Total pages in book: 47
Estimated words: 43653 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 218(@200wpm)___ 175(@250wpm)___ 146(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 43653 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 218(@200wpm)___ 175(@250wpm)___ 146(@300wpm)
Stone shoots me a broad smile before sitting down on a lounger and gesturing for me to do the same.
“Of course. I wouldn’t think otherwise. Now, what did you want to talk about?” he asks innocently, his eyebrow quirked.
I exhale with impatience. “Stone.” I’m exasperated suddenly. “Let’s start with the obvious. Where have you been? Why did you disappear without a word? Especially after-after,” and here I choke, “after you took my virginity?”
He’s serious then, his blue eyes darkening into a stormy gray and looking at me with feeling, with fervor.
“Honey,” he whispers quietly. “I wanted to do what was best for us, and leaving was what was best,” he states. “I know it was sudden, that I gave you no advance warning, but trust me, the less contact we had, the better.”
I shake my head, disagreeing. “Whatever your reasons, they couldn’t have justified leaving me like that. Who does that? Who takes a girl’s virginity and then beats feet out of town?”
Stone sighs. “I know this is going to be tough to understand, but I was doing it for you, Evie,” he claims gently. “When you came over for dinner, suddenly, I realized we’d entered new territory, and the stakes were high. Really high.”
I still don’t get it.
“Like they weren’t high before?” I ask, shaking my head. “I mean, we fucked on an air mattress in an empty classroom; if we’d been caught, it would have been disaster for your career.”
At that, Stone nods slowly.
“That’s true, but I wasn’t thinking about my career,” he explains, choosing his words carefully. “I was thinking about my heart.”
Suddenly, my pulse is pounding, the beating in my chest so thunderous, my hearing is muffled. The world is spinning on its axis.
Stone turns to me, his blue eyes full of feeling.
“Baby,” he remarks quietly. “When you came over for dinner, I realized this wasn’t some lunchtime fuck. This wasn’t some dalliance that I was going to shrug off with no emotions. You were so amazing, so gorgeous, and so perfect, I wanted to bury myself in you, keep you with me, and make you mine. And that shook me to my core. It shouldn’t have, but it did.”
I’m so overwhelmed by his words that I just stare at him with wide eyes. I was perfect? Gorgeous? Stone had wanted to make me his? Oh god, this is beyond my wildest dreams. I can hardly believe my ears. I’d thought Stone was going to offer some lame excuse like “I was really busy” or even “my grandmother died,” but instead, he’s declaring himself. Stone Phillips is speaking words I’ve never heard a man say before, and my heart jumps into my mouth.
But something still doesn’t jive, and I’m cautious after a year apart.
“Stone,” I say slowly, “if I meant all that to you, then your actions make even less sense. If that was true, then I should have been the first person you told when you left town. The first person you reached out to. Why would you ghost someone you love?”
With that, finally, the words are said. They are out in the open. I half-expect Stone to deny that he loves me, to state that what I’d just said was an overstatement, but the big man doesn’t fight it. He just nods soberly. His blue eyes are clear, acknowledging the truth and the rightness of my words.
“I know, honey,” he whispers quietly. “It makes no sense, but trust me, I did it for you.”
“For me?” I repeat, dumbfounded, my cheeks coloring. “Don’t turn this around,” I warn. “There was nothing worse than realizing that you’d left town without a word. Do you know how depressed I was? How miserable? How I’ve been walking around in a fog for an entire year?”
Stone reaches a hand out and takes my small palm in his. His fingers are square and warm around mine.
“Honey, there’s not a day that I don’t think about it,” he says roughly, emotion filling his voice. “But the problem is that you’re a terrible liar. Every emotion, every feeling can be read on your face. You’re an open book, baby, and if someone had asked you, you’d have given everything away.”
“So what?” I ask, still confused, shaking my head. “Why would that matter?”
“Because you’re a young girl. If someone discovered us, it was better if you’d been used and then deserted. It was better if you knew nothing about me or where I was.”
“So you were doing it to save your own ass?” I ask slowly. “You didn’t want to be found?”
Stone shakes his head exasperatedly at that.
“No, honey. That’s not what I’m saying at all. They can find me all they want; I don’t give two shits about that. It’s you. You can’t tell a lie, Evie. It’s impossible for you. And if someone found out about us and reported it to the police, I wanted you to be honest and to be able to say, ‘I was used and abused by Stone Phillips, and I have no idea where that fucker is now.’ I didn’t want you to be pulled deeper into the web, so a clean break was best.”