Total pages in book: 150
Estimated words: 148434 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 148434 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 742(@200wpm)___ 594(@250wpm)___ 495(@300wpm)
Maximoff glares at the wall. This must have been in high school, and I don’t ask what rumors Wesley spread or what terrible things he said because I don’t want to award him any space in my brain.
I try to send my brothers a pointed look, but I’m sure the alcohol has dulled its effect. “Will Rochester isn’t Wesley. The sins of his brother aren’t his own.”
Charlie takes a hot sip of Scotch. “We all bear the sins of our parents every day we breathe, and so why aren’t the sins of a brother or sister or cousin the same?”
“Because,” Maximoff says, “being a dick isn’t hereditary.”
We reach no real conclusion on the subject, and I’m not sure that Charlie or Beckett will ever accept Will, the older brother of someone who has wronged me. Maximoff is far more forgiving, and I see that in how he’s let Thatcher back into his life and my life and his fiancé’s life.
My brothers go to the bar for new drinks, and like the seas have parted, I have a clear and direct line to the sofa.
To Thatcher.
I sip my drink.
He tries to scout the pub, but his narrowed gaze returns to me in a flash. I’m drawn to him, and I practically float towards my boyfriend.
“Jane,” he greets deeply. I’m only a few feet away.
My bones ache for him. I want to feel him inside me. I want the emotion, and I barely see concern tighten his eyes.
Climb him, Jane. “I want you,” I whisper.
“Jane.”
“Thatcher.” I’m a drunken fool, but Flirty Jane doesn’t give a damn. I’m one second from straddling Thatcher when hands clasp my waist.
Farrow pulls me back, and Thatcher shoots to a stance, his concern still on me. But the world rotates and blurs, and I try to cling to all the voices that pitch around me.
“Did she just call you Thatcher?” O’Malley asks.
Tony laughs. “She’s just drunk. Aren’t you, Jane?” He thinks he’s being cute teasing me, but he’s nothing more than a patronizing prick.
And I hope I’m glaring at him, but the pub is a smear of multi-colored twinkling Christmas lights. Farrow is still behind me, I think.
Thatcher in front. Isn’t he? I hope.
Voices pile on each other. I blink for focus.
“How am I an asshole?” Tony rebuts. “I don’t care that she mixed ‘em up. It doesn’t even matter what anyone calls them. Banks responds to both names.”
I wish I could defend my boyfriend, but I’m fighting to grasp my bearings.
My cheeks roast, uncomfortable that I’m too uninhibited and not put-together among people who should meet my iron walls. I’m lost, but I feel hands on me and voices in my ear. “Thatcher?” I trip over my feet and try to right myself.
I touch something hard. A chest?
I haven’t been this drunk in a long, long while.
“Thatcher?” I’m scared. “Thatcher?”
“Jane—I’m right here.” He cups my cheeks.
It alarms me, more than anything, that I didn’t call for Maximoff.
I called for him.
For a man I…
I love him.
I hold onto his biceps, unsure of where my whiskey glass even went. “I’m fine.” I speak, not even sure what he asked me. I try to strong-arm my drunken-self and not slur. “I think it’s just hitting me…harder all of a sudden.” Because I moved. I walked and now I’m speeding rapidly through Sloppy Drunk Jane to Black-Out (SOS) territory.
God, help me.
A translation comes through my brain: Thatcher, help me.
20
THATCHER MORETTI
Swiftly and easily, I lift Jane off the glass-shattered ground and into a front-piggyback. She just dropped her drink, whiskey soaking the floorboards, and she almost went down with the liquor. She can’t stand on her own, and right when the glass broke, the team stopped yelling over each other.
I’ve never seen her this plastered, not even through the six-and-a-half years I’ve been a bodyguard. Jane Cobalt is notoriously composed when she’s drunk. She’ll do cute things like trip over her own feet and call me Mr. Moretti—but she’ll right herself up with some type of poise. When the matchup is Jane vs. Whiskey, I’d put my money on my girlfriend every time.
And I’d lose that bet tonight.
She blinks a hell of a lot, panic behind her blue eyes.
I tuck her to my sturdy chest. Protective. One of my hands is lost in her blue skirt. Really, I’m cupping her ass, an effortless hold, and I press my other palm to the back of her head, whispering against her ear, “I have you, honey.”
She eases into me.
“Here.” Farrow passes me a glass of water.
“Is she pale?” Maximoff asks, voice hard-edged but he looks concerned. He’s probably seen her this wasted. Hell, I know he’s held her hair back while she’s puked.
Before I came along, he’d be the one holding Jane, and the fact that he’s not upset that I’ve taken over—it means we’re making good strides.