Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 134212 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 671(@200wpm)___ 537(@250wpm)___ 447(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 134212 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 671(@200wpm)___ 537(@250wpm)___ 447(@300wpm)
“Not so fast.” I struggle to keep up with him as I fight away the guilt and tell myself that tonight I will forget about everything. I need to forget about everything, if only to save my sanity. I have to press the reset button. I know Luke can help me do that. “Thank you,” I say out of the blue, but I know he knows what I mean when he looks at me out the corner of his eye, hiding his smile.
“No sweat. You’ve done me a favor.” He opens the door and helps me in.
“How?”
“Well, clearly this look is amazing on me. I had women falling at my feet left and right.”
“More than usual?”
“More than usual,” he confirms, shutting the door and rounding the car.
I turn in my seat towards him. “And you weren’t tempted by any of them?”
Starting the car, he pulls off down the road. “Too old.”
“Oh, boy.” I laugh, returning forward. “You’re no spring chicken.”
“Charming. You’re such a great friend.”
Friends. Such a simple but needed position. “Thank you for being my friend.” He’ll never know how much I need him.
“We shared a near-death experience. Two actually. And in the space of two minutes. If that’s not a sign that we should be friends, I don’t know what is.” He reaches across the car and squeezes my hand. “And thank you for being mine. Besides, I can tell I’m the only thing making you smile in your life right now. Who am I to take that away from you?”
“You have no idea,” I say easily, but I know he won’t push for more.
“Like I said, I won’t ask.” Luke smiles reassuringly, and once again I’m just so thankful that he nearly killed me all those weeks ago. “Now, what do you want to do?”
“I don’t know.” I never gave it a thought. My emergency call was made in a panic. “I’m not exactly dressed for anything special.”
“Hmmm,” he muses, running eyes down my seated form as he pouts. “You’re not really, are you?”
“You can be quiet.” I sniff, tugging on the sleeve of his leather jacket. “I look a whole lot better than you.”
“True.” He indicates and takes a corner.
“Where are we going?”
“To my place.”
“Your place?” Luke’s place. I’m suddenly riddled with thoughts of what Luke’s place is like. I can guess. A total bachelor’s pad, I bet.
He shrugs off my question, like what’s the problem? What is the problem, I guess? I shrug too and settle, looking around his car. It’s still sparkling. “Have you had this cleaned?” I ask, not noticing one of Boris’s hairs in sight.
Luke shifts in his seat, looking at me out the corner of his eye. “I looked like a yeti every time I got out of my car,” he mumbles, looking down at his lap and having a quick brush of his thighs as I smile like crazy. “Tell me how your little friend isn’t bald, because I’m pretty sure he left his coat in my car.”
I grin. “I’m sorry.”
“You look it.” He reaches over and nudges me in my upper arm, spiking a chuckle from me, as I admire his devilish smile. He has the loveliest smile. Pure and happy.
For a few moments, there’s silence, and I quickly conclude that to be a bad thing, as it gives my mind space to fill with guilt. Meeting for lunch in my spare hour is one thing. A Saturday evening out? When Billy is in such a horrid state? When Linda is there to judge and curse me. “You have to keep talking so . . .” I bite down on my lip. “So . . .” What can I say? So I don’t fall into despondency and question my integrity?
“Ever been to a fancy dress party?” he asks quickly.
I deflate in my seat. “Yes, lots. You? Before tonight, I mean.”
“Nope. And I don’t plan on going to another. What did you dress up as?”
My lips straighten and I look out of the window, trying not to see Billy and me together, raring to go and knocking them all dead with our amazing homemade costumes. I spent weeks on those things. We looked ace. “Wilma Flintstone.”
“No way.”
“Yes way.” I breathe in and look across the car to Luke.
“You made that costume too, didn’t you?”
“Of course.”
Because Luke just knows.
I silently take it all in while we wait at the electric gates as they slowly glide open. Wow. I’m saying it over and over in my head, awestruck by the pile of bricks coming into view. Luke either doesn’t notice my shock, or he chooses to ignore it. “You live here alone?” I ask, mentally calculating how many bedrooms there must me. Seven, at least. And the triple garage to the side seems to have a self-contained apartment above it.
“All alone,” he muses, driving up the brick-laid road to the front of the house. “Except for Arabella when she’s in town.”