Total pages in book: 169
Estimated words: 162138 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 811(@200wpm)___ 649(@250wpm)___ 540(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 162138 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 811(@200wpm)___ 649(@250wpm)___ 540(@300wpm)
“Hey,” she says. It’s loud where she is.
“Lachlan is here.”
She’s silent, but I still hear the noise around her, so I know she hasn’t hung up.
“Mar?”
“You’re fucking shitting me,” she whisper-shouts. “How?”
“I don’t know, but. . .there’s too much for me to say. I’m meeting Wade for breakfast at nine. Can you come?”
“Of course. Do you want me to go over right now?” she asks. “I’m coming over now.”
“No, he’s here. He went outside for something but he’s coming right back.”
“I don’t give a shit. You don’t sound well.”
“I’m going to bed. I can’t do this.” My voice breaks on that word.
“You can, honey. Fuck, I can be there in twenty minutes.”
“I’ll be asleep by then,” I say quietly, because that’s exactly what I’m going to do right now. “Breakfast.”
She exhales. “Are you sure I can’t go over?”
“Just meet me there at nine-thirty.”
“I’ll be there.”
I rush out of the bathroom, set it to charge on the nightstand beside me, turn off the light, and close my eyes. My body is exhausted, inside and out. For a moment, I think I won’t be able to fall asleep, but I doze off before he comes back.
CHAPTER 31
LACHLAN
I haven’t even been around her for a full day, and this is already fucking me up more than I care to admit. She was sleeping when I walked back into the room, and I barely slept, trying to make sure I didn’t move to her side of the bed and throw an arm around her. It’s not like I want to do that, but I think my body would betray me and do it without my consent. She’s the last woman I slept with — truly just slept with. The only woman. That realization is jarring. For years, I’ve played out the scenes in my head of how things would go when I saw her again. None of them involved me sitting in a chair in the corner of her bedroom, watching her sleep. For an hour. Like a creep. At least the chair is comfortable. I bet she always sleeps in it, curling up in a ball like she likes to do. I pick up the throw that rests over the chair, inhale her scent on it, and drop it when I realize what I’m fucking doing.
A faint glow comes through her curtains, and I can see her well enough in the dim room. She’s so fucking beautiful. Is it possible that she’s more beautiful now than she was then? I swear she is. She makes me want to strangle her. She makes me want to fuck the shit out of her. She makes me want to strangle her while I fuck the shit out of her and make her come screaming my name. It’s incomprehensible that after everything she’s put me through, she could still hold this much power over me.
When she stirs, I pick up my phone to check my emails. It’s what I should have been doing for the last hour. When her phone starts buzzing on the nightstand a moment later, I think better of it and hit the side button on my phone. She has no idea I’m here. I’ll watch her a little longer to see what she does next. I’ve already wasted a chunk of my life doing this. I can watch her for ten more minutes. At first, I think it’s an alarm she set, but she reaches over and swipes the screen without even looking at it. That minor action fucks with me. It means she’d answer anyone who has that number.
“Yeah.” Her voice is raspy, the way it is when she first wakes up.
My dick instantly gets hard. Harder. Fuck. I swear she conditioned my body to react this way. Her raspy voice in the morning? Instant hard-on. Her bitchy attitude? Instant hard-on. The way she smiles at me? Instant hard-on. The conviction in her words when she speaks about her soccer abilities? Instant hard-on. The fire in her eyes when she’s turned on? That’s an obvious one. She’s turned me into a fucking lab rat in a B.F. Skinner study, for fuck’s sake. I really need to get my shit together.
“Yeah, I know. I told you I’d be there.” She throws an arm over her face. “Yes. I’ll be there too, I’m not irresponsible.” She’s quiet for a moment. “Of course, we can walk there together. No, he won’t. He wouldn’t do that. It’ll be fine.” She sits up quickly, her sheets rustling. “Did you call me to remind me about breakfast or to question me like I’m a fucking suspect in a crime?”
I bite my tongue at her snappy tone. Fuck. She doesn’t even say goodbye; she just hangs up. I almost smile, but then I remember that he has her number and I don’t. Well, I do, but she hasn’t given it to me. She tosses her phone on the bed carelessly and gasps when she remembers that I may be lying there. She presses a hand to the area I’m supposed to be in. I can’t tell if she’s disappointed or relieved that I’m not there, and that, of course, pisses me off.