Total pages in book: 101
Estimated words: 93453 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 467(@200wpm)___ 374(@250wpm)___ 312(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93453 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 467(@200wpm)___ 374(@250wpm)___ 312(@300wpm)
“I didn’t lie to anyone. Did you ask me?” Quinn defends himself from the table in the other room. “No, you didn’t.”
She winks at me. “So now I have to ask you things, and you not tell me?” She puts her hands on her hips and walks into the room. “What else are you keeping from me?”
He groans, and I hear the chair creak across the floor before I see him bend. The next thing you know, she’s over his shoulder. “What are you doing?”
“You are begging to fight with me.” He smacks her ass. “I’m going to give you something to fight with me about.” He walks out the door and slams it after him. I look over at the dining room when I hear the sound of the other chair scraping the floor.
Charlie now comes to my side as he bends down and picks me up over his shoulder, and I laugh. He slaps my ass. “You owe me make-up sex.” He walks over to one side of the house. “Plus interest.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Charlie
I’m sliding on my suit jacket when I hear a knock on the door. I walk out and head toward it; I can see figures through the glass window. I’m almost there when there is another knock on the door. “I’m coming,” I say, pulling it open and staring at my sister, Grace, in shock. “What the hell are you doing here?” Her husband, Caine, stands behind her, wearing a suit very much like mine. My parents pull up behind them, and then a couple of my aunts follow. Everyone is dressed to the nines. The last time I saw them was when we went home to escape the man lurking around. It took my grandfather two days to find out who he was and to deliver him a message that he was messing with the wrong people. Which isn’t surprising since my grandfather runs the biggest security firm in the country. It took him less than an hour to cut ties with the Cartwrights, and we found this out through an email he sent to them quitting. Since then, we haven’t seen him around town, and from what my grandfather told me this morning, he’s in New York.
“Is that any way to talk to your favorite sister?” She steps in, kissing my cheek.
“You’re my only sister,” I remind her, turning and seeing Caine hold out his hand to me and shake it.
“I told them it wasn’t a good idea, but I’m usually never listened to.” Caine walks in with Grace toward the living room.
“Usually?” I watch him grab her hand.
“Ever,” Caine corrects himself. “It’s like I talk for nothing since no one listens to me.”
“Oh, don’t you look nice,” my mother says, coming to me and getting on her tippy-toes to kiss my cheek, then flattening down the front of my jacket.
“What is everyone doing here?” I ask, shaking hands and kissing cheeks.
“It’s your girl’s big debut. You didn’t think we’d miss it,” my father explains.
“Does she know you’re coming?” I ask the question, though I know full well she has no idea, or else she’d be double stressed. Considering for the past four days she’s slept maybe two hours each night, waking up, gasping for air with nightmares that she forgot to do something, which wasn’t the case.
“She has no clue,” Caine replies. “I also said it was not a good idea to ambush her at her job.” He looks over at Grace.
“I’m not ambushing anyone. I got an email and bought tickets to the event”—Grace avoids looking at him and instead looks at her nails—“in your name.”
“You’re welcome.” He nods at me.
“Okay, this is fun, but I don’t want to be late.” I look at the room as they all get up and head toward the door.
“How are we going to plan this?” Grace asks, stepping out of the door.
“You planned all of this,” Caine reminds her, his hand doing a circle of everyone in my driveway, “but you didn’t plan how to execute this?” He shakes his head and laughs.
“I don’t think I invited you,” she hisses.
“You didn’t have to invite me.” Caine smiles at her. “Because I bought a ticket.”
“Okay, you two. I get the whole he said, she said. Let’s get mad at each other, but you aren’t really mad at each other. But Autumn has killed herself for the past month putting this together, and we will not ruin it.” I look at everyone. “We are on our best behavior.”
“Wow,” Grace interjects, “you really do love her.” She smiles. “I’ll be on my best behavior.”
I get into my parents’ car, and I’m out of it before he puts the car in park. The parking lot is filled, every single parking spot has been taken, so people are now parking along the street. We walk to the doors of the bar, met by two pillars of balloons at the front with a big chalkboard that says private event.