Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 75289 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 376(@200wpm)___ 301(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75289 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 376(@200wpm)___ 301(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
Oh God, I’m definitely going to hell. Santa’s not going to be the only one coming this Christmas.
My hand curls around the base of my vibrator, and as desperation pulses through me, I flop onto my bed, grabbing the blankets and hauling them up to my chin. More than ready to make a little Christmas magic of my own.
15
BLAIR
My head pounds with regret as I trudge through my house, groaning when I find the fire has fizzled out. A small sigh leaves my lips when I stop, my heart threatening to pound right out of my chest.
My feet pause, my brows furrowing, and I back up a step, turning to face the offending fireplace.
I cleaned that fireplace yesterday. There shouldn’t be any charred remains. I go over the shady details of my night, trying to remember everything in chronological order. Nick unlocked the door, led me inside, and got a glass of water. He took me down to my room where we awkwardly found my trusty vibrator, and then after completely winding me up, he left.
Neither of us stopped to put the fire on, but it had to have been Nick after he walked out of my room because nothing else possibly makes sense. But I could have sworn he walked straight out. I heard the thud of the door when he left.
At least, I think it was the thud of the door, but in reality, it could have been any single door inside my home.
Ahh fuck.
This can’t be happening. If he didn’t walk straight out last night, that means he was still here when I went to town on myself with my vibrator. He would have heard every moan and sharp gasp I made. Oh, God! Even though the details are fuzzy, I definitely screamed his name in shameless desperation.
Oh no, no, no, no, no. This is not happening.
Humiliation sweeps through me. I already made enough of an ass of myself at the bar when I asked him to take me into the back of his pickup and have his wicked way with me. But damn, the way his eyes sparked to life as though I’d breathed pure oxygen right into his lungs for the first time in six years . . . Shit. What I wouldn’t give to see that look in his eyes every day for the rest of my life.
Woah. Every day for the rest of my life? I shouldn’t be thinking like this. I need to be focusing on the business I’m going to build very, very far away from here, not the life I’ll never be able to have in Blushing. I walked away from those possibilities years ago, and until now, I thought I was content in that decision.
Being back here in Blushing is starting to screw with my head. Or maybe it’s just whatever Oxley was pouring into my drinks last night.
Not wanting to freeze, I stride over to the charred remains of last night’s fire and grab a few pieces of wood off the pile—a pile that’s certainly fuller than it was yesterday. Strategically placing them into the fireplace, I quickly light it.
Pride drums through my chest. There are so many things I’ve had to learn about being a homeowner in an area like this, and lighting that fire has been one of the biggest learning curves of all. I’ve spent hours trying to get the hang of stacking the wood inside the fireplace correctly, but I’m getting there. Not going to lie though, if I ever had the opportunity to build my own house, I’d definitely be ordering one of those electric fireplaces. Or perhaps just installing central heat would be easiest.
With the fire now roaring and the house steadily getting warmer, I make my way into the kitchen, and just as I turn on the coffee machine, my open laptop comes to life with an incoming video call. I cringe at the sound, cursing myself for leaving the volume on max, but there’s no denying the happiness I feel seeing Rena’s name on the screen.
“Hey, Rena,” I say, answering the call and swiveling the screen to face me so that I can keep making my coffee. “Bit early, don’t you think?”
“Early? What the hell are you talking about? It’s almost midday.”
“What?” I grunt, whipping around to see the old clock on the wall. “Holy shit.”
“Did you only just get up?”
“Yeah, I had a bit of a wild night at the bar,” I mutter, willing my coffee mug to hurry up and fill itself. “Oxley was working the bar and after having Dwayne call to beg for me back, he made it his personal mission to get me as fucked up as possible.”
“Oh shit.”
I laugh, remembering it all too clearly. “Well, I wasn’t exactly innocent in all of it. I had a shitty day and sat at his bar with every intention of wasting the night away, but then Sarah showed up, and she’d had a shitty day too, and then—”