Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 68698 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68698 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
I was a coward.
I didn’t want to get any closer to Aodhan than I had to. Because there was no way in hell he didn’t know I was there anymore.
“Sure,” she chirped. “As long as you tell me who was at lunch when you get in tomorrow.”
Today we were going to a beach front café that was up the coast a ways. But the food, though all fried and bad for you, was excellent. And, from time to time, a member or two of Gator Bait MC—the same motorcycle club that Aodhan was in—would be there.
Theresa loved going, and seeing, everyone that walked through the door.
I wasn’t sure why it was a hot spot for attractive people, but it was.
“Deal,” I said.
I was just pulling the money out of the till, packaging it up in a bank envelope, when I felt it.
The telltale signs of my body shutting down on me.
I had a few seconds at most, then I knew that I’d be passing out cold.
Customers that came here were used to me going out like a light at any given moment.
Sure, I could counteract some of the episodes by sitting down, but there were others, like this one, that I knew I wouldn’t make it.
The lights started to dim, and before I could even drop the money in my hand back into the drawer, I passed out.
Luckily, I was out before I hit the ground, because it was never fun to experience a fall.
I wondered what new and exciting bruise I’d wake up with.
And I did wake up. I always woke up.
The first thing to register was my muscles twitching. At first, a lot of the doctors and EMS workers thought I was having a seizure when I passed out. But, more appropriately, it was my muscles twitching because my brain wasn’t giving them the oxygen that they needed.
“I see you’re still doing that passing out thing,” a dangerously sweet, sexy voice said.
The next thing to register was I wasn’t laid out on the floor. At least not completely.
And someone was stroking my hair so reverently, so sweetly, that I felt like crying.
Aodhan.
When we’d parted ways, I’d been just exhibiting symptoms of my POTS.
Now, I was fully into the symptoms, and there wasn’t an end in sight.
That’s why I’d never gone to medical school. Why I was back in my hometown. Why I was not doing what I wanted to be doing, where I wanted to be doing it.
Because this diagnosis had put a full and complete stop to my every single dream, all in one fell swoop.
But the universe wasn’t done laughing at my hopes and dreams.
Not only did I have POTS—Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome—I also had neurocardiogenic syncope.
One gave me light-headedness, difficulty thinking and concentrating—also known as brain fog—fatigue, intolerance to exercise, a fuck load of headaches, occasionally blurry vision, and an always there, mild case of nausea.
The other caused me to faint all the damn time because my body overreacted to things. Such as intense emotion—Aodhan being in my coffee shop would definitely be a trigger—the sight of blood, extreme heat, dehydration, or standing for a long period of time.
Separately, they were absolutely horrible. Together, they were a goddamn nightmare.
I couldn’t tell you how many times I’d woken up with someone else touching me.
At least, this time, I was being touched by someone that I knew.
Or at least, had known.
Sometimes, the memories of Aodhan would sneak up and suffocate me, like right now.
Just the idea of him so close…it brought tears to my eyes.
And this time, the crying when I woke up wasn’t just the stupid shit I had to deal with on a daily basis. I couldn’t tell you how many times I’d woken up from passing out, crying my eyes out, because this stupid disease was a freakin’ horror show.
But this time, it was because I smelled Aodhan.
The woodsy, pine-and-cedar scent was enough to make my heart physically ache.
I hadn’t smelled him in so long…
“Come on, gorgeous, wake up.”
His deep, dark, sensual voice woke up even memories.
Are you awake, baby?
How many times had he uttered those words?
When we were younger, I used to sneak into his house, and he used to sneak into mine. One or the other would have to wake up before school the next day and go home, so we weren’t caught.
God, those were the days.
“She’s okay,” I heard Theresa say. “She has a disease and everything. This is totally normal for her. You can go.”
Please don’t.
But also, please leave so I don’t have to make eye contact with you, and make this any harder than it has to be.
A long time ago, I’d found out that my brain came back online faster than the rest of my body did.
So I’d hear the conversations going on around me. Meanwhile, I was useless to do anything about said conversations.