Total pages in book: 60
Estimated words: 56169 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 281(@200wpm)___ 225(@250wpm)___ 187(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 56169 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 281(@200wpm)___ 225(@250wpm)___ 187(@300wpm)
I wish I could ask the granny for her twenty grand part of the deal, but of course, Asher doesn’t know anything about that. I can’t ask him to please phone her up for me and get me my money, even if it is in a nice way and kind tones. I’m not a threatening kind of person, even when I’m desperate. And I’m still debating whether I should be taking anything more considering Asher is already paying me so much already.
“Thank you for the fence. And the neighbors. And the table. And the movie the other night. You’ve paid for everything, and I feel a little bit like a leech, and now I’m worse because I’m leeching onto you, but kind of for what you already promised, and I’m not trying to be threatening or take it for granted that—”
“How much do you need?” Asher cuts in.
I cut myself off and gulp audibly. “What do you mean?” I’m so shocked that I drop my arms down to my sides, leaving my perky nipples unattended. “Just what you said. The ten thousand.”
“I’m asking you how much you actually need. For your brother.”
Holy smokies. This guy is for real. There’s genuine concern flashing in his eyes, which are the color of the sky right before all those nasty clouds gathered up and let loose on me this morning. My stomach drops the same way it did the first time one of those passing cars soaked me. I was frigid, sopping, filthy, and shocked that no one even bothered to slow down or care that they’d just deposited a tidal wave of nasty street water onto a pedestrian already struggling.
This morning kind of made me feel like there was no hope for humanity but now Asher’s standing there, asking me how much money I need. Or rather, how much Sam and Melody need. He looks legit and not at all like he’s going to ask me, then laugh in my face and tell me he was kidding about everything, including the twenty grands.
“I…I…I…” Apparently, my I’s are in order because it’s all I can stammer out. “I…don’t know. It will probably take Sam a good few months to find another job, and their mortgage is probably around fifteen hundred a month. They have car payments, bills, the stuff for the baby to buy, groceries, and whatnot. But I really can’t say. I was going to give them the money to help them out, so I hadn’t run a total in my head.”
Actually, that’s exactly what I’d done. I’d come in here to ask if Asher would consider giving me an advance on my paycheck so I could give it to my brother.
“How about I double my offer?”
I gape at him while warning bells sound in my head. “With what kind of strings attached?”
“None. Same rules.”
“Except you broke one already.”
He legitly does look sorry—kind of. I feel sorry, too, though not really. Both times I’ve kissed Asher have been, oh, I don’t know. Life. Freaking. Changing. How can I be sorry about that?
“I’ll have it in your account within the hour if you give me your information. I actually asked you for it before, but you hadn’t given it to me, so I thought you weren’t in a rush.”
I realize he’s right. I was the one holding out. I’d forgotten all about giving him my banking info. I guess, somewhere in the middle of trying to keep my life from going to total shit and then trying to pick up the pieces and hold what I had left together—namely my job—while explaining to my friends and family that I was doing my new boss a solid by pretending to be his girlfriend for a few weeks while giving them no more details than that, I must have forgotten.
Maybe I can look up his granny and give her the same information. She has to have some kind of a number I could reach her at. Or an assistant I could leave a message with.
“Are you…really? You would do that? I’m not trying…I was going to ask for an advance. I wasn’t trying to come in here and beg money off of you.”
“I know.”
“But I feel like…I feel like…I don’t even know.”
“I hope it’s something about a show and dinner and maybe a walk in a larger park, hopefully, tomorrow night. Because I have good tickets, and it also happens to be opera. I thought you might like it. Sadly, there were no plays featuring classical literature at the moment.”
“The opera?” My head is turning into a tornado. “I’ve never been.”
“But you’d like to?”
“I…yes. Of course. Who wouldn’t?”
“Do you think your mom would like it?”
“My…my mom?” Now I feel like I’m lost in a fog. What does my mom have to do with it?
“Yes. Your mom.”