Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 82940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
“You’re right there,” Jay agreed. “He’s less than nothing.”
“Besides, I managed to fight him off myself.”
“You sure did.” He looked proud for a moment.
Erin sighed, but it was a happy sigh. She had felt much better after she’d finally shared her story with Mila, but now that Jay knew too, she felt a thousand times lighter. “I honestly had no idea how much keeping this inside hurt me. How much it held back my heart.”
And then he kissed her, a soft, sweet, understanding kiss. They wrapped their arms around each other and just held on. They didn’t talk about it anymore. They didn’t have to. What had begun with Mila, in a kind of letting go of the awful shame and self-loathing Erin had felt all these years, was feeling even more significant now that she’d shared her story again, with Jay.
They stood and walked on, and then Jay said, “I can’t believe the guy’s still alive anyway. How did Howie and your brothers not take him apart?”
“Because they never knew. I never told anyone, until I told Mila a few days ago.”
Once more he stopped and turned her to face him. “Are you saying I’m only the second person you’ve ever told?”
She nodded mutely. He pulled her in again for a hug and whispered in her ear, “I am so honored.”
If she’d had any doubts about her feelings for Jay, they all melted away in that moment.
She loved him. Wholly and completely, unlike anything she’d ever experienced before. But after the day’s confession, she wasn’t ready yet to tell him so. Things between them were already moving too fast. Besides, there was the not insignificant issue of her brothers, especially Arch, all of whom would have something to say about their choice of each other.
For now, she just wanted to enjoy their newfound intimacy. Now there was nothing she couldn’t say to him. Nothing he wouldn’t understand. Nothing he couldn’t say to her and know that she would also understand. It was bliss. Pure and simple.
By the end of their walk, they were both famished, so he took her to Cannery Row for lobster rolls. She loved his suggestion, which was about as far as they could get from an uptight, exclusive restaurant.
As they took a seat, he told her that he’d been doing a little more research on romantic comedies, even talked to a couple of screenwriters he knew. And here she’d thought the script he’d begun was more of a joke or a kind of a romantic gesture than something he was actually taking seriously. But she should have known that once Jay got an idea in his head, he didn’t let it go until he’d brought the thing home. It was, she realized now, one of the qualities she most loved about him.
She smiled to herself at the thought, and then took a fry from the basket that had arrived along with their lobster rolls. They shared a pool of ketchup, both dipping their French fries into it, and when he chomped into his lobster roll, he got a little mayonnaise on his cheek. She leaned forward and wiped it away with her thumb. This meal probably cost about a hundredth of what the fancy one had, and she enjoyed it so much more.
In fact, everything felt so right and so easy it scared her a little. She just hoped that Jay’s feelings for her were as strong as hers for him.
After dinner, they agreed that they didn’t want the day to end, so they drove back to Jay’s place and the pair of them settled in the library. She couldn’t decide which was her favorite room in the house. Was it the upstairs bedroom, with its amazing view and the Barbara Hepworth sculpture? Or in fact this room, with its beautiful bookshelves crowded with so many amazing books, and the stylish but comfy furniture that simply insisted a person curl up, flip the gas fireplace on, and read. She was looking along the shelves for something new, picking up books, some of which she’d either read or always meant to, and putting them back. And then she spied a shelf of board games.
She turned to him. “I love Scrabble.”
He took off his reading glasses and grinned at her. He’d been reading the Sea Shell. Adorably. “Ever played strip Scrabble?”
She put her hands on her hips and stared at him. “Strip Scrabble? Is that even a thing?”
He said, “I don’t know. Should we find out?”
It turned out they were both pretty good at Scrabble. He came up with exudate, which gave him the X and a whole bunch of points. But she countered with nexus, using both the X and a U. They figured the best way to play strip Scrabble was to take off a piece of clothing every time they tried to play a word that didn’t exist in the Scrabble rulebook.