Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 67490 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 337(@200wpm)___ 270(@250wpm)___ 225(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67490 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 337(@200wpm)___ 270(@250wpm)___ 225(@300wpm)
Keene: Was it a mess?
Me: I’m fairly sure if I wanted to get rid of a body, I’d rent an industrial woodchipper, go out to a field I wanted fertilized, and spread it out there. Then I’d throw a couple of trees through it to clean it up. Then I’d take it back to the store I rented it from.
Keene: That’s oddly specific.
Me: I learn new things every day on this job.
• • •
Three days later
“Hey,” I breathed, glad that Keene had the time to call.
“Hey,” he greeted, voice all deep and rumbly. “No FaceTime today?”
I felt my insides start to melt. “No. Light’s already off, didn’t figure that you’d want to look at blackness.”
“My light’s not off. So at least you’ll get to see me,” he teased.
I immediately hit FaceTime, and was greeted with his grinning face.
“Has anyone ever told you that you look like The Witcher character? But with very dark hair instead of white?” I asked, loving the way the wet strands of his hair fell around his face and onto his shoulders.
He’d just gotten out of the shower, and I wanted to trace a few of the stray droplets I saw down the length of his chest.
He squinted, and I took pity on him and turned on the small flashlight I kept next to my nightstand when I slept in foreign places.
His face lit up when he saw me, and I knew I’d made the right decision.
He’d missed me just like I’d missed him.
“Good day?” he asked, ignoring my Witcher comment.
I thought about that one before I answered. “We lost a young kid today who decided to test out the ice thickness at his local pond. By the time they were able to cut him out from where he’d fallen in, he was about sixty feet from where he started, and had been in there for over an hour.”
His expression fell, and he looked away. “We lost one today, too. A young boy.”
My heart felt for him. “Oh-for-two.”
“Oh-for-two,” he agreed. “How was your dinner with your friend?”
I laughed.
My friend, Shayne, wasn’t having a good day, either.
Mostly because my brother had decided to stop by on his way to an unknown location, and Shayne had seen him.
“Not good,” I explained. “Did I ever tell you that Shayne and Quinn used to date?”
His brows shot up. “No.”
“They did,” I nodded my head. “And I’ve never been privy to why they broke up. Only that they did. And now every time he’s near her, or she sees him, she goes into this downward spiral. I’m pretty sure that after she left, she punctured his tire with a knife.”
Keene thought I was joking, but I wasn’t.
“What makes you think that?” he asked curiously.
“Well, just the way that she left, I guess. She didn’t know that he was coming—I didn’t either—and so she actually saw him today. Usually, she’s able to duck out before he sees her, or she sees him. And today, she got so irrationally angry when she saw him and pulled something out of her purse before she left, muttering about kicking his ass.”
Keene shook his head, his face filled with laughter. “I can’t wait to meet her. She sounds like a spitfire.”
“She is,” I confirmed. “And she’s excited to meet you, too. I’ve, uh, told her a lot about you.”
The grin that spread across his face was nothing short of fantastic.
“That’s good,” he said. “That means you actually give a shit what your best friend thinks about me. Correct me if I’m wrong, but that means I’m a little bit in there, right?”
A ‘little bit’ was an understatement.
A lot would be more apt.
I usually had no problem focusing on work when I was in the middle of it—having ADHD was a bitch sometimes—but lately…
“Today I was in the middle of starting an IV on some man, and all I could think about was the way that your arms look, and how easy it would be to start an IV on you,” I mused.
His face once again flashed with a grin, but then his eyes sobered as he moved.
“What was that about?” I asked.
“What?” he hedged.
“Keene!” I cried. “Was that pain?”
He opened his mouth, and then closed it. “Well…”
“Keene!” I sat up in bed. “Are you okay?”
I scratched the back of my head, looking at him, trying to figure out what could be wrong. “Tell me, please.”
He sighed. “This is part of the ‘more,’ honey. It’s not that I don’t want to tell you, but it’s not just my life on the line if I spill the beans. It’s a lot of lives.”
I slumped.
He had said that.
“What’ll it take for you to tell me?” I sobered.
“About six months in a committed relationship and knowing that you’re the one.” He looked apologetic. “I’m sorry, honey.”
“Does all this count toward our time, sir?” I batted my eyelashes at him.