Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 63563 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 318(@200wpm)___ 254(@250wpm)___ 212(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63563 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 318(@200wpm)___ 254(@250wpm)___ 212(@300wpm)
I lead the way, stopping beside my dad’s armchair. He doesn’t even turn to acknowledge me even though he knows I’m there. Finally, I step around the chair and stand in his line of view to the TV. He raises a brow and looks at me. Then his head swivels to look at Ash. I tense, waiting for the explosive moment of recognition, but it doesn’t come.
“Dad, this is a friend. A, uh, a good friend of mine. He has something he wants to talk to you about if you’ll let him.”
My dad blinks at me. I don’t think he can believe I brought someone in here to see him like this. He must know it’s beyond serious that I have. He actually grabs the remote and turns off the TV. One more long look at me, and he frowns, but not in an angry or betrayed way. Instead, he’s confused and pensive.
“He was wondering, that is, he thought it might be better if you both spoke alone. I’ll just be down the hall, doing laundry or cleaning the bathroom or something. If you want to throw something at him, I already gave him fair warning that you might, so feel free.”
“Thanks for that,” Ash mutters.
“No problem.” I take myself down the hall before I can lose my nerve and do something humiliating like get down on my knees and beg my dad to accept Ash’s help. Because even though it’s Ash, and the help is coming from the hand I very much want to bite by publishing an awful story about, my dad needs it. We both need it. As it is, I feel like we’re drowning here.
I shut myself in my dad’s room. The bed is unused, which is scary. I made it up a few days ago, and he hasn’t slept in it. Has he been sleeping in his chair? Dad, please, please accept Ash’s help. Staring at the bed and the room that’s clean because Dad hasn’t changed his clothes in days either, a rush of moisture floods my eyes and trickles down my cheeks before I have any hope of blinking it away.
How did it come to this? I don’t know if I mean my dad, me, or both of us accepting Ash’s help because he’s the last person I thought would ever extend a hand in kindness to us. It almost makes me want to take back the article, but then I think about the kiss. Our second kiss, actually, though the second one went way further. I was already tearing off clothes and going way too far in my mind before I managed to break away. Ash is dangerous. He’s dangerous because not only am I having second thoughts about the article, but I’m having seconds thoughts about the ring and wanting to take it off. The curse must be working its cursed magic even faster than I thought.
Step one is dealing with my dad.
Step two is getting this ring off before I do a lot of things I know I’ll regret.
There’s a word I could use to describe Ash’s kisses, which is addictive. It’s a bad word. I don’t know what it is about him that made me tell him things I would never in a million, billion, gazillion years just blurt out for anyone else. I know there isn’t a correlation between how long you know a person and how much you trust them. You can know people for years and hardly know a darn bit about them, but I know a lot about Ash since I did some prerequisite research before applying for the maid position. However, it’s no reason for me to just give him my life story as though I trust him.
It was the kiss. It did things to me, and it’s like his lips were coated in truth serum. Yeah, maybe I watch too much spy shit. Probably as much as my dad watches true crime. Well, okay, not that much. I also love to read. Spy shit, of course. What can I say? Like my dad, I was always into investigative journalism.
All I know is, last night, I felt seen for the first time in years. I felt like Ash was looking into me and seeing things I didn’t even know were there. I couldn’t hide one bit of myself, so I didn’t even bother, except the deceptive, nasty, snaky, snarky, betraying bits. He didn’t seem to pick up on those, luckily for me.
He didn’t just see me. Ash heard me.
Wait, that wasn’t it. No, no, it wasn’t. He heard me, he saw me, and he touched me, and I’m obviously not talking metaphorically here, though maybe he did touch those parts too.
Suddenly, c-ccccrrassshhhhhh!
“Aaargh!” I jump about three feet in the air and come down like a startled spooky cat, my hair bristled, back arched, claws at the ready, and eyes wild. I dash out of the bedroom. I wasn’t really serious when I said my dad would throw stuff. I thought he’d contain himself. Shit. Maybe he recognized Ash, and he’s now bent on revenge and is going to tear the house apart. If that’s true, I have to stop him.