Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 73699 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 368(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73699 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 368(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
I hesitate briefly, realizing I forgot the coffee, but since the flowers are a two-armed affair, I’ll have to make two trips: one to deliver flowers and grovel, and a second to deliver coffee and grovel again.
In true Charlotte fashion, I didn’t think my plan all the way through, because even though it takes me about five times of rattling the doorknob, and about twenty more dropped stems before I can get his bedroom door open, he’s apparently not a light sleeper and doesn’t budge from beneath the covers.
Fantastic plan.
Here I am, sneaking into a sleeping man’s bedroom with enough flowers to fill the back seat of an SUV, standing at the foot of his bed and … watching him sleep.
I don’t mean to, I’m just trying to figure out my next move, but even as my brain races through what now options, I take in the fact that even at his most vulnerable, he’s still got that slightly haunted, closed-off vibe. There’s no softening of his brow while he sleeps, no slight smile indicating pleasant dreams.
I clear my throat. No movement.
“Colin,” I whisper. Nothing.
I say his name louder, but he still doesn’t move, and the thorns from some pokey flower are making my situation kind of desperate.
His bed frame doesn’t have a footboard, so I lift my knee to the foot of his bed and awkwardly manage to nudge his foot. “Colin!”
That does the trick.
He bolts upright, and … oopsie.
The bed covers drop all the way to his waist. It stops short of telling me whether he sleeps naked, but he definitely sleeps shirtless, and, well, all I can think is, very, very nice, said in an Irish accent in my head.
That first day in the bar before he’d told me he wanted a divorce, I’d guessed he had at least a six-pack, and I give myself a mental pat on the back for being proven right this morning. Colin’s chest is broad, sculpted, and covered in just the right amount of hair. And interestingly enough, I may have hated that beard back in the day, but the dark shadow on his jaw at the moment is extremely appealing, especially when paired with the mussed dark curls.
“Charlotte, what the hell?”
“What the hell am I doing in your bedroom, or what the hell is with the flowers?” I ask.
He drags his hands over his face, rubbing his eyes slightly, then shakes his head and repeats. “What the hell?”
“Okay, so that’s what the hell to both, then. Well, okay. I’m in your room to deliver the flowers. And I’m delivering flowers because I’m really, really sorry.”
“For?”
I take a deep breath. “Your parents. For their passing. And for not knowing and saying some really insensitive things about how you didn’t make time to visit them, and … oh God. It’s so awful, and I’m so sorry. Really sorry. And I want you to forgive me. You have to say that you do.”
Colin doesn’t say he forgives me. He doesn’t say anything at all. He just sits there with the sheet pooled at his waist, his eyes still looking slightly fuzzy from sleep, his hair rumpled and adorable.
“Okay,” he says.
“Okay, you forgive me?” I ask.
“Okay, you can get out of my room now.”
“Fair enough. I made coffee. I’ll go get it.” I heave the flowers upwards slightly, as I lose a couple of tulips to the floor. “Can I set these down first?”
“Please don’t.”
I pretend I don’t hear this, mainly because if I don’t put the flowers down soon, I may die of blood loss.
Colin sleeps on the right side of the bed, so I scoot around to the left side and leaning over, I awkwardly deposit the flowers on the bed. They take up a lot of room, and he makes a grumbling noise.
I make a quick sprint for the kitchen, hoping coffee will make up for the fact that he’ll probably have to wash his bedding to get rid of all the flower pollen and dirt that are now all over his bed.
I’ll wash the sheets, I amend. Right after I cook him breakfast.
I pour us each a cup of coffee, and when I go back into his bedroom, he hasn’t moved except to turn his head to stare at the flowers as though he doesn’t quite know what to make of them.
“Coffee?” I ask rhetorically, going around to his side of the bed. I hand it to him, but he doesn’t reach out to take it, so I set it on the nightstand.
Without warning, Colin reaches out and jerks the hem of my cami upwards.
“What the—”
“You’re bleeding,” he announces unceremoniously, as he looks at my exposed stomach.
“Oh.” I glance down at the red scratches on the left side of my torso. “Yeah. Roses weren’t a great choice for my plan.”
“So, you actually had a plan?” he asks.