Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 75240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 376(@200wpm)___ 301(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 376(@200wpm)___ 301(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
“He thinks our children were spawned from the devil sometimes,” she explained his remark. “Not that I can deny that. I feel the same way, sometimes.”
The conversation was flowing well when I happened to look to my right.
And then I saw her.
What. The. Fuck.
It was the long dark hair like my own that first caught my attention.
Then my eyes moved down until I took in her attire, and my brain nearly short circuited.
“No, she didn’t,” I muttered, standing up.
Without waiting for the permission to move, which I wasn’t sure if I did or did not need to have, I started to make my way down the stadium bleachers.
I got all the way to the bottom and started to move left, stopping in front of a bunch of high school students that were dressed in even less than my target.
“Ariel Soco!” I screeched. “What in the hell do you think you are wearing?”
My sister’s head snapped in my direction, and she stared.
I was just thinking she was going to come in my direction when she suddenly turned on her heels and fled, her short skirt riding up her ass as she did.
“Move!” I barked at the other sluttily-dressed teenagers.
The girls moved, the men, not so much.
But the barked ‘Move!’ from Jack behind me had them hastily tripping over themselves to get out of my way.
“Thanks,” I muttered.
I shouldn’t have been surprised that they were at my back.
Bowe had charged the man with my safety.
Safety that he swore was in question now that Troy had threatened me two nights before.
Shaking with anger at my sister, I ran after her.
I caught her easily.
Then again, that was the benefit of not wearing shoes you could barely walk in, let alone run.
I caught her before she could get to the stairs, and the first thing I did was grab hold of her tube top and yank it back up.
“Are you fucking insane?” I asked her. “What would our mother do if she caught you dressed like this?”
“Momma is busy watching your kid all the time,” she snapped angrily. “How would she know that she has another kid that dresses questionably?”
I gritted my teeth from the retort that threatened to pour out of my mouth, and instead looked at her like she’d disappointed me.
Which I knew from experience would break her little heart.
And it worked.
Her face softened.
“I didn’t mean that,” she admitted. “And what are you doing here?”
I looked at her, really looked at her, and saw the sadness she was trying to hide.
“What happened?” I asked.
A huff of annoyance sounded from the woman whose view of the track we were blocking, and I gestured for Ariel to continue down the steps.
“Talk,” I ordered, once we were in a relatively quiet place.
Jack and Winter had stopped about five feet away from us, both of them watching whatever was happening on the track.
I heard what sounded like motors revving up, but they weren’t your regular sound of motors. These were much fiercer and grumpier sounding than any I’d ever heard.
In all the time that Bowe’s car had been at my brother’s shop, never once had I heard it started up.
If it sounded like that, I could see why he’d never started it.
The noise would’ve been deafening and would have likely drawn noise complaints.
Alec was in the heart of the city, and many businesses surrounded him on all sides.
He probably only started it up after-hours when nobody was there to complain.
“Dad called me,” she said simply when I looked at her with raised brows.
“And?” I asked, frustrated.
“He offered to buy me a car if I agreed to come to dinner with him, his wife and his children,” she said softly.
“His children,” I said. “And what else did he say to you?”
My calm was deceptive.
I was pissed inside.
His fucking children?
We were his fucking children, not them.
And for him to ask that of Ariel, one of his biological children that only got him for a short part of her life rather than Alec’s or my ten plus years, wasn’t very fair.
My sister craved her father’s attention. Needed it like she needed air to breathe.
And he never gave it to her unless he needed something out of it or was feeling incredibly guilty.
Each being a bad thing in my book, because they always led to heartache.
“And that’s why you’re dressed like a hooker ready to head out for the night?” I asked her.
She looked down at her fingernails, which were painted a cheery blue.
“I told him no, and he told me that I was a bad daughter,” she whispered.
I gritted my teeth.
My eyes automatically went to Jack, who had a huge smile on his face while he spoke with Winter quietly.
His eyes were on me, though, and he stayed alert and aware all the while he spoke.
“Ariel, you’re not a bad daughter for protecting yourself.” I turned back to her. “You’re a good person, a hard worker. You volunteer and get good grades. And that’s all because of who you are as a person, and it has nothing to do with him. Momma raised us to be all that we could be, despite having him as our father. He doesn’t even deserve the title of ‘dad.’”