Total pages in book: 184
Estimated words: 186756 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 934(@200wpm)___ 747(@250wpm)___ 623(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 186756 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 934(@200wpm)___ 747(@250wpm)___ 623(@300wpm)
“And what of the little fact that she loves you?”
I thrust my hand down my pocket and fist the ring. “As I just said, I’m fixing it. I’m helping her move on.”
“From you.”
I press my thumb against the diamond. “Yes.”
“You do know how insane that sounds, don’t you?”
I realize that.
To an outsider, it does sound insane. To an outsider, it looks like I’m stealing my twin brother’s bride-to-be. But the world doesn’t know what we have.
The world doesn’t know what this is all about.
I’m trying to make her happy. I’m trying to give her what she wants—love—the only way I can. By getting her to move on from me and marry the man who loves her.
When she sees that I’m not the man she thinks I am; when she realizes the things she wants from me, vulnerability, intimacy, emotions are not something I’m capable of giving, she’ll lose interest.
She’ll move on.
It’ll hurt, but she’ll be better for it in the long run.
But I’d be lying if I said I’m doing this solely for selfless reasons, no. I’m also doing this for me. I’m doing this because while she’s falling out of love with a man like me, I could get to be with a girl like her.
Even if for a little while.
Because I may not be her destiny, but she is mine.
Taking a deep breath, I look at my brother to find him steadily watching me. “Are you”—I swallow, my chest tight—“disappointed?”
“With what?”
“With the fact that I’m like the man we hate the most.”
Conrad takes his time answering the question and in the seconds that pass, I regret asking it. I regret telling him the truth about me. No matter how strangely relieved I feel at having shared the burden, it still wasn’t a very good idea.
“We do hate him the most,” he says finally. “He was a deadbeat dad. He fucked around on Mom; he beat her, abused her. He left us when we needed him the most, when Callie needed him the most and she didn’t even know it. So yeah, he deserves to be hated. But you’re not like him.”
Chapter 11
I always wanted to see his room.
And even though I got a peek of it through the phone screen that one night, it still wasn’t as satisfying as actually being in his room in person. So it makes me happy. Although how I got in here isn’t something that’s going to make him happy all that much. I stole the master keycard from the housekeeping cart. But only for a minute and I didn’t even have to flirt with anyone in order to do so.
So maybe he should take that as a win and move on.
When I tell him, I mean.
I haven’t yet; because he’s not here.
I don’t know where he is, which is why I’ve had to take such drastic measures as stealing and sneaking into his room to wait for him to get back from wherever he went off to. Which happened as soon as we reached our next destination.
After his long talk with Conrad in one of those back rooms, he came out looking grim. So severely grim and rigid that I almost sprang out of my seat and went after him. I almost forgot that my fiancé was sitting right next to me. And today was the day he decided to spend his entire time sitting beside me. Maybe because today was also the day that he decided to sit up front and away from his usual spot.
And as the time passed, his grimness didn’t go away.
He hardly looked at anyone. In fact, I’m sure in the entire four hours of our journey, his eyes were firmly planted on his clipboard and his laptop screen.
In any case, I didn’t get a chance to talk to him at all. Not even through texts because I couldn’t text him on the bus, but then when we did reach it and I could, he wouldn’t reply back.
And since all else has failed, this is what I’ve chosen to do.
I stand in the middle of his room, but it doesn’t look like his room yet. As in, all his stuff is packed and sitting in a corner and every other object, furniture, the little armchairs and the desk, in the room is untouched. While I know that much of his room is probably going to stay that way, I know at some point he’s going to have to make use of the empty closet and of course bring out his books.
That he isn’t going to be able to read.
Because of me.
Because of how much I disturb his peace.
Which at one point made me happy when I resigned myself to the fact that what people thought about him was right: he is cold. But now it makes me sad when I know I was right all along: he’s as hot as wildfire.