Total pages in book: 150
Estimated words: 142818 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142818 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Elden did not come into my mom and Swiss’s. He sat on the bike, looking like sex and sin.
Swiss stood in the kitchen, glaring in the direction of the rumbling bike. He did not go out onto the driveway to challenge Elden to a duel, so I called that a win.
“Thank God you’re here!” Julian shouted at me the second we walked through the door. “Get your ass to the coffee machine.”
I was about to do what Julian so politely asked when Elden grasped my waist and pulled me to him.
It felt exceptionally strange, him touching me like this in public. Good strange. Or it would’ve been had Elden not been glowering at me.
“It’s okay, honey,” I reassured him. “He’s really sweet, and he’s Australian… That’s just his way. I know you’re under the impression that you’re the only man who can order me around, but he actually can order me around because he’s paying me. If you start paying me… No, that wouldn’t work because this would move to an ethical gray area.” I shook my head. “Anyway, he doesn’t mean any harm.”
“I know he doesn’t mean harm,” Elden bit out. “I want to know what he means.”
I tilted my head in confusion. “He means he wants me to get my ass to the coffee machine,” I clarified, even though he’d made that pretty clear. I gestured to the long line of people waiting for coffee. “Or they might start getting violent.”
People took their coffee very seriously here. Which you could only understand once you tasted what real coffee was meant to taste like.
“You are not working,” Elden replied through his teeth.
I frowned at him. “Uh, yeah, I am.”
“You’re pregnant.”
I blew a strand of hair from my eyes. “I’m aware.”
“Your morning sickness is getting worse.” There was no denying the concern in Elden’s tone.
My stomach lurched as if on cue. “Of that I am also aware.”
“You’re not standing on your feet all day when you’re pregnant and sick.”
“I am working because I made a commitment to Julian, because I enjoy it and because there are millions of pregnant women at this very moment, managing to stand all day and exist in general,” I refuted.
“Violet,” Elden warned.
“Elden,” I warned right back.
We had a very long stare off.
Elden was probably used to winning those kinds of stare offs because he was a badass, irritable, dangerous guy, and any regular person would not just break the stare off but likely go off running.
I was not a regular person. Not since I met Elden.
“I could stand here all day,” I informed him.
“You bloody can’t stand there all day,” Julian chimed in.
“I can’t promise the coffee deprived customers won’t drag you out,” I told Elden, ignoring Julian for the time being.
Elden’s eyes had a hard glint, but he let out a very frustrated sigh.
I smiled wide in triumph. I might’ve even done a little dance if not for the morning sickness and the alpha male yanking me in for a publicly inappropriate kiss.
Julian whistled.
Or I think he did. I was in a vortex. On an alternate plane where only we existed.
“I’ll be here to pick you up at three,” Elden murmured against my lips.
“I’m scheduled to work till five,” I argued.
“I’ll be here at three.” Elden’s jaw was granite.
I swallowed my grin. “Okay.”
Elden gave me one more hard look, kissed my nose then dragged me—lovingly—toward the counter.
The previously hostile customers parted for Elden. They were coffee deprived, not insane.
“She is not to lift anything heavy,” Elden barked at Julian.
Julian, to his credit, did not even bat an eyelash at the hostile biker barking orders at him in his place of business.
“Ten-four, big boy,” he saluted.
Elden narrowed his eyes. “She gets regular breaks. And make sure she eats something.”
”She is standing right here,” I smacked Elden’s arm. “She can also speak for herself, and by golly, she can feed herself.”
Elden looked sideways at me. “Did you just say ‘by golly?’ ”
I jutted my chin up. “I thought something from your generation might sink in better.”
He shook his head, chuckling.
Though I was currently irritated with him, I couldn’t help but revel in the chuckle.
Elden gave me a firm kiss, closed mouth. “See you at three, baby.”
My irritation melted to nothing. “Yeah,” I murmured back.
He held onto me for a moment longer, staring at me like there wasn’t a line of people behind us. Like he had all the time in the world just to look at me.
Then finally, he walked off. I, along with the entire café, watched him. The difference between me and everyone else in the café was that I was entitled to stare dreamily after him because he was mine.
“Violet!” Julian snapped me out of my trance. “Stop with the lovey eyes, and make some fuckin’ coffee!”
THREE DAYS LATER
ELDEN
When everyone sat down, the air was tense. Very fucking tense. Swiss and I had not been in the same room since he pulled his piece on me.