Total pages in book: 147
Estimated words: 137176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 686(@200wpm)___ 549(@250wpm)___ 457(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 137176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 686(@200wpm)___ 549(@250wpm)___ 457(@300wpm)
It took several steps before JJ’s suggestion—no, order—began to pay off. Feeling began to return to the rest of my muscles. The pain wasn’t terrible, but I still wasn’t strong enough to take my weight off him.
I limped across the floor as quickly as I could. I knew our destination was the living room couch, so I only had to get through a couple dozen more steps to reach the old, dusty piece of furniture.
Once we reached the cabin’s entryway, I started to go straight to enter the living room, but JJ shifted us to the left so that we were standing at the base of the stairs leading to the upper floor.
“We’re gonna take this slow, okay?” JJ said.
“Just put me on the couch,” I growled. Between my muscles all trying to remember how to work together and the heavy exhaustion that was consuming me, stairs were a level of humiliation I could do without. I really didn’t need JJ to see me hugging the thin banister as I climbed each step. “The couch—”
“Shut up, Cass. It’s still my turn to talk, and if I want you to take it fucking slow when we go up these stairs then we’re going to take it fucking slow!”
There was that familiar stubbornness that was built into the DNA of all the men in the Ferguson family. Sully was the proverbial bull in a china shop when he wanted something, while their father had been a quiet kind of stubborn. Like Goldilocks, JJ had fit somewhere in the middle. He knew when to be the right kind of stubborn, and right now my JJ was being just that.
My JJ.
God, I missed thinking of him that way.
I was wise enough to keep the endearment to myself and spent the next several minutes focusing on the steps. Most of my cramping muscles began to relax, but I felt utterly drained.
And helpless.
God, I really fucking hated being helpless.
As grateful as I was that JJ was going to give me the only bed in the cabin to lie down in, I was more concerned about his need to rest. I had no idea how long he’d been in pain both before and after I’d found him on the floor the previous night. It didn’t really matter, though, because I’d seen the level of agony he was forced to endure when he had one of his episodes. It wasn’t even on the same spectrum as my own discomfort. He needed rest. Real rest. I just needed a few minutes to loosen up my body, pop a couple of ibuprofens, and I was good.
“JJ—”
“Cass…” he said in warning.
God, he was fucking stubborn, but it had been that determination, that fierceness, that had saved his life after the shooting. He’d had to use it all over again when he’d woken up afterwards only to find that he’d have to learn all of the most basic skills needed to live life every day. On top of that, he’d had to live with the knowledge that he’d lost pieces of his own life.
I’d take his stubbornness over his hatred of me every time.
“We need to keep moving,” JJ said.
He wasn’t encouraging me anymore. He was downright telling me what to do.
I couldn’t help but wonder if he’d be like that in bed. After our first kiss the night before he’d gotten shot, I’d tagged him as being more of the submissive type. The way he’d kissed me on the canyon road had changed my thinking. His current way of ordering me around was waking up the one part of me that was never tired when it came to JJ.
Would he take control in bed? Would it be a battle of the senses to see who ultimately determined how and when we each found the prize of sweet release? I had the advantage of strength, but JJ had already proven he knew how to get what he wanted.
I was panting when we finally reached the bedroom but as soon as I headed toward the bed, JJ veered me off course and in an entirely different direction.
The bathroom.
There could be only one reason he’d take me in there and it was a humiliation I really had no wish to endure.
“JJ, I don’t—”
“Are you fucking kidding me? What did I tell you to do with that mouth?” JJ asked in disbelief as he looked me dead in the eye, daring me to continue.
With my free hand, I made the motion of zipping my lips. If JJ wanted to stand me in front of a toilet, or worse, sit me on one, he’d have no right to complain about it later. At least the embarrassment would kill off my impending boner. Of course, his comment about him telling me what to do with my mouth was counterbalancing the whole needing his help to take a piss thing.