Total pages in book: 225
Estimated words: 218500 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1093(@200wpm)___ 874(@250wpm)___ 728(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 218500 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1093(@200wpm)___ 874(@250wpm)___ 728(@300wpm)
We decided I’d get Chloe to the bathroom, but Craig would finesse the bathroom nearest to the entrance as being temporarily out of order, blocked off by janitorial services. I’d move her deeper into the building to get closer to the side door and out into my car which is directly beside the entrance. Craig would distract and then detain Derek and have one of his uniformed buddies escort my car out of the area until the uniformed cop was sure there was no tail. If there was, we’d go to the cop shop. If there wasn’t, I’d take Chloe out of town to my brother’s hunting cabin a few hours north.
I’ve already told my brother not to tell a soul where I am. I packed a bag with enough clothes for me and Chloe both. I also have half a case of wine, and two coolers filled with groceries in my trunk with this week booked off work.
I just need the sign from Chloe that she still wants me to help her get out of here. I’ll know when I see her. If she doesn’t, I figured I’d come up with something to get Craig to back off, though if it comes to that, it won’t be easy since he knows the main facts now and to say he’s pissed is an understatement.
I can’t help but feel a touch envious of my best friend. Because while I’ve got no desire to settle down and promise to grow old with somebody, if I were in that headspace, Derek Steele is the stuff fantasies are made of. The total package.
Yes, he’s shown that his cheese has slid off his cracker, that he’s got toys in the attic, but I’ve dealt with all sorts of personality types in my dating life, including mentally unstable ones. To have a rich, movie-star-looking guy devoted to making my every dream come true? I might be able to tolerate a bit of crazy. Life could be worse. And if it all went to shit, I’m sure there’d be a decent financial outcome at least. I wonder what that pre-nup looks like.
I get why Chloe’s acting so shell-shocked. When I saw her at his apartment on Saturday morning, she was shook. Dazed. And no wonder.
Being pursued to that degree by a determined alpha male who has gone to extremes like this? Stalking. Threats. Cameras in her house and bugging her phone? Her reference to the bodyguard and being held at gunpoint is, of course, beyond the garden variety stalker stuff. But he sure said all the right things on Saturday.
And she feels bad about Adam, but the fact of the matter is, although I like Adam, I never thought he was perfect for Chloe and I hoped, for her sake, when that whole conversation about the hall pass happened that she’d use it and it’d inject some excitement, some color into her life again to where she’d see that she could be missing out by staying with him. Sure, he’s good looking. He’s a nice guy. But he’s a little boring. And Chloe is not a boring person. Or, she wasn’t before she met him. And she complained about the sex long before his spinal cord injury and to me, sex is a pretty pivotal part of a relationship. I don’t want a monogamous relationship, but I certainly wouldn’t sign up for one if the sex was bad.
Adam and everything that happened to him has turned my bubbly, happy, colorful bestie… beige. Beige and sad and stifled. He can be kind of judgy. And while it started long before the accident and I made no bones about it with her, telling her she shouldn’t let him dim her fire, I haven’t said much in the last six months because of course his accident snuffed it out entirely and I know there’s no way she’d walk away from a guy now confined to a wheelchair without it being extreme circumstances.
Derek is the extreme circumstance.
Derek’s brand of crazy? Of course that sounds like a situation she should get out of. But a little part of me wants to grab her, shake her, and tell her if she doesn’t go for it, I’ll happily switch places with her and let him fill my life with color for a while. I’d probably sleep with a gun under my pillow in case he snapped, but I’d enjoy the fun while it lasted and collect a healthy divorce settlement when it fizzled out.
When I told Craig just the very basics, that Adam had given her a hall pass and that Derek Steele overheard the details and decided to woo Chloe and is now forcing marriage by holding things over her head, over Adam’s head, Craig was livid.
He says this family acts like they’re above the law, that they’ve got enough money and connections to get away with shit that nobody should, and that he’d like nothing more than to bring them down a peg or three. Craig got so hotheaded about it, in fact, that it made me want to jump his bones and let him take all that aggression out on my body in sexual ways. But I knew that suggestion would piss him off, so I waited a few hours and then once he had calmed down, I let him jump my bones instead.