Total pages in book: 179
Estimated words: 170878 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 854(@200wpm)___ 684(@250wpm)___ 570(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 170878 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 854(@200wpm)___ 684(@250wpm)___ 570(@300wpm)
But even the men with rings on their fingers, even the fucking busboys, all of them looked at Hannah, lusting after her with a hunger that made me see red.
She didn’t even notice. She was too busy with Clara. Clara was all she saw. I’d done my best not to pay her any attention the entire ceremony. Which was hard, given that we were seated right next to each other. Her vanilla scent choked me, tortured me. When her smooth arm had brushed against mine, I’d scowled, draping my jacket over her shoulders without a single word.
It was too cold for her to have bare arms, even inside. And I couldn’t keep looking at her skin without going mad.
She was twirling Clara on the dance floor, my jacket hanging over the back of her chair.
I couldn’t keep my eyes off them. They were fucking spellbinding. And I got to go home with them.
They both slept under my roof.
But Hannah wasn’t in my bed.
And every night I went to sleep meant one less day that I’d wake up to her.
“Calliope wore white.” I tore my gaze off my girls only to glance at Calliope, dancing and laughing with them.
My brother sucked on his cigar, in full view of the dance floor.
I’d gone outside to get away, to take a breath, suck down another drink, and try to celebrate with my brother. To revel in the happiness he deserved. I was trying to be a decent older brother, who wasn’t such a grumpy bastard.
But it was hard to be happy when my whole world was down there dancing, and I couldn’t join them.
“It’s a wedding. It’s her wedding,” Elliot replied with a wry grin. “Why wouldn’t she wear white?”
I drew on my cigar again. Everything I knew about Calliope Derrick pointed to her being a force of nature I’d never want to cross. Never in a million years would I have paired her with my easygoing brother. But seeing them together, it just made sense. Even I had to admit it.
Still, her wearing white on her wedding day was a surprise to me. Calliope was not a traditional woman, so I hadn’t expected her to agree to a wedding.
Instead of answering my brother’s question, I gave him a long look.
Elliot exhaled a puff of his cigar, chuckling at my pointed look.
My brother had always been easy to laughter. Smiling often, glass half full and all that. Even when our mother died, and our family was dealt a blow we’d never recover from, he didn’t let it drag him down. He grieved her, of course. But he was able to talk about her with a smile, laughing when recounting memories.
I could barely say her name, let alone look at her picture. To this day, I couldn’t do it. The hole inside me never healed, never scabbed over.
We were different, Elliot and me. He was perpetual sunshine. I was dark fucking storm clouds.
But his laughter had become different. More robust. He seemed happy in a way that I hadn’t thought possible.
My eyes drifted back to where Clara was now perched on Hannah’s hip, and she was spinning her around.
Maybe I’d be able to laugh and smile if that were something permanent. If I didn’t have to prepare to lose the most important woman in my life.
“She’s pretty.” Elliot motioned to the dance floor.
My entire body jerked as if he’d hit me. Because he wasn’t looking at his wife. He was looking at Hannah.
I cannot punch my brother on his wedding day.
“It’s your fucking wedding day,” I spat at him.
Elliot chuckled, unaware of how close I was to laying my hands on him. “And dare I point out that your nanny is pretty, nice, and wonderful with your daughter?”
Technically, it was all true. Except Hannah wasn’t merely pretty. It was an insult to describe her with such an ordinary word. But Elliot was pointing it out for the same reason my father had on Clara’s birthday. Because they were romantics. And because, unfortunately, I hadn’t done a good enough job at hiding my want for Hannah.
They needed to know that their fantasies for my future were ill-founded.
“And in her fucking twenties,” I reminded my brother. And myself.
Elliot shrugged as if an age gap of almost twenty years were nothing. “She’s legal. And she seems older than that.”
She did. Hannah seemed older than she was. Because she was smart, kind, honest. Because she’d been through things that had forced her to grow up.
Because some asshole had stolen her carefree youth from her.
But she was still young.
“Young enough to be my daughter,” I finished my thought out loud.
“Not by a long shot, brother.” Elliot slapped me on the shoulder. “Go ask her to dance.” As if doing the thing I’d been wanting to do all night was that simple.