Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 76203 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 381(@200wpm)___ 305(@250wpm)___ 254(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76203 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 381(@200wpm)___ 305(@250wpm)___ 254(@300wpm)
“That would be great,” I said, even if I felt a little guilty for not telling her myself. But my mom was there. I wasn’t. I couldn’t gauge how she was handling the information over the phone.
“We’re going to come see you this coming weekend,” she said. “Any idea if the motel has any openings?”
“You can stay at my apartment,” I told her. “I haven’t been there since I was released. It would be much more comfortable than the motel.”
“Oh, so you’re living with him?”
“I… yes,” I agreed. “I mean, we haven’t really talked about that yet, though,” I admitted.
“Talked about what?” Detroit asked as he came in with a new coffee for me.
I felt my cheeks heating.
“If we are living together or not,” I admitted since my mom was listening, and I couldn’t try to evade the question.
“Well, we gotta move the rest of your stuff out of the guest room,” he said. “But I didn’t wait this long for you to have you leave every night.”
“Oh, honey, what a voice,” my mom gushed in my ear.
“I know, right?” I asked.
“Okay. Well, I won’t keep you. But I want to hear from you when you get your check-up with Dr. Price.”
“You’ll be my first call,” I assured her.
“I know this sounds strange with so much going on, and not all of it good, but I’m so happy for you, honey,” she said. “Love you.”
“Love you too,” I said, and hung up feeling like the weight of the world had been lifted off of my shoulders.
“It go okay?” Detroit asked.
“Yeah. She was a little upset that I didn’t fill her in sooner, but she’s not mad or anything. Oh, and she likes your voice,” I told him, watching what I could only call a bashful smile play across his face. “And she wants to meet you.”
“I’m looking forward to meeting her too,” he said, reaching to pluck the puppy from my lap as she woke up. “Figure anyone who created you has got to be pretty fucking amazing. We gotta take her out,” he said, pressing a kiss to my forehead as he stood to do just that.
I followed behind, watching him as this giant wall of a man walked my tiny little puppy on a leash around the yard, asking her over and over to ‘go pee.’
And I had to agree with my mom.
A lot had gone on.
Some of it was really not good.
But I was still so incredibly, blissfully, indescribably happy despite all of that not-great stuff. Because so much good had happened to offset it.
And, it seemed, there would only be more off that good to come.
I couldn’t freaking wait.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Detroit - 5 days
I wasn’t sure I’d gotten a full night of sleep until we went back to Dr. Price for a check-up, and Everleigh was given the all-clear from him. I would constantly find myself dozing off, then startling awake to check on her.
Watching someone you love overdose was even more fucking traumatic than I could have realized. And I’d been lucky enough to know we had reversal meds and a doctor close by to help her.
But Dr. Price assured us that there was nothing of the drugs in her system, that her head was healing great, and that, unfortunately, she was just going to have to keep nursing her shoulder for a while, that dislocations could take months to fully heal, and it would only take longer if she didn’t make sure she took it easy.
Luckily for her, there was nothing she needed to be doing around the clubhouse, manual-labor-wise like she would have needed to do at work or her own place.
Colter, Coach, and Rook when he was around did the lion’s share of the work around the place. I did the cooking. So all she had to do was occasionally pick up her three-pound dog.
“Oh, hey!” she said as we pulled the SUV into the gas station to fuel up.
“What is it?” I asked, but she was already throwing open her door, and rushing out.
“Della!” I heard her call before the door slammed.
Turning, I watched her rush up to a red-headed woman wearing yoga pants and a baggy sweatshirt.
It took a moment for my mind to catch up and place the name with the story.
Della.
The sex worker who had helped Everleigh navigate County. It had been on my list to track her down. But it seemed our small town did all the work for me.
I climbed out of the SUV, pumping the gas while she talked animatedly with Della, whose eyes kept widening, making me think that Everleigh was telling her the wild details of her story since they’d seen each other last.
The whole interaction ended with the exchange of cell numbers and a hug before Everleigh was rushing back to me.
“Had fun catching up?” I asked.