Total pages in book: 151
Estimated words: 138334 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 692(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138334 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 692(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
Meiling turned her face up to look at the sky. Despite it being overcast, bats dipped and wheeled, performing their nightly dance. Insects droned and owls occasionally shrieked a disappointed cry as they missed their prey. Fingers of fog drifted through the scattered cedar trees. The light from the moon turned swaying moss to blue-gray and the fog added an extra layer of silver to the lacy veils.
A lump formed in her throat and tears burned behind her eyes. She didn’t know why she still was so unsure of Gedeon’s feelings for her. She knew Slayer was wild about Whisper. She knew Gedeon wanted her body. She just didn’t know if he was in love with her. He never said the words to her.
She told herself she didn’t need the words—after all, they were just words. Nothing special. People told their spouses they loved them and then cheated or tried to kill them, like Guy Hawkins. Words didn’t matter. Actions did. Gedeon had gutted his bedroom for her. She hadn’t asked him to. He’d just done it. She hadn’t asked him to wait to have sex with her. He’d done that too.
“Lotus, tell me what you’re thinking.”
“I’d rather not.”
“Uh-oh. Are we going to play twenty questions? Is this about Hawkins? McGregor? Or me? You’ve got your moody aura surrounding you, so I’m not certain which of us is being scrutinized.”
“I don’t have a moody aura.” She turned back to him, narrowing her eyes and trying to look intimidating.
Gedeon flashed a little grin and slowed the boat even more, so they were nearly stopped in the dark water. “Baby, you look so sweet you give me all sorts of bad ideas. Very bad. Indecent. In fact, downright dirty. That look you’re giving me right now turns me on.”
“Gedeon, drive the boat and stop looking at me. Do you not see those eyes staring at us? They’re converging on the boat, and we’re in such shallow water I think they could climb aboard and have a feast.”
“There’s that tone you use that makes me hard as a rock.” He rubbed the front of his jeans. “Why don’t you come over here and help me out?”
“I’m not coming over there. This boat is balanced just the way we are. If I’m over there with you, it throws the balance off and we could end up in the water with the alligators,” she pointed out. “Take a look around, Leopard Boy. There are red eyes staring at us from the banks on either side and they look hungry. I’m not even going to count the ones swimming toward us. Get us moving now.” She tried very hard not to encourage him with laughter.
Gedeon made a show of looking around them at the red eyes slowly going through the water right toward the boat. “They are getting a mite close.”
“You are so ridiculous,” Meiling said, covering her mouth with her fingers because it was impossible not to laugh. “Fire up the engine.”
He increased the speed just a little, going around a particularly large alligator. “That one is bigger than you are.”
“It wasn’t,” she denied. The alligator was longer than she was. Probably weighed more as well, but she wasn’t conceding that to him.
“I could get out and measure.”
“You would too, just to prove a point.” There was no hiding her laughter from him.
He looked pleased, his eyes lighting up. “I love the sound of your laughter, Meiling. It could be my favorite sound in the world. That or the way you say my name sometimes.”
There. He did it again. It wasn’t just his words. It was the way he said them. His tone. Velvet soft, like a caress. He wrapped her up in his casual statement that wasn’t casual at all. He could turn her inside out with the way he would suddenly, out of the blue, issue his declarations. Was that his way of telling her he was in love with her? She knew nothing of real relationships. She didn’t trust herself to know one way or another. She just knew she didn’t want to lose what she had with him.
She smiled at him, pretty certain her heart was in her eyes, so she looked away from him as he took the boat up the channel and back to the next fork heading home. He had such a great sense of direction in the swamp. In the dark of night, there weren’t any landmarks, and yet he always seemed to know exactly where each turn was, even if he was taking a shortcut.
There were sections of the river where he drove fast and others where he went slower and more cautiously. She paid little attention to the actual direction and more to the beauty of the night and his skill. The way he looked against silvery-black water or the backdrop of an abundance of trees took her breath. Gedeon always gave off a quiet confidence.