Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 91064 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91064 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
“Keeping this?”
“Now that you’ve touched it,” he replies. “How could I ever bear to part with it?”
I toss him a look over my shoulder and catch him staring at my ass. Which is a relief.
I was beginning to wonder.
He keeps pulling away just when things are gaining momentum, and it’s a problem I’m not familiar with.
“Enjoying the view?”
“Always,” he smirks. “I’d enjoy it even better in my shower in about two minutes from now.”
“Sorry.” I yawn. “Took one this morning while I was waiting on you. Which won’t be happening again, by the way.”
Rory’s still stuck on the idea of me in the shower with him, and he’s breaking out the big guns now. Whipping off his tee shirt and snapping the waistband of his pants.
He forgets who I am.
Amateur.
“Last chance.”
He winks and I grin.
“Pass. I need to go home and get some clothes, anyway.”
“I’ll give ye a lift,” he says. “Just need ten minutes or so.”
“Sure.”
I give him a mock salute and plant my ass on the sofa again, tapping my fingers over my thigh.
“Scarlett.”
Rory’s voice is serious. And he isn’t ever serious. So I turn around, and I don’t like what I find in his eyes.
“Don’t go disappearing on me again.”
My smile is weak, and my reassurance is too.
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
Eleven
Rory
Scarlett is quiet on the drive over to her apartment.
And nervous too.
I don’t ask her about it because that will only give her a reason to back out on our date tonight. Which was her idea.
I had no bloody notion of going all the way to New York to play some cards, but if it buys me some time with her, I’ll take it.
She doesn’t allow me to open the car door for her and leaves me to trudge after her up the stairs. An orange cat greets her at the top and she hesitates like she wants to pet him before she glances over her shoulder and decides against it.
Scarlett could never know it, but I see so much of myself in her.
And I see the way I could have become, had Niall not taken me under his wing and helped me sort out my shite.
It’s quite obvious nobody has ever done the same for Scarlett. She doesn’t accept favors, or sympathy, or even a kind word. She hates the world and everyone in it. And inside, beneath that false sweetness and lies, she is filled with rage.
She doesn’t want anybody to know it. To see that vulnerability in her. I’m well acquainted with that feeling myself. Which is why I used to beat the ever-loving fuck out of any bloke who thought he could mouth off to me.
I thought it made me a man, but I’d only become my own worst enemy. I’d become my father. And I couldn’t keep a lid on my rage.
But things are different now. And so am I.
People never take me too seriously because I’m always joking. Scarlett thinks she’s got me all figured out too.
That’s why when she does things like this- when she won’t stop to pet the cat who wants her attention for fear of what it will reveal about her- I don’t call her out on it. But I make a note of it. I make a note of everything she does.
And someday, we’re going to unpack this baggage she carries around.
Just not today.
Scarlett shoves her keys into the door and goes to town on the locks. All six of them. And if there are six on her door, I can only imagine how many there are on her heart.
When she’s managed to open the barricade to her apartment, she lets us inside.
My eyes settle over the chaos while Scarlett discreetly checks each room for invisible threats.
Again, I don’t call her out on it, because I’m using the opportunity to soak up her personal space.
The apartment is small, with only the basics for furniture. No photos, no decorations, just plain white walls and a whole load of books.
Books on every surface. The couch. The counter. The table. They are all bookmarked in different places, and I check a couple of them when she isn’t looking to see what it is she wanted to come back to.
There are multiple copies of the same books.
Hamlet and The Great Gatsby.
The second one she’s mentioned to me before.
I haven’t a clue about books, but Scarlett is obsessed. When she comes back into the room and catches me leafing through the pages, it’s even worse than I thought.
She snatches it from my hands, distraught at the prospect of trying to find the exact stack it came from. Her eyes are darting around the room, frantic in a way I haven’t seen before, when I point to the pile beside her on the counter. She replaces it and then notices the book still lingering in my other hand.