find joy in that.
My body was detached, a numb sort of fire crawling up my spine. My jaw ached with how tight it was, throat constricting with the need to scream.
That was it.
I was going to jail tonight.