Total pages in book: 65
Estimated words: 63564 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 318(@200wpm)___ 254(@250wpm)___ 212(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63564 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 318(@200wpm)___ 254(@250wpm)___ 212(@300wpm)
I felt so terrible for him.
“I tell you this story to give you hope. No matter how low you feel right now, you will get better. You’ll fall in love again—with a much better man.”
“How do you know?” I whispered.
He grinned. “Because I want that man to be me.”
7
Conway
Vanessa was calling me.
I stared at her name on the screen as the dread filled up inside me. My sister never called me for a simple chitchat. It was always with a purpose. The phone rang exactly the same as it did any other time, but somehow, her rings sounded angry.
I sat on the couch in my bedroom and took the call. “Hey.”
“Don’t hey me,” she snapped.
Yep. She knew.
“I’ve been trying to get a hold of Sapphire, but her phone isn’t working. What’s that about?”
No point in hiding it now. I couldn’t lie to my sister, especially when it was pointless. The truth was going to come out at some point anyway.
“And why am I seeing her all over the news working for Lady Lingerie?” she snapped. “Con, did you guys break up?”
I closed my eyes for a brief moment, feeling sick to my stomach. “Yes.”
“Yes what?” she asked. “You broke up?”
She was going to make me say it again? “Yes…”
“What?” she snapped. “Did she leave you for Andrew? Did she two-time you? Because I’ll fly my ass to America and yank that pretty hair out of her—”
“It wasn’t like that. I ended it.”
Vanessa finally became quiet.
“It’s a long story, but basically…she wanted more. I didn’t.”
Vanessa’s silence was actually more terrifying than her words.
“She wanted to move to America to start over. That’s why she’s working for Andrew now.”
“Con, you’ve got to be fucking kidding me right now. That woman was perfect. Are you out of your goddamn mind? You really think you can do better?”
“No.” I know I couldn’t.
“That woman was so good to you. Mom, Dad, and I loved her. How could you not see a future with her? Why did you ask her to move in with you in the first place if you didn’t see it going anywhere?”
“It’s not that simple…”
“Maybe I need to make it simple for you so you’ll understand. Con, you’re an idiot.”
I listened to my sister berate me, a grown-ass man. “It doesn’t matter. It’s over now.”
“You’re making a huge mistake.”
“Just stay out of it.”
“How can I stay out of it? Sapphire is a great person.”
“You hardly knew her.”
“But I knew she loved you—and that’s all that mattered. When I saw the way she looked at you, like you were the only man on this planet, I knew we would be good friends. Because even if she were high-maintenance, annoying, or whatever, I wouldn’t have cared. She loved you, and that was good enough for me to be friends with her. All those other skanks you hang around only care about your wallet, Con. Sapphire didn’t.”
I bowed my head and rubbed my fingers across my eye.
“Is it because she went on camera and said she loved you?”
I stayed quiet.
She sighed into the phone. “She wore her heart on her sleeve, Con. I think that’s brave. If you don’t, you didn’t deserve her anyway.”
Click.
Carter sat beside me at the bar, drinking his whiskey and looking at the girls dancing in the background. In nothing but thongs, they worked the poles and danced for the cash men stuffed into their panties.
I hardly paid attention to them.
Carter didn’t mention Muse anymore. He’d finally laid off it and moved on.
It was a relief, but it was also depressing.
Carter eyed two women sitting together at a table. Cosmos were sitting in front of them, and they both wore tight black dresses. It wasn’t clear why they were hanging out in a strip joint, but judging by the way they made eyes at us, we were on their radar. “What do you think their story is?” Carter asked without looking at me, somehow knowing I was looking at them too.
“No idea. Maybe they’re into perverts that come into a joint like this.”
“You know that would make us perverts, by your logic.”
“I don’t think that statement is incorrect.”
I drank my scotch again and watched them walk over to us. Both brunettes.
“I got the one on the right.”
I didn’t care which one I got stuck with.
They joined us at the bar, and the girls made small talk with us as the music played overhead. The one near me played with my tie when she got comfortable, and she pressed closer into me, as if she was looking for a hard-on in my slacks.
She would be disappointed.
She finally called me out on my coldness. “I’m dropping moves left and right, but you’re responding like a wall.”
I’m not hard like a wall.
Carter was busy making out with his girl, so he wasn’t listening to us anymore.