Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 74844 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 374(@200wpm)___ 299(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74844 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 374(@200wpm)___ 299(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Get it together. We’re wooing, not trying only to fuck her.
I clear my throat and shift a bit to give my growing cock some room. I just want a taste. I need a taste. I know it’s not the same, but I bring my thumb to my mouth, sucking off the balsamic as our eyes lock. A soft little sound leaves her lips, and I smile. “I haven’t been with or seen anyone since I walked out of that hotel room.”
“Why?” she gasps.
“Because I left a part of me here,” I admit, holding her gaze. “With you.”
CHAPTER 11
Elliot
It takes everything in me not to say, “You sure the fuck did!”
But I know he doesn’t know about his child, so he only means that he still has feelings for me, and I don’t understand why.
“Alex, be real,” I say as I reach for my lemonade. “It was sex.”
His eyes are so telling. Heat moves through those caramel depths as he slowly shakes his head. “The sex was fantastic, it was, but you know it was more. We spent every night together.”
“For sex,” I remind him, but he doesn’t budge.
“You slept at my house even without it.”
“Because I was living with my peepaw and Clara. Your place was easier to get to the arena from.”
He eyes me, his lip curving in a lopsided smirk. “Me encanta la forma en que mientes.” I love the way you lie.
Asshole.
“I’m not lying.”
He just chuckles as the waiter brings our food. As soon as he sets down my chicken piccata, I don’t know if it’s the lemon or what, but nausea hits me hard. I cover my mouth and look away, closing my eyes as I breathe through my nose.
The waiter leans in and says, “Signorina?” just as Alex asks, “Elliot, are you okay?”
I wave them both off, exhaling hard. “Yes, sorry. Just felt off for a second. I’m fine,” I urge as I lean back, breathing through my mouth. I’m not sure what is happening. I haven’t had any issues with food in months. Why am I now?
The waiter smiles and wishes us well before heading back to the kitchen. I can feel Alex’s gaze on me, those knowing eyes watching me. I look up to see such concern in his expression.
“Are you okay?”
“The lemon is overpowering, I think.”
He only nods, standing up and switching our plates. As soon as the plate of piccata is out of sight, my nausea dies down. I look down at his mushroom risotto and then back to him. “But this is your favorite.”
He shrugs. “And yours. So, eat it.”
We’d come here a few times before he left. He’d never let me order the mushroom risotto, saying he wanted to try something new but always also have his favorite. He liked to try what I got, and I always looked forward to eating part of his risotto. My heart softens at his kindness, and then the guilt floods in, drowning me.
I should have told him when I found out. I know he would have run back, though, and I wanted him to have that experience in Nashville. He’s destined for greatness, and I don’t want to hold him back.
I don’t want him to resent me.
I don’t want to fall for him.
Damn it, though, he’d make it so easy. Hell, he wouldn’t even need to try that hard. With those quick grins, those all-knowing eyes, and that mouth that has a way of making me wet just by saying my name, I’d be a goner. I’ve always wanted to be in love, even when I didn’t know what it was. When I was trapped with men who would use me as a hole and not as a woman. When I was owned and never said anything because I didn’t want my sisters to come save me. They were getting out; I had to keep it that way. Even knowing I was being used, I still confused it with love. When I learned the truth, when I got out, I felt like a nasty whore. I’d just wanted to be special to a man when, really, I was already special to someone.
Myself.
Lot of therapy and lots of med changes caused that realization to happen for me.
With how Alex looks at me, he makes me feel as if my childhood dream could be possible.
But I know there is no way he’ll accept what I did. Not hiding my pregnancy and not what happened before I escaped the cult. Hell, with how I have to be on meds to survive. No one wants that. No one wants that burden. I don’t even know how my sisters do it.
I’m spiraling.
Fuck.
I look up just as Alex takes my hand. “Mami, breathe,” he whispers, running his thumb along the back of my hand. “It’s okay. I want you to have my meal. This piccata is damn good.”