Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 87142 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 436(@200wpm)___ 349(@250wpm)___ 290(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87142 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 436(@200wpm)___ 349(@250wpm)___ 290(@300wpm)
“You jealous or something?” He strode past me and took one of his bajillion guitars from a stand near the coffee table.
“Hardly.” Would I have wanted to know what it was like to sleep with him? Maybe. Okay, definitely. But wanting to know and actually sleeping with the man were two different things. I valued my career and my body more than that.
“Nice fucking robe.” He stalked off, heading toward his in-home studio.
“It’s Casual Friday, remember?” I called after him.
He spent the rest of the afternoon in his studio, and I caught up on work at the dining room table. Dinner was silent and tense, and I’d never been happier to hear him say he was headed to bed early, because that meant I could too.
Except, I didn’t sleep. My mind wouldn’t quiet. It was too busy thinking of every scenario Nixon could get himself into, and how I could possibly keep him from risking his sobriety.
At two a.m., my phone lit up with yet another email, and I cursed. I really needed to turn the notifications off on that thing. The world wasn’t going to burn down while I caught a few hours of sleep, but I wasn’t about to let some other assistant at Berkshire get the jump on me either. Besides, I was up anyway, so I headed toward the kitchen, reading through yet another endorsement offer for the band.
Not that I should have bothered. The band didn’t do brand placement. Ben only forwarded these to me so I could craft a thoughtful rejection, which he would then send.
My phone in my face, I opened the cabinet closest to the refrigerator and pulled down a box of tea, then turned and put it on the island…and screamed at the figure sitting across from me at the kitchen’s bar.
3
NIXON
“What the hell are you doing?” Zoe shrieked from across the kitchen island.
“Sitting in my kitchen. What the fuck does it look like I’m doing?” I fired back, her scream still ringing in my ears. Damn, the woman had some lungs.
“Who sits in their kitchen, in the dark, at two o’clock in the morning?” She slammed her phone down on the counter. “You scared the shit out of me!”
“Am I supposed to apologize?” I gripped my glass of water between my hands, wishing it was something stronger, like that bottle of Crystal Head those girls had taken with them.
“Yes! No. I’m honestly not sure.” She flicked on the light, and I blinked rapidly at the assault on my eyes. At least she’d gone with the softer, under cabinet ones instead of the overhead. “You have every right to sit wherever you want in your home at whatever time you want to do it. I just wasn’t expecting you…here…at two in the morning.”
Any retort I would have fired back died on my tongue. Her plaid shorts barely reached her mid-thigh, exposing her shapely, toned legs, and her pink ribbed tank top didn’t leave much to the imagination.
Had she always had such incredible breasts? Where the hell had she kept them hidden for the last four years? They were high and firm, the curves straining the material between the peaks.
“Were you having trouble sleeping?” she asked, turning away to fill the teakettle.
My grip tightened on the glass. Stop looking at her ass. She’s off-limits. Everyone is off-limits.
“Nixon?”
“Uh. Yeah.” I wouldn’t have called it trouble. It was far past that.
“Is that normal?” She finished filling the kettle, then put it on the stove.
“For me, it is.” Sleep was something that didn’t happen for me anymore, and without the alcohol as an aide, I spent a shit ton of nights right where I was now, running from my own memories. But on nights like tonight, when I hit decline on her call, it was worse. Fourth time this week.
She’d already threatened to show up here, at which point I’d stopped listening to that voicemail…all voicemails.
“Want to talk about it?” She leaned back against the counter and faced me.
“No.” I wanted to drink about it, but that wasn’t going to happen. Another face danced across my mind—big blue eyes, curly blond hair, and a smile that had gotten her anything she’d ever wanted from me. Anything except the one thing she’d actually needed. I closed my eyes like it would dull the pain, but it never did.
I didn’t deserve relief anyway.
“Okay. Well, how about some tea?” she offered.
“Tea?” What was I? An eighty-year-old woman?
“My dad used to make me tea when I was little and couldn’t sleep.” She picked up the box she’d dropped on the counter. “Chamomile, valerian root, and lavender. It’s always worked for me.” She tilted her head and looked off in the distance, a wistful smile transforming her face in a way that made my chest tighten. “Or maybe it was just knowing that he was there that relaxed me.” She shrugged, then tucked a piece of hair behind her ear nervously when she caught me watching her. “I guess it’s kind of my comfort food…except it’s comfort tea. Anyway, do you have anything like that? A comfort food? I can make it for you.”