Total pages in book: 98
Estimated words: 93312 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 467(@200wpm)___ 373(@250wpm)___ 311(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93312 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 467(@200wpm)___ 373(@250wpm)___ 311(@300wpm)
“I’m not letting you go,” he says again, his palm gliding up to lightly grip my throat, keeping my back to his chest as he snaps his hips forward. “But if I find out Grey did it, I won’t show him any mercy.”
“I know.”
He presses his lips to my spine, kissing me, and then he’s pushing my chest flat against the table.
“Good.”
“Why don’t you ever go to class?” I ask, coming up behind him as he stands at the kitchen counter, circling my arms around his bare torso. After Thayer fucked me on the table, we went at it twice more. Once on the floor, and once on his couch, right in front of the glass window. Sometime around nine o’clock, we realized we needed sustenance, so he ordered pizza. I’m sore and sated and sleepy, trying to soak everything in before we have to go back to reality tomorrow.
“It felt wrong.”
I press my cheek against his back, my hands flattening on his stomach as I wait for him to elaborate.
“Moving on with my life, going to college…Danny was supposed to be here for all of it. It feels like I’m leaving him behind.”
My thoughts drift back to when Valen said she hadn’t seen him for months. She was as surprised to see him in Sawyer Point as I was. “Is that why you came home?”
He captures my wrist, examining the faint lines the lightning left, his thumb rubbing across the sensitive skin. “I came back for you.”
“No, you didn’t.” I laugh. “You hated me.” Sometimes, I still think he might on some level. My biggest fear is that he’ll never be able to see me the way he did before the accident.
“I never hated you. I hated that I couldn’t have you.”
Shayne
Yawning, I trudge into the kitchen to make myself a late-night snack after finishing up the homework I fell behind on. Between Thayer keeping me up all night last night and my game after school today, I can barely keep my eyes open. Not that I’m complaining. It was worth losing sleep and the grief Coach gave me for missing practice.
I grab the cheese and butter from the fridge before I pad over to the stove. I move on autopilot, getting the frying pan and buttering the bread, lost in thought, when I hear the sound of breaking glass coming from the other room. I jump back with a scream, and then I freeze with my hand over my mouth. When I don’t hear anything else, I blindly slap a hand onto the counter behind me, feeling around for my phone. I back into the pantry, shutting the door as quietly as possible as my shaky fingers manage to click on Thayer’s name.
“Shayne?” he asks, concern evident in his tone. I never call him.
I cup my hand over my mouth and the speaker of my phone, trying to keep my voice low. “I think someone just broke into my house.” My heart threatens to pound out of my chest.
“We’re coming,” he says immediately. “Where are you?”
“Hiding in the pantry.”
“Good. Stay there. Don’t come out until you hear me.”
A weird scent hits my nostrils and I inhale, trying to place it. It smells like…burning fabric.
“Shit,” I curse.
“What?” Thayer barks into the phone.
“I think I smell something burning.”
Thayer’s panicked voice yells something to Holden, presumably, and then I hear the telltale sign of his Hellcat. He says something else, but adrenaline has my pulse pounding in my ears, making it hard to hear.
I slowly open the pantry door and peek my head out. When I don’t see anyone, I grab the frying pan off the stove and rush out, running toward the front living room, confirming my fear. A small fire blazes on the floor in front of the broken window. “There’s a fire,” I manage to say before I drop both the phone and the frying pan.
“Shit, shit, shit,” I chant, trying to form a coherent thought. Fire extinguisher. I know I saw one somewhere when we moved in. I jog over to the entryway closet and open the door, spotting the red container on the shelf above my head. I push up onto my toes to reach it, stretching my arm as far as possible, the tips of my fingers barely grazing it. I jump up, trying to knock it off the shelf, but I only end up pushing it back farther.
I yank a hanger from beneath a coat and use that instead. “Come on, come on.” Finally, I’m able to scoop it off the shelf and catch it before it hits the floor. I rush over, willing my shaky hands to comply long enough to do what needs to be done. Pulling on the ring, I squeeze down on the handle, and then a white cloud explodes from the nozzle, extinguishing the fire.