Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 90266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 451(@200wpm)___ 361(@250wpm)___ 301(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 90266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 451(@200wpm)___ 361(@250wpm)___ 301(@300wpm)
It’s long been dark when I close my laptop and stretch my once again aching neck and shoulders out.
Hours have passed since Spencer fled from the house, leaving me with no clue as to what time he might reappear.
After tidying up my mess, I make my way up to bed. I strip out of my clothes, pull on a shirt to sleep in, and climb under the covers. It’s cold with the drafty window, but before long, I’ve warmed up the sheets and I drift off into a peaceful slumber.
I wake sometime in the night. The room is in total darkness and the house seems to be in silence.
I have no idea if Spencer has come home but as I swing my legs over the side of the mattress so I can head to the bathroom, I hope he’s safely tucked in his.
My door creaks as I pull it open, and I swear it echoes around the silent house. With a wince, I slip through it the second it’s wide enough in the hope I don’t wake him if he is here.
I tiptoe to the bathroom and do my thing, swirling my dry mouth out with some mouthwash before drying my hands and pulling the door open.
I take one step before I halt, my heart jumping into my throat.
Footsteps start up the stairs and my hand that’s still on the door handle begins to tremble, thinking that we’re about to collide.
I look to my bedroom door, but I know I don’t have enough time to bolt in there.
My heart pounds as he approaches.
He hasn’t turned a light on, so when he appears, he’s only illuminated by the light of the moon that’s streaming in through the window at the end of the hall.
“Fuck,” he barks the second he turns toward the bathroom and finds me standing there like a deer caught in headlights.
Our eyes connect, his are dark and wild and when I suck in a breath, I can’t miss the scent of alcohol on him.
“Spencer, I—”
“No.” He takes a step toward me and presses two fingers against my lips.
My chest heaves as he steps into my space.
His eyes drop from mine to my lips that are half covered by his fingers and then lower.
“Are you… fuck.”
I follow his stare and look to my shirt.
Shit. I’m wearing an old Snow Valley jersey. His Snow Valley jersey. If he were to spin me around, he’d find his old number printed on the back.
This shirt was my savior when I first arrived in New York. Back then it still smelled of him and I would sleep with it every night.
After a while, his scent faded and when my mother found it, she bundled it up with my sheets and sent it with the laundry. I was devastated. It was the only thing of his I had. It was the only thing I could hold on to.
After that, I started wearing it to bed and I’ve continued ever since, needing to feel closer to the place I’ve missed so much.
He spins me around and gently pushes me up against the wall with his hand on the back of my neck.
“Motherfucker,” he says it so low that I wonder if I’ve imagined it, that is until he speaks again. “You’re wearing my number. Why?” His fingers flex, nowhere near enough to hurt me but the perfect amount to have heat pooling in my core.
“B-because it’s yours. It… it reminds me of you.”
“But you left.” He steps closer, the front of his body lightly pressing up against my back. “You walked away and never looked back.”
“Y-you told me to.”
He drops his forehead to my shoulder and sucks in a deep breath as the words he said to me the day I went to say goodbye run through my mind.
“I was so fucking angry,” he admits. “You were leaving me.”
“You didn’t need to end it. We could have—”
“No, it never would have worked.”
“Says who?”
“You never even called.” The emotion in his slurred voice slays me.
“Y-you told me not to. That if I had to go that… that was i-it.” My own voice cracks at the end of my sentence.
“Fuck, Gabby… Ella…FUCK.”
He pulls back and I miss his heat, his touch immediately.
I look over my shoulder, about to spin back around, but the intense expression on his face and the dark warning in his eyes freezes me to the spot.
He takes a step forward once again, a determination oozing from him that wasn’t there earlier.
“How much did you miss me exactly?” He reaches out and tucks a finger under the hem of his shirt. “Enough to be bare beneath my number?”
He lifts, revealing my lace panties that are cut high across my ass.
“Hmmm… not that much then.”
“No, Spenc—”
“Did you ever wear this and get yourself off wishing it was me?”