Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 84829 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 424(@200wpm)___ 339(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84829 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 424(@200wpm)___ 339(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
The confused, questioning look Drake returned was downright adorable. I, however, was too damn cold and hungover to delve into what it meant. Drake retrieved his phone out of the back pocket of his jeans and typed.
At his house
Blink. Blink. Blink. He might as well have dropped a bull on my head. I tried to measure my breathing, doing my best to control my reaction as I always did. Damn proud of myself too ’cause I was near to blowing like a Yellowstone geyser. Nevertheless, I couldn’t stop the heat that marched up my neck and covered my face.
My mind flipped through snapshots of Scott from all those years ago. My instincts had been right. This cabin wasn’t his style. He’d been gaslighting me all along. I was going to be sick––or homicidal. Not sure which yet. Probably both.
“Riiight,” I said, all breathy. It was hard to make the word come out when my thoughts were on a loop. That loop being unfit for public consumption.
“How do I get there again?” I asked.
He typed.
Follow the dirt road over the hill, make a right at the aspens, and keep going up. You can’t miss it.
I forced myself to smile at him. “Thank you.”
Drake tipped his chin and walked around the side of the cabin. The second he was out of sight, my smile dropped and I jumped into action. The blankets wrapped around my shoulders flew off, and I slammed on my purple Hunter boots. Then I marched straight for the shed with Romeo and Juliet trailing after me. I’d seen a mountain bike in there yesterday.
Straddling the bike, I glanced at my loyal fur friends. “Let’s go fuck some shit up.”
Twenty minutes later…
His home was magnificent. Around ten thousand square feet was my rough estimate. Natural stone, glass, and high-polished wood. It looked like a living thing growing out of the stunning scenery. And yet I couldn’t quite appreciate it. Not yet, anyway. Much, much, much later I would. At the moment, however, my lungs felt blowtorched, my hams and quads were on fire, and I still had a man to make pie out of.
Huffing and puffing, I pedaled up to the front door which was covered by an enormous overhang of wood and stone and dropped the bike in the driveway. In serious pain, I stumbled, my lungs burning worse than my quads. Grabbing a medium-sized stone, I weighed it in my palm and deemed it big enough to do some serious damage. Then I hurled it with all my might at one of his gigantic floor-to-ceiling windows, screaming in hollow satisfaction. It hit dead center, made a plunk sound, and dropped back to earth without even leaving a scratch. Which, of course, made me want to scream again.
Adrenaline and a hunger for justice willed my legs to move. Crawling up the stairs to the front door, I pressed my thumb on the doorbell and didn’t let up until a woman’s voice could be heard on the other side.
“I’m comin’, darn it!”
If that was a clown, I was going to murder his ass for sure.
The front door flew open to reveal not a slinky wannabe model, but a very tall woman, nonetheless. This one, however, was on the Rubenesque end of the spectrum. She was middle-aged with short red hair, wide shoulders, and eyes an interesting shade of periwinkle blue. The dogs loped past me into the house like they’d done it a million times and my blood pressure shot to the moon and back.
Periwinkle blue took in my bedraggled appearance––the bedhead, the flush of overexertion, the wild–eyed expression––and her glossy pink lips quirked.
“Who are you?” I snapped because––manners? Yeah, I’d left those back at the cabin.
“Who the fuck are you, sweetie?” the tall woman returned. Although she smiled amusedly and used a decidedly sweeter tone than I had. Then again, she hadn’t been subjected to cold showers and mood swings of a manchild.
“I’m Scott’s wife.” I tried to look around the woman to no avail. Tall Red kept moving in my way. “Where is the two-timing son of a bitch?”
“Ahhh, yes, the new wife.” Red thrust a perfectly manicured hand out. “Nice to meet you. I’m Jan, Scott’s house manager.”
Whatever points Scott earned by hiring a trans woman paled in comparison with all the points I deducted for all the crap he’d put me through.
After a brisk handshake, I stepped closer. “Nice to meet you. I need to see him now.” When Jan didn’t budge from the doorway, I went for broke. “Jan, is it? I’ve been living in a cabin for three weeks with no hot water or heat because Scott lied to me. He led me to believe that the cabin was his home, not”––I gestured to the mansion we were currently standing in––“this.”
Jan blinked her bright blue eyes. “He’s in the master suite. Down the hall and to the right. Boots off. Don’t get any blood on the carpets please. They’re Tibetan.” Jan stepped aside.