Total pages in book: 85
Estimated words: 80495 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 402(@200wpm)___ 322(@250wpm)___ 268(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80495 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 402(@200wpm)___ 322(@250wpm)___ 268(@300wpm)
I did survive. Thank dear freaking trash-eating raccoons that she’s not scraping me off her front lawn with a shovel. She’d be scarred for life.
“You know,” she whispers, all raw and wide-eyed now. She dabs at my lip again and hands me the icepack so I can stick it on my own face. “Life does things to people that make them hurt—”
“Don’t make this into a metaphor,” I interrupt her. I have to be an asshole because there’s a whole lot of tenderness going on, and it needs to be dialed way down on both our parts, especially mine. I survived falling off the roof. Now, I have to survive this woman, too. My team is close. Colin is close. Just a few more days, and I can get out of here. I want that. I. Fucking. Want. That. It’s everything I want.
So why do I feel so unsatisfied?
Right. Concussion multiplied with blue balls. My hormones and head are both scrambled.
“I’m alive,” I grunt. “And I’m happy that way. It’s good enough.”
I expect another lecture about being alive versus living, but it never comes. Instead, her blue eyes get even bluer and even wetter and softer, and they never leave my face. Then, her hand comes down and cups the back of my neck with enough sensual grace to knock the breath right out of me all over again. “Okay.” She rubs my neck, and fuck, it feels good. Like I just fell off a roof and she’s rubbing out the kinks kind of good. “Okay, Beau. I’ll talk about myself then.”
Her hand, the pain. Her hand, massaging it away.
It’s all I can do not to moan and whimper and beg her for more. I could have a professional masseuse and any doctor I want here in a matter of hours. But the only touch I want is hers.
She runs her palm down my back, over my T-shirt, and back to my neck. “It’s been eleven months since I last saw my family. I know that when I finally do get to go back home, or they come out here, they’ll have aged. I’m at the point in my life where I’m adult enough to realize that everything and everyone gets older. People start falling apart, and they’re not here forever. I hate that I’ve already lost almost a year with them. I’m worried about them. They’re worried about me. I miss them terribly. I guess…I guess that’s me talking about me.” She stops massaging and cups my good cheek, tears dancing in her eyes. “I’m worried about you too. You’re so rock hard that you survived plummeting off my roof, but I think at the center, you’re not so hard.”
I take the cloth from her hand and dab my lip, keeping the ice pack in place. I need my phone to make some calls. I’ll tell her where it is, so she can help me get it. I’m not going to expire on the spot, but I need another pump, or at the very least, some insulin, the pen needle, and something to check my blood sugar until I get the pump up and running to do it for me again.
“Good thing I have a tough shell, then. Nothing reaches the squishy parts,” I say.
I lift my shirt basically as a distraction, but then I survey the destruction, and…it’s not pretty. It’s worse than it looks. Ignacia doesn’t faint, but she does gasp again. “That’s going to need some hydrogen peroxide.”
“Yeah.”
“And some stitches,” she adds.
“No, just a first aid kit. I have one in my room. And my phone. Could you help me get them, please?”
She wants to talk more and break me with her soft words falling from her sensual lips. She also wants to share her huge, wonderful, sunny, and happy heart with me. But I can’t let that happen, so I keep my T-shirt lifted, letting all the gore show.
“Yes.” She swallows so hard that it sounds like she’s choking. “I’ll be right back with the stuff.”
Falling off the roof saved me from having a heart-to-heart up there. I’ve done a lot of things in life to avoid getting mushy, but that’s a first.
Hopefully, it’s the last.
A few more days. I need to manage not to get myself killed. I need to remind myself to use my brain, not do silly things like climb out of windows, let Ignacia climb on top of me in bed, or let her tell me I’m worth something, something great. I can’t let her think that. Because she’s wrong.
Soon, she’ll find out how not worth something I am.
Too soon.
Fuck.
Chapter thirteen
Beau
Opening my eyes the next morning is a big nope.
Trying to get out of bed to empty my bladder is even worse.
I basically drag my sorry, bruised, near-broken carcass down the hall and then fall back to sitting on Ignacia’s bed. She didn’t kick me to the guest room last night even though I was disruptive enough, spending half the night patching myself up and getting insulin delivered because I couldn’t get a pump on short notice, no matter how much money I had. One will be arriving by nine this morning. Last night, I understood there are real medical emergencies in the world, and flying in a doctor who’s head of such and such just because I can afford it will be a dick move when the world needs every available doctor working every available hour they have.