Total pages in book: 22
Estimated words: 21429 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 107(@200wpm)___ 86(@250wpm)___ 71(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 21429 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 107(@200wpm)___ 86(@250wpm)___ 71(@300wpm)
At first I thought maybe I’d put my number in his phone wrong. I even convinced myself that that’s what had happened, and I sat outside the house until our vacation was over, hoping he’d just show up like he had the first time and invite me to go swimming with him again.
But no such luck.
Then I thought, Well, maybe he’s already left—gone home to wherever it is he lives when he’s not on vacation. So I started replaying that moment over and over in my mind—that moment when I put my number in his phone. Had I put the number in wrong?
No. There just wasn’t any way. I could see my fingers pressing the numbers and see them showing up on the screen. I’d definitely given him the right number; he just wasn’t calling.
But why?
Had he used me? It just didn’t seem possible for a man that charming, a man I’d felt such a connection to, to have played me just to sleep with me. Sure, maybe I don’t have much experience in that area, but still…
I started carrying my phone around with me like a maniac, never on vibrate, always with the ringer on high just in case he called. I even started answering spam calls just in case it was him. Of course, it never was, and every single time I picked up and heard some other person’s voice on the line, I felt my heart break a little more.
I never even told my mom about him. Obviously, my dad would kill me.
“You what?” he would say. “You had sex with some random guy you met that night? Are you insane, Skylar!?”
No, there was no chance of going to him. My mom would be more sympathetic, but even she wouldn’t understand this one. The girls at school would just be bitches and find some way to use it against me, so until months later when I met Mary, I carried this weight around with me all by myself. When I was finally able to open up to her about it, it felt like I could finally breathe again.
“Ugh, remember when this show used to actually be about high school drama?” Mary asks, nodding at the TV.
“Right?” I laugh. “And when…”
My voice trails off when I hear the sound of the door at the top of the stairs open. Mary and I are in the basement living room, and my parents are both in their room on the second floor. Neither of them would come down here without texting first.
I glance over at Mary, who instantly mouths, What the hell?
I shake my head, instantly pinned by fear. The front gate and front door both have alarm systems. There’s no way we could have suffered a home invasion without one of them going off…right?
Then footsteps. Heavy, male footsteps coming down the stairs.
“Mary…” I whisper.
The soft sound of my voice breaks the icy tension in the room. Mary snatches a pair of scissors from the coffee table and holds them in front of her like a tiny sword.
“Get behind me!” she hisses. I immediately do as the footsteps grow louder and closer. I’m trembling, but Mary stands strong and stoic like a tall tree. Must be all those long nights working at the diner dealing with crazies.
I see the shoes first coming down the stairs. A pair of worn, scuffed, Gucci loafers.
My heart skips a beat, and my legs nearly give out.
No. It can’t be!
“Whoever you are, I’m warning you, I’m armed!” Mary calls out.
Then the legs appear, two long male legs in faded blue jeans. I hear the sound of chuckling, and my heart skips another beat.
“No…”
And then he appears.
Walker, hands in his pockets, looking like a million bucks, grinning right at me.
“Hey, Sky.”
Mary turns and glances at me with a confused look at her face, still holding the scissors defensively. She looks at Walker then back at me.
“Sky? Wait, you two know each other?”
I can barely breathe, let alone speak, but manage to nod and gasp out, “Yes. Hi…Walker.”
An array of emotions cross over Mary’s face in an instant, from shock to anger to happiness to horror and finally settling on a deep concern.
“Are you okay?”
I can’t even answer her. My eyes are fixed on him. It takes me a few more deep breaths to find my voice.
“What are you doing here?”
“Oh, you know, I just got home,” he replies.
“Home?” I ask. “And you decided to come over and see me? How did you even know where I live?”
Walker chuckles to himself. “No.” He shakes his head. “I mean, I am home. I’m moving in. I live here now.”
3
Walker
I’m unpacking my socks and briefs when I hear them—the sound of angry, feminine footsteps coming down the hall toward my room. I was expecting them a lot sooner than this, actually, but I was expecting them nonetheless. I’m just closing my top drawer as Skylar strides through the door.