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)
After the cats finally tone it down, and a few minutes later pretend like we’re not even here, all cattitude and perfect feline indifference, Katie puts her hand on my arm. “You still haven’t said anything.”
I sigh. “I’m not sure what there is to say.”
She’s pure evil with all that burning curiosity, but there’s humor lurking under it. She knows I’m hurting, and she wants to help in any way she can. “Was he hunky?”
“Oh, terribly,” I deadpan. She’s not put off by the dryness of my tone.
“Excellent. You look like you banged him.”
“Katie! What the hell?” I gasp.
She giggles and waves a hand but refuses to let me off the hook. “It’s not the end of the world. So what if you had crazy sex with your bodyguard slash undercover agent dude? That’s hot. You were out here all by yourself for a long time. You probably needed to end the dry spell.”
I shake my head. “Good freaking goodness.”
She frowns at me. “The problem isn’t the hot sex. It’s that I think you fell for him, the fact that he was kind of a douche notwithstanding.”
Ugh. Denial isn’t going to get me anywhere. Not with my little sister. I might be good at clothes, but she’s a genius at people. She should pursue that. She’d be great at it if that’s what she wanted. I’m not one of those people who has an easy time keeping everything jammed up inside. It’s almost a relief to let it all out.
“I’m not sure what I am. Still kind of mad, still a little sad, but still missing him anyway. And yeah, it wasn’t just the…um, well, the physical aspect I miss. It’s him. But he’s the kind of person who needs to realize for himself that the world is a problem, but it’s not his biggest problem. His problem is the way he sees it and reacts to it. He’s had a lot of pain in his life, and he doesn’t want to let himself feel it. He thinks breaking isn’t strength, and feeling anything is silly. I know he does, but he won’t admit it, even to himself. He wants to just be one of those strong people who keeps moving forward, but he thinks doing that means cracking himself wide open.”
“Butt cracking himself?” Katie snickers.
I roll my eyes. “He told me I was obsessed with butts. What I should have said was that it runs in the family.”
“Definitely. There’s nothing wrong with a good butt joke, and how on earth would we call anyone a jerkface without inserting some kind of bathroom humor in there? It’s just not as fun.”
“I pretty much told him that,” I say with a chuckle.
“Goodness. If he can’t accept a good butt-laced insult, then I’m not sure he’s the one, Sam.”
Sam. It feels so, so good to hear my real name spoken out loud by someone who has known me my whole life. Yes, even if Sam is short for Samandra. I might not ever look at my real name with such disdain again. It’s more of a privilege to be able to even use it.
“I don’t know if he’s the one. That’s a little heavy.”
“You won’t know if you don’t get in contact with him again,” Katie wisely says.
“I don’t have his number. I don’t…it’s not like he’s one of those people you can just track down and call up. He probably goes to pretty great lengths to keep his privacy private.”
“Hmm.” She pretends to think deeply. “Despite the fact that he was kind of a catfishing turdstink, you did meet him on that hot bedding website.” Yeah, my family does know about that. I was always straight up and honest with them. They were already worried about me. I wasn’t making things any worse with the hot bedding thing. At least not that much worse. “You could try to message him on there.”
“I’d be surprised if his account is even still active.”
“You mean you haven’t checked?” she gasps. She isn’t faking the surprise.
How do I explain that I haven’t had the heart or will to log back in after Beau?
“A lot of things have been on hold in my real life and my…well, under my fake name too.”
“This is real life.” Katie pats the bale and motions to the two cats, who are sitting side by side, staring at us with huge, unblinking cat eyes. It’s slightly creepy and a whole lot cute. “They’re real, and they love you. You’ve loved this place. I can see your touches everywhere. This is just the start of good things, and I’m glad you’re staying here.”
“Are you?” I ask.
“Well, I kind of hate you for it too. I miss you, bish.”
“I missed you too, bish.” What a terrible term. I punch her shoulder lightly and lean into her.