Total pages in book: 104
Estimated words: 97836 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 489(@200wpm)___ 391(@250wpm)___ 326(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 97836 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 489(@200wpm)___ 391(@250wpm)___ 326(@300wpm)
When I spotted the house in the distance, the house that only Way and I had ever been inside, it made me think of Eden. She’d been at Final Night but had only approached Way while I’d been stuck several yards away in a conversation with Foster about the ETC installation scheduled for the following week.
“Relax,” Foster had said in a low voice when he’d caught me staring at the two of them. “That’s old puppy love. Don’t confuse it for the real thing.”
I’d blinked at him in surprise. “It… doesn’t affect me,” I’d said, blatantly lying. “You know the truth of our… situation.” Way had confessed his best friend and cousin was the one person he’d confided in when he’d returned from Vegas.
Foster had snorted. “Right. The truth. Well, regardless. There’s no there there, so keep your shirt on. Better yet, don’t keep your shirt on. In fact, take your shirt off.” He bounced his eyebrows at me without cracking a smile.
I’d been unable to keep from laughing, which had caught Way’s attention and brought him over to ask what was so funny. Foster had looked right at him and said with a straight face, “I was asking your husband to consent to a strip search.”
It had made me laugh even harder, but it had the opposite effect on Way. He’d glared at Foster and snapped at him for being inappropriate.
And I’d wanted to kiss the angry lips right off him.
Now in the dark night with only the dim dashboard lights and the dusty road ahead illuminated by the headlights, I felt like Way and I were the only people on earth, that there weren’t any well-meaning townsfolk with questions or mild judgment, there weren’t any neighbors requesting favors, and there weren’t any family members to keep secrets from.
It was just the two of us, returning to the magical little elf house in the aspen trees.
When I parked and turned off the ignition, Way began to stir. “Fell asleep,” he mumbled. “Sorry.”
I moved around to the passenger door and hauled him out by the hand. “No need to be sorry. You’re exhausted.”
I held his hand as we moved toward the house, kicking off shoes by the door and moving toward the bathroom without saying a word. We moved through an abbreviated version of our nighttime routine before crawling into bed in our underwear. I assumed he was too sleepy for sex, so I simply pulled him toward me, turned him around, and spooned against the back of him.
“Night,” I murmured against the back of his neck, closing my eyes.
“Mm.”
He was out quickly, the rhythm of his breaths even and steady.
The window was slightly open since Way liked to sleep cool, and the night air in May was still cold as fuck. The same bug and frog noises continued, and as long as I could block out the memory of the snake from our hike a few days ago, I thought I could actually like living in a place like this.
My eyes shot open.
Not that I ever would, of course. I couldn’t actually picture it; I just meant that if I had to be here… if I ever took a consulting gig here or something… maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.
But when I closed my eyes again, I fell asleep imagining it. Life on a Wyoming ranch with a lean and sexy cowboy in my arms, friendly neighbors and family members who cared. Problems to solve and animals to tend. Adventures to explore and new activities to try.
It was different but nice. Intriguing. Tempting, if only I had a second life to live besides the one I’d already chosen.
The following day was one hundred percent less rosy.
“I told you to watch your step,” Way snickered across the paddock as I pulled my new boot out of a very fresh pile of horse shit.
He and a kid called Taza were in the process of gathering the first group of horses for inspection before preparing them for an early morning pickup tomorrow. My job was to enter the information they called out into the spreadsheet on a laptop, but I was also their gofer, which included running back and forth between the paddock and the barn to fetch things.
This was not my first misstep. My poor boots were already six missteps from being new anymore, and between the shit and the sweat, I felt about as fresh as a back-alley trash pile in the city.
“That wasn’t there five minutes ago,” I barked back. “Keep your shitting horses away from this area, for fuck’s sake.”
Taza nudged his horse’s flank with his heel as he let out a laugh. “Your area happens to be between a horse barn and a horse ring, Silas. Afraid you’re shit outta luck.”
That only made Way laugh harder, so I shot both of them the bird before walking over to a patch of thick grass to scuff off the worst of it.