Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 95471 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 477(@200wpm)___ 382(@250wpm)___ 318(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 95471 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 477(@200wpm)___ 382(@250wpm)___ 318(@300wpm)
“I don’t think it’d be crazy at all.”
If I didn’t live in Chicago.
I don’t add that part—still doesn’t seem like the right time to let her know I intend to keep her.
Seeing her so happy here makes me wish things were different. If I had the freedom to, I’d have no problem relocating to a place like this.
I think she’ll like Chicago, though. It doesn’t seem to take her long to fall in love with new places, and my city has plenty to offer.
“Did you get to see much of Chicago while you were there?” I ask, since I don’t know when she actually got into town.
Autumn shakes her head. “We flew in Saturday, but we went straight to his parents’ house. I didn’t make it to Chicago until the day you kidnapped me, and I was only there to shop.”
As we pass an elderly couple, they overhear that sentence and the old lady cranes her neck looking back at us.
I smile mildly. I’m not worried. With Autumn on my arm, no one will take her comment seriously.
“It was really hectic, too,” Autumn goes on, shaking her head. “I love seeing new cities, but I don’t want to be the one driving through them. I get anxious with the traffic and the unfamiliar roads. I hated going alone. I know I played it off, but I begged Brady to go with me. He’s from there, he knows his way around. If he’d have gone with me, we would have had fun—Christmas shopping in Chicago with my boyfriend. How is that not fun? But by myself…” Her voice drops lower. “It wasn’t fun.”
Brady’s a fucking idiot.
If he’d have done his job and gone with her, she also wouldn’t have been kidnapped.
I’m glad he didn’t, but for purely selfish reasons. The guy’s an asshole for abandoning her in a strange place like that, making her vulnerable to the likes of me.
Autumn gasps, dropping my hand and pulling away to point up ahead. “There it is! There’s the malt shop. I’m so excited,” she says, grinning and looking over at me. “I bet they have the best burgers. Places like this always do.”
Leo’s Grill & Malt Shop looks like the kind of place that’s been here as long as the town has. It’s a corner lot with windows wrapped around both sides and a red and white striped overhang. There are benches outside the windows in case pedestrians want to stop for a spell, and there’s a wall of brick beside the main window with stamped advertisements for ice cream and Coca-Cola. A red neon sign in a smaller window screams OPEN.
I look around, determining where we’re supposed to enter while Autumn pays all her attention to the sights.
Once I figure it out, I open the door and usher Autumn inside.
While she’s admiring the rustic, old-fashioned quality of the scarred wood floors and the themed décor, I look around for a place to sit.
Given it’s right before Christmas, downtown is crowded, and this restaurant is no exception. People are parked at nearly every table, going to town on hot dogs and baskets of fries with shopping bags packed all around them.
I spot a big, empty booth by the window. Autumn will love sitting there so she can watch outside while we eat, and I’ll like sitting with my back to a wall.
I can’t stand the feeling of someone walking up behind me. Makes me tense up every time.
The booth is technically too big for us when there are bigger parties to seat, but I put on my friendly face and lightly assure the waitress we’ll order extra food to make up for it. She’s busy and doesn’t feel like arguing, so she leads us over to the booth by the window.
Autumn is practically vibrating with excitement as she slides into her side of the booth and peers out at the bustling sidewalk full of holiday shoppers. She watches out the window, and I watch her.
I really do like her, even more than I expected to when I first picked her up.
It’s nice here, too. It’s nice to play pretend that we’re two normal people out Christmas shopping for our family, just like all those people she’s watching.
I guess she’s not pretending. Autumn is a normal person. This is only playacting for me.
Doubt creeps in. The first time I’ve really let it since I picked her up.
There’s a lightness about Autumn, almost an innocence, but that’s not the right word. She’s not the way she is because she’s sheltered and untried. It’s not that she doesn’t know any better… she does.
Autumn has lived through some tough shit, but she hasn’t let it poison her spirit, not in the least. Given a glimpse at the harsh, ugly side of things, she simply chose to focus her energy on the light. Every time she is given that choice, she chooses light over the darkness.