Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 91937 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 460(@200wpm)___ 368(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91937 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 460(@200wpm)___ 368(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
He gives her a smirk before kissing her lips again. “You taste like cake,” he observes, looking at her desk and grabbing her fork. She protests by gasping out when he sticks it in her cake and takes a bite. “That’s good,” he mumbles with a mouthful.
“You’re lucky you’re hot,” she grumbles to him between clenched teeth and grabs the fork from him, “and I love you a little bit more than I do this cake and that I’m carrying your child.”
He laughs at her as he sits at the edge of her desk. “I thought we were having lunch?” he asks her.
“That was a lie,” she confesses to him, and he folds his arms over his chest. The grin on his face goes to a huge smile. “Not that.” She shakes her head.
“Oh.” His smile dashes. “So are we going to eat?”
“Do you know my brother has a new neighbor?” she asks, then looks over at me as I sit in the chair Harmony sat in not too long ago.
“Oh, you told her?” he says, and I close my eyes.
“Hold on a second.” She holds up her hand to her husband. “He told me?” Autumn questions him. “Wow, you knew?”
“I mean…” Charlie says and looks over his shoulder at me. The look of love he was giving my sister is now gone from his face, and in its place is a glare.
“I told him yesterday,” I tell my sister. “I told him to let me tell you.”
“Interesting.” She leans back in her chair, putting her hands on her stomach. Charlie leans over and places his own hand on her baby bump. She glares at him but lets him leave his hand on her stomach. “So what else did you guys share with each other?”
“I’m not answering anything,” Charlie declares. “I’m just going to be here listening.”
“Well then, I’ll talk.” Autumn moves her hand to put over his. “I called Harmony to come into the office today because I forgot to have her fill out a paper.” She looks at Charlie and not at me. “She came in with her face blotchy from crying and—”
Charlie interrupts her. “She was crying?” He looks over his shoulder at me as if I’m the one who made her cry.
“Fuck you.” My voice fills with anger. “Why the fuck would you think I would make her cry?”
“Just a question.” He turns back to Autumn.
“The Cartwrights are trying to take her boy away from her.” Autumn skips over a couple of parts and gets to the point of the story. “And if that is not bad enough, no lawyer will take her case.” I can see Charlie’s jaw get tight. “Well, no lawyer that she knows, and she called every single one of them. But the last name can either open all the doors or get the door slammed in your face. In her case, it was slammed in her face.”
“That’s why she got served.” Charlie looks over at me. “Classic fucking Cartwrights.”
“Well now.” Autumn doesn’t even wait for me to answer Charlie before she talks. “Brady over here”—she points at me—“offered her up his lawyer.”
“What?” Charlie gasps.
“Yup.” She nods. “And forget the fact that he has no fucking lawyer.”
“I have a lawyer,” I tell her. “I just don’t know if he’s still practicing.”
“Jesus, Brady,” Charlie swears, “this isn’t something to fuck around with.”
“You think I’m fucking around with this?” I stand. “You would think fucking wrong. They want to go after her son. Not because he wants to be a good father but because he hates to fucking lose.” Charlie just stares at me. “Those fucking assholes raised two fucking spoiled-rotten brats who grew up to think they are above the fucking law.” My voice goes higher. “I was with this kid for maybe ten minutes, and I could see he is nothing like them. I also know his father hasn’t seen him in over two months and could fucking care less. So right now, my guess is that Mommy and Daddy Cartwright are frowning at him and letting him know people in town are talking, because they are. You hear it.” I point at him. “I hear it. Fuck, you know they will stop at nothing to make sure they get their claws into him, and I’m not going to let that fucking happen.” I run my hand through my hair. “Over my dead fucking body.” The last part comes out in a hiss.
Charlie glances back at Autumn, and the two of them share a look. “So that’s why you called me over here?”
“Ugh, no.” Autumn rolls her eyes. “Can’t I miss my husband?”
“Um, no,” Charlie says, taking his hand off her stomach and reaching for his phone. I watch him touch a couple of things and then put the phone to his ear. “Hey,” he starts, “need a favor.”