Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 77519 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 388(@200wpm)___ 310(@250wpm)___ 258(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77519 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 388(@200wpm)___ 310(@250wpm)___ 258(@300wpm)
“Am I interrupting?” he asked.
“It’s fine. Do you want a drink?” she asked.
“What do you have?”
This was unusual. He was used to women fawning all over him. Nikki seemed to keep her distance.
“I’ve got tea, coffee, water, and hot chocolate. Do you want to take a seat?” she asked, pointing down to the small seating area.
“No beer?” he asked.
“I don’t drink.”
“What about whiskey?”
“I don’t drink.”
“Coffee it is.”
He walked down her trailer, feeling it move beneath his feet, and he wasn’t sure if that was how it was supposed to be. Lowering into her sitting room, he couldn’t help but glance around. The trailer was old, but Nikki kept it clean. There was something floral in the air, and everywhere he looked, it was so very clean. Nothing was out of place.
He noticed there were no dishes piled high. No used takeout cartons filling up the counters. Nikki had one of the cleanest trailers on the lot.
Glancing over at her, he had a feeling that the moment she moved in, she would have gutted the place. Was this why she had to cancel her enrollment in beauty school?
He heard the kettle whistle, and seconds later, her question about cream, milk, and sugar.
“Black, two sugars,” he said.
He heard the spoon in the cup, stirring. He had a feeling she was stirring longer than she normally would. She was nervous. He found it rather sweet.
She walked over toward him, passing him a cup, and then taking a seat as far away from him as she could possibly get.
“I guess I’m going to have to talk with Diana about giving away personal information,” Nikki said.
“It wouldn’t have been hard to find your trailer without her.”
“Are you defending her?”
He blew across the surface of the coffee.
“Depends on how pissed you are that I am here?”
“Why are you here?”
“Now, wouldn’t you like to know?”
Nikki laughed, leaning on the edge of sarcastic, but he liked the sound. She actually snorted and then shook her head. “You do know you are insane. What are you doing here?”
“I thought you might like the company.”
She shook her head and he noticed she didn’t deny it.
“And besides, I did invite you to come and spend some time with me. You didn’t come, so I had no choice but to find you.”
“You had a choice.”
He shrugged. “I guess we’ll never know.”
Chapter Three
Nikki was pissed off.
Well, she wasn’t overly pissed off, but she wasn’t in a good mood, and right now, Diana was her enemy. Not that she had many friends to begin with, but she was pissed. She hadn’t wanted to go to that party last night. Diana had called her up and asked her to go, but she refused. It was up to Diana to find someone else to drive her to the clubhouse and wait around for her.
She’d been enjoying a pampering session. It was rare for her to get many of those, but she valued her skin care routine, ever since she had seen something on social media about prematurely aging, and well, she was kind of obsessed with beauty. Even if her mother and most of her boyfriends had told her she was wasting her time, because she was neither pretty enough nor good enough to offer anyone beauty advice. Her mother had often referred to her as a dull mouse. Some of her mother’s boyfriends had told her she reminded them of a fat cow or whale.
Over the years, Nikki had gotten used to the insults. She knew she wasn’t a beauty, or anything special. It was one of the many reasons she dropped out of beauty school. The main reason being that she had been robbed, bailed out Diana, and her mother had made one of her rare appearances.
As much as she ignored her mother, there was still a part of her that believed every single word she said, and that hurt. Yes, her mother liked to remind her how little she was like her own mother. She was no great beauty. No man would want her.
And so, with no funds, she didn’t see the point in putting herself into debt for a course she didn’t need. She had phoned, apologized, and quit before she could be made a fool. From that day forward, she did her beauty routine inside her own trailer. She never left with makeup on. She would practice behind closed doors, applying makeup and taking it off. She always had a clean face. There was no point in giving anyone the chance to mock her.
Now, as she made her way toward Diana’s house, paid for by her absent father, she slammed her palm against the door and waited. She saw the bike outside of Diana’s house. She felt so angry.
Diana didn’t come to the door after the first bang, so she kept slamming her open palm against the door. She was not going to give up. If Diana was her friend, she wouldn’t have given out her address, and if she had no choice, then she should have warned her. There was a damn friend code.