Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 84203 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 421(@200wpm)___ 337(@250wpm)___ 281(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84203 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 421(@200wpm)___ 337(@250wpm)___ 281(@300wpm)
Not good, I tell myself, thinking about all the bad boys my mom has brought home. Bad boys equal trouble. They’re good with pretty words… that lead to hurtful actions.
“Damn, you look gorgeous,” he says, dragging his eyes down my body and knocking me out of my thoughts. Since I didn’t have my suit with me, I ran down to my room and grabbed the one I bought in the boutique yesterday. Ellie was on the phone with her friend, eating a buffet of food she ordered from room service, and when I asked if she wanted to join us, she shooed me away.
“You’ve seen me naked several times,” I scoff.
“That doesn’t change the fact that you’re gorgeous,” he says.
The wraparound balcony is even bigger than it looks from the inside. It houses an outdoor kitchen and grill, a few lounge chairs, and a pool.
I ease my way into the pool and sigh as the cool water envelops my legs, then dive right in, plummeting under the water and not coming up until I get to the other side. When I push through the surface, I come face to face with a very wet Micah.
“Hey,” he says, backing me up against the side of the pool.
“Hey,” I say back.
He reaches out and tucks the wet hair that’s clinging to my face behind my ear, and my breath hitches at his touch. This is exactly why I’ve made it a point not to date, not to be alone with a man—outside of work. It doesn’t matter how smart a woman is, as soon as a man gives her that look, touches her like so, she turns into a puddle of stupid at his feet.
“Tell me something about you that no one knows,” Micah says, caging me in with his strong arms.
“I don’t want to be stupid,” I admit without thinking.
“I think you’re far from stupid. Aren’t you majoring in accounting?”
“I might be book smart, but being here with you, letting you into my life, definitely makes me stupid.”
“You haven’t even begun to let me in,” he says with a half-smile.
“Then maybe there’s still hope for me yet.”
“If you could do anything for the rest of your life, what would you do?”
“No way.” I shake my head. “You have to answer, too. Tell me something about you no one knows.”
He thinks for a second before he says, “My biological mom didn’t want me, even threatened to have an abortion. My dad compensated her quite generously to carry me to term and then paid her another hefty sum to sign over her rights and disappear from my life forever.
“So, you and Lincoln aren’t…”
He shakes his head. “No, everyone thinks we share the same mom. But the truth is, my dad met Lincoln’s mom, Donna, when my bio mom was pregnant with me. They fell hard and fast, and she accepted me as her own after I was born.” He smiles softly. “Everyone thinks she’s my mom because she’s always loved me the same as Lincoln, her own flesh and blood. She chose for me to be a part of her life when my own mom chose to discard me.
“Maybe that’s the best kind of love,” I say. “The kind where someone chooses to love you when they don’t have to.”
“As opposed to what?” he asks.
“Forced love. From my experience, when it’s forced, it doesn’t end well. My parents were both professional dancers who got pregnant with me by accident and were forced to marry. In the beginning, I think they tried to make it work. But dancing was more than a career to them, it was their dream. My mom had to give up that dream in order to care for me, and when my dad got injured and could no longer dance, things really started to unravel. My dad eventually left us, choosing to start another family, one he wanted. When my mom became pregnant with Ellie and her deadbeat dad skipped town, she was forced to care for two children on her own. Trapped and looking for an escape, she chose a path of drugs and prostitution and a string of men who were nothing more than a series of poor choices. Time and again, our mom has abandoned us, choosing that life over the children she is supposed to love.”
“You love Ellie, and she loves you,” he points out.
“True, but our love is tainted. You heard her at breakfast. She thinks she’s a burden to me. That I’m giving up what I love to take care of her. What I want is for someone to choose to love me. To not see me as a burden or associate me with heartbreak. I want someone to look at me and think I’m the best part of their day. I want to feel a love that is pure and good and doesn’t come with any strings attached. I don’t know if that kind of love actually exists, but I want to believe in the fairytale.”