Total pages in book: 158
Estimated words: 156392 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 782(@200wpm)___ 626(@250wpm)___ 521(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 156392 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 782(@200wpm)___ 626(@250wpm)___ 521(@300wpm)
Ava has always been an open book, including her attention-seeking behavior and over-the-top hatred during the past couple of years. I recognized what she wanted to accomplish with those and I often smashed any opportunity where she could’ve moved on to smithereens.
Again, and again, and fucking again.
Until she fell to her knees and could only see me as her savior.
Not anyone else. Me.
And yet, right now, she feels foreign. Not that ghost version of herself, but something different whose fine print I can’t read.
“Why can’t I drive?” she asks in a low, barely audible voice.”
“It’s not that you can’t.”
“It’s that I shouldn’t,” she finishes. “I figured that out from your uncharacteristic anger. You were worried about me because you anticipated the panic attack. Will I get one every time I drive?”
“Most likely.”
“Is that why you didn’t let me drive that time when I, uh, damaged your car?”
“Correct.”
“It’s a trigger?”
“Yes.”
“It wasn’t a trigger before I lost my memory.”
“It is now.”
“Why?”
“It’s not important.”
“According to you?”
I nod.
“Okay, but do you want to know what I think?”
“Go ahead,” I say, even though I don’t appreciate where this conversation is heading, let alone her apathetic tone and expressionless face.
“I think you don’t want me to know about an accident that I believe could have traumatic effects that could interfere with my state.”
I drum my fingers on my thigh, exhibiting nonchalance that’s the exact opposite of the roar of alarm igniting in my brain. My voice is calmer, more controlled than hers. “Have you remembered something?”
“Only a few images of me slumped by a car and staring at blood. You were there.” Her cloak of neutrality slips as she gapes at me with a trembling chin. “Is it true?”
“Does my judgment on what’s true and false in your memories count?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because you saw me at my worst and stayed.”
“What makes you think that?”
“I’m not an idiot, Eli, and I also have enough self-awareness to know you must’ve seen the version of me that’s riddled with so many issues, it shouldn’t be allowed outside, and yet you neither threw me back at my parents nor locked me up in a psychiatric facility. You never treated me as abnormal, and I’m grateful. No, I’m beyond grateful. I owe you and, therefore, I trust you in this regard.”
“Don’t do that. I can’t trust myself most of the time, so neither should you.”
A small smile tilts her lips and I want to sink my teeth into that cushion and suck her blood through it. I need her to stop smiling or else she won’t like the consequences of her actions.
“I still think you’re more trustworthy than my head,” she whispers. “Lan mentioned things about my ex-therapist and abnormal behavior, but I’ll ignore that and my unreliable memories if you tell me so.”
My jaw tightens. That motherfucker Landon seems to be back for his funeral. A wish I’ll grant him sooner rather than later.
“What else did Lan say?”
“Nonsense as usual.”
“What type of nonsense?”
A red hue covers her cheeks and I don’t like it one bit. Why the fuck is she blushing when thinking about that slimy little bastard?
She clears her throat. “Nothing important.”
“Tell me and I’ll decide whether or not it’s important.”
“It’s really nothing.” She eyes me carefully. “What about everything else I just mentioned? Is it also nothing?”
I can see the hope in her bright blue eyes and the need to believe in this dark fairy tale that I built for her.
I can see the next crack in the hourglass, and instead of letting nature take its course, I place one more bloodstained plaster on the pending dust devil.
I let my hand curl around her smaller one as I say, “It’s nothing.”
A shiver rushes through her as she releases a puff of air and flips her hand, interlinking our fingers. “Thanks.”
I stare at the contrast of her fairer skin against mine and the sparkling pink nails that she often drags anywhere she can touch me. I might leave marks all over her throat, tits, and arse, but my wife never fails to leave hers as well. Even if I tie her up, she somehow finds a way to claw at me.
My phone vibrates and I ignore it, probably because it means letting her go to check it.
When it vibrates again, however, I retrieve it with my free hand.
Dad
I expect you in the meeting for the Ansil project tomorrow.
Despite the absolute awkwardness of typing with one hand, I do so anyway.
Me
Since when are outsiders allowed in strategic meetings?
You’re not an outsider. You’re back on the roster.
Why? Pressure from Mum?
And your wife.
I stare at the screen, then at Ava, who’s watching me expectantly. Pressure from who, now?
My wife?
Since when is she able to pressure my dad?
Are you sure you don’t mean YOUR wife? Last I checked she’s the only one able to pressure you into anything.