Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 99500 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 498(@200wpm)___ 398(@250wpm)___ 332(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99500 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 498(@200wpm)___ 398(@250wpm)___ 332(@300wpm)
Dinner goes by in a blur. Hugo easily keeps the conversation going, attempting to engage me in it, but my mind keeps slipping in other directions. It’s not until we’re pulling into the garage at his house that the fog clears.
Apprehension skitters through me knowing I’ll have to face Spencer again and soon. I climb out of the car and take my backpack while Hugo grabs my suitcase. It’s amusing to see a grown-ass man in a terribly expensive suit tugging a dented, hot pink suitcase on wheels behind him.
The house is exactly as I remember. Massive. Chilly. Decorated fit for a magazine spread. If I thought I’d felt out of place years ago, it’s only made more obvious now that I’m a colorful, messy, tainted version of the girl I once was.
I follow Hugo down the hallway past Spencer’s closed door to my old room. He abandons the handle of the suitcase to fish out the key that fits it. Once he unlocks it and pushes inside, a wave of familiar nostalgia hits me.
Oh, God.
“You kept the Harry Styles posters,” I say, grimacing. “How sweet.”
Hugo barks out a laugh. “What? He’s not your boyfriend anymore? I didn’t get the memo.”
Crushing over Harry feels like a lifetime ago, especially since I actually slept with a musician who looked eerily like him. The guy’s name was Wes and he was a dick who stayed high. I’d lost interest by the third time he couldn’t keep his dick hard from being so stoned.
“Those posters have to go.” I toss my backpack onto the bed and inhale the scent of oranges. “I can’t believe you kept everything the same.”
Hugo picks up my suitcase and sets it on the bed beside my bag. He saunters over to me until we’re inches apart. I suck in a breath, expecting oranges, but am met with his expensive cologne—the same fragrant scent Spencer wears.
“I told you,” Hugo rumbles, lifting a finger to stroke my cheek. “You’re always welcome here. Somehow I knew you’d come back.”
It’s difficult not to melt into his delicate touch. But, if I have any hope of finding Mom and actually keeping this place to live, I’ll not give in to my urges. It would be so easy to use my skills of luring a man into my bed on Hugo.
Then what?
With Hugo, the whole dynamic would be screwed up. He’s my stepfather and I really care about him. I don’t want him to resent me later, especially if Mom comes back home and they work it out. I’ll be a dirty little secret.
I may be self-destructive and wild at times, but I protect my heart at all costs. Having it broken once in this lifetime was enough.
“Get settled in,” Hugo says, hauling me into his arms for yet another comforting hug. “If you need anything, you come to me.”
I cling to him, my palms greedily sliding over the prominent muscles in his back, and nod. “Thanks, Hugo.”
“Anything for you, Love.”
I’ve packed away the last of my things and am changing into my pajamas when the snick of the door opening has me whirling around. I expect to find Hugo coming to check on me but instead find Spencer.
In nothing but a low-slung pair of gray sweatpants, he saunters into my room like he owns the place. His sharp gaze is on me, raking down over my naked, exposed shoulders to where I clutch my nightshirt to my chest. He grins, calculating and predatory.
“Did I interrupt something, Aubby Loves Cock?”
Rolling my eyes, I turn my back to him and pull on the shirt. I can feel his stare still on me, so I make sure the shirt is pulled all the way down over my ass before discreetly shimmying out of my jean shorts. I drop them at my feet and step out of them, leaving them where they lie.
“That wasn’t funny when I was sixteen. Still not funny,” I say, turning to glower at him.
“Your mom had to have thought it was hilarious to name her kid Aubrey Love Cox. It’s like she despised you from the second she pushed you out of her vagina.”
I’d never thought my name was a problem until my beloved stepbrother twisted it into something that stuck—something that earned me ridicule from him after he randomly decided he hated me one day.
“Don’t you have better things to do?” I ask, refusing to look at the deep curves of his abs that weren’t there the last time I’d seen him shirtless. “Like organize your sock drawer?”
He doesn’t flinch at my jab at his OCD. But he does glare at my shorts on the floor like they’ve personally offended him. It pleases me to know I can get to him, even if just a little bit.
“My sock drawer is fine,” he drawls out. “Besides, I have something better to obsess about.”