Total pages in book: 146
Estimated words: 143842 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 719(@200wpm)___ 575(@250wpm)___ 479(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 143842 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 719(@200wpm)___ 575(@250wpm)___ 479(@300wpm)
I tried to hide my breath of relief, only she paused at my side just as she was rounding the island. Reaching out, she rubbed her thumb on a sensitive spot where I realized it was raw from Cody’s scruff. “Only I think you might have a little reputation…right here.”
All the craps.
Lolly was never going to let me live this down.
“Mommy, watch me!” Maddie climbed the ladder to her slide for what had to be the hundredth time. We’d been out back all afternoon, soaking up the sun, relaxing, playing, enjoying this freedom we’d been given.
I sat on the top step of the back porch, watching my child, my chest stretching full with the hope of this life.
With the hope that we could leave the past behind. That we could flourish here. Find the true joy of safety and security.
Of love and devotion.
The chains still rattled at the back of my mind, a constant threat, but I knew this was the true risk I’d had to take.
The one that was worth it.
I couldn’t allow fear to reign. Couldn’t succumb to the pressures that had been given.
The bright blue of the day had faded into a misty hue of pinks and grays, and the sun slipped far behind the trees, the night barely creeping up on the cloudless sky. A single star blinked to life, and the air had cooled a fraction, enough that we’d left the screen doors open to the house.
I’d done my best throughout the day to ignore the lure I could feel emanating from the house next door. To ignore the way I could feel his big body moving through the space, as if each step he took within his walls sent a bolt of seismic activity into the ground and trembling into me.
Which was insane and obsessed, and I was not that girl, so I’d done my best to push all thoughts of one Cocky Cowboy out of my mind.
I inhaled a deep breath, holding in the joy that surrounded me as I watched my daughter get to the top of the slide. “I’m watching you,” I called.
“Good. Don’t even look away for one single minute or you’re gonna miss it. Count ’em down, my Lolly!” she shouted to my grandmother who was reading a book from a rocking chair on the far side of the porch.
Lolly was happy to oblige. “Three, two, one, go!”
Maddie threw her arms high as her little body flew down the slide.
“Look at you go!” Lolly whistled.
Maddie planted her feet when she hit the bottom, angling her arms back like she was sticking a dismount in gymnastics class. “What’s my score, Mommy?”
“A 9.9, at least.”
“Whew. I knew it was a really good one. Did you see how fast I went?”
“So fast,” I told her.
“Like a rocket, right?”
“Even faster.”
“One more because I have to get a 10.” She darted around to go for the steps again.
That was right when the doorbell rang, echoing from within the house.
“Are you expecting someone?” Lolly lowered her book, which was one of her favorite smutty romances, to look at me from over the top.
A tiny bolt of unease rippled through. “No. You?”
“Unfortunately, I can’t say I have any hot dates on the books. Though maybe you’re about to get yourself one.” She grinned, and I shook my head, getting ready to tell her to drop the pushing since she’d tried to corner me twice during the day to get the dirty deets from last night, her words, not mine, when the doorbell went off again, twice in a row.
Huffing, Lolly arched a brow. “Someone’s impatient.”
A frown pulled tight between my eyes, that unease lifting, and I pushed to standing. “Watch Maddie for a second?”
“Won’t look away,” Lolly promised.
I entered through the back screen door and hurried across the house to the front. The exterior light had just flickered to life, illuminating the front porch, though I couldn’t see that anyone was standing on the other side of the screen.
Disquiet clamped around my chest, slowing my steps as I edged forward, my mind starting to whir.
It’s nothing, it’s nothing, I silently chanted. I had absolutely nothing to be afraid of.
Except it was fear that smacked me across the face when I took the last step up to the screen door and caught sight of the man who lingered just off to the side, facing away with his hands planted on his waist.
Fear that drummed my heart and thinned the air, the oxygen becoming so thick I inhaled it like an oil slick.
Pruitt was here. Standing on my front porch.
Sickness curled in my stomach and bile climbed up my throat.
But he didn’t get to control me any longer. He had no bearing on my happiness. On my joy. On my daughter’s safety.
I refused to be afraid of him, which was kind of comical since I was terrified.