Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 96586 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 483(@200wpm)___ 386(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96586 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 483(@200wpm)___ 386(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
My hands fly in surrender around my laughter.
“Next Saturday work for you?” Katherine inquires, attention back on my other half.
“Saturdays in general are shit for me. Typically work twelve hours,” he announces yet doesn’t abandon the subject. “Can we do Sunday instead?”
“Sunday’s perfect.” She begins typing. “I’ll leave Carter at home with Angel, and it’ll just be us.”
“Am I invited?” I teasingly interject in spite of the tension in my system.
“Probably,” my best friend sassily proclaims before looking back up at Ry. “Presley and I’ll work on deets.”
He finishes typing, puts his phone back in his pocket, and grins. “Look forward to it.”
“Me too.”
Me…not so much.
Them getting along now is one thing.
Do I think they can or will for two hours over food that’s gonna stress my boyfriend out to buy?
I don’t know.
“Good luck looking at high education institutes, Collins.”
“Good luck, babe.”
He warmly tips his head our directions. “Thanks ladies.” We watch him wordlessly walk to the door and when he finally reaches it, he shoots me one last look. “I love you, Pres.”
It’s impossible to ignore how much harder my heart starts to pound. “I love you, Ry.”
Joy floods his expression upon his exiting.
After she feels she’s waited a significant amount of time for him to be completely out of earshot, Katherine ponders, “Who’s the friend?”
“No clue.”
Her eyebrows lift in suspicion. “And you’re fine with that?”
“Yeah.”
“Completely okay with not knowing if this friend is a male or female or attractive or unattractive or perhaps a recovering serial killer?”
“Yeah, I don’t think that the latter have support groups, Katherine.”
She snickers at her own joke as she prepares to finish her salad. “You’re not concerned at all?”
“No.”
Katherine flashes an impressed expression and lifts a bite to her mouth. “Remember it’s a thin line between trust and blindness, Presley.”
Obviously, I know that.
I mean, am I really concerned about the unknown individual?
Nah.
I trust him.
I really do.
He’s been open and upfront and honest about his struggles and day to day frustrations.
Now, am I curious?
Fuck yeah.
It’d be insane not to be about this “mystery” friend who he also sometimes texts, although not often when we’re together.
But if he wanted me to know more…he’d tell me.
He’s not the same boy he was all those years ago.
And I’m not going to punish the man that he is now without reason to.
Innocent until there’s proven fuckery.
That’s what it means to truly trust someone.
Chapter 16
Ryder
- “Eventually, I learned that was a good thing.” -
I give my front door a heavy slam behind me.
Fuck. This. Day.
I don’t even give a shit that it’s my goddamn birthday.
I’m done.
I’m so fucking done.
It’s the bullshit days like today that once drove me to stop at Rico’s to grab a sack of whatever was cheapest, call a chick like Kara to come over, and get lit to then get my balls wet.
I’ve spent so much time loathing those moments that it’s fucking baffling to think there was ever anything enjoyable in them.
But there was.
Simplicity.
Numbness.
An escape.
“You look cheerful, birthday boy,” McCoy says from the hallway where he’s adjusting his backpack.
“And you look like you’re going to fucking camp.”
He gives me a cocky smirk. “Crashin’ the girls’ cabin.”
His joke receives another scowl.
His ability to keep that fucking smile every day…every goddamn day…is as equally impressive as it is irritating. It’s like nothing bothers him. Like he’s never had a real fucking problem in his entire life.
And I know he has.
And I have a general idea how dark some of his past really is.
What I’m fucking clueless about is how he manages to constantly keep his spirits high no matter what shit punches him in the dick.
I’m sure Jovi probably helps the same way Pres does, but I wonder if there’s more to it than that.
Does he fucking meditate or some shit?
“Panty raid,” McCoy needlessly states with a wink.
“Bro, I don’t wanna find Jo’s thong behind the box of Fruit Loops again.”
He loudly laughs while I retrieve my vibrating cellphone from my pocket.
Everyone already told me happy birthday.
It better not be Big Roscoe asking me to come in early after my ass had to stay fucking late.
One click reveals a photo of Kara curled up in bed, blanket barely covering her naked body, expression melancholy, and a bandage around her wrist. The caption definitely matches the mood of the picture.
Kara: Don’t wanna be alone tonight.
I don’t either.
But it’s not her I wanna spend my birthday with.
It’s the beautiful, workaholic woman, I don’t hate for being successful, but fucking hate that she’s successful.
Sharing her time like this is probably what sparks my urge to wanna smoke the most.
And while toothpicks as well as Jolly Ranchers curve the craving, they don’t kill it.
My typed response is quick.
Me: Text me. I’m around.
“Alright, birthday dick,” McCoy casually begins, arms folding across his chest, “what’s got your ass trying to break the front door to our apartment?”