Total pages in book: 180
Estimated words: 176012 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 880(@200wpm)___ 704(@250wpm)___ 587(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 176012 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 880(@200wpm)___ 704(@250wpm)___ 587(@300wpm)
And I feel a sudden urge. Hidden in this empty room, in this empty house, in the dark of night, I stop thinking for a moment.
I strip off my shirt and my bikini top and pull the hoodie over my head. It falls halfway down my thighs just before I drop everything else I’m wearing to the floor.
Stepping out of my shorts and bikini bottoms, I pull my hair out of the sweatshirt and sit on the edge of the bed, just like Winslet.
Not naked like her, but goosebumps spread across my arms, down my legs, and into my scalp all the same. I wanted to feel something he wore on my skin.
Tears suddenly fill my eyes as my toes graze the floor. “I’ve been in love with you since I was a kid, Lucas,” I tell his memory, out loud.
The cloth of his hoodie brushes my nipples, the skin of my thighs tingles under the hem. I part my legs just a little, letting the cool air in.
“Everyone in our family has someone,” I say as a tear falls. “Madoc has Fallon, Dylan has Hunter, James has A.J., Kade has anyone he wants…” I breathe out a laugh as I swipe a tear off my face. “When I was little, you were the one I looked forward to.”
The sweatshirt is so loose on me, I feel his imaginary hands climb inside.
“You were smart and funny and kind.” I rub my lips together. “You trusted me to hear difficult things when everyone else tried to shield me. You talked to me. The only one who really talked to me.”
Everyone else lied to me. All in my best interest, of course, but Lucas couldn’t. For some reason, it didn’t sit right with him.
“When I grew up, I thought about you,” I tell imaginary Lucas. “I wondered if you’d like what you saw when we met again. And if you’d want to keep looking.”
An image of him is in front of me, leaning over and reaching up inside the hoodie, pulling me down the bed by my naked hips.
“I rushed to grow up, so you could find me before you found someone else…” I finally admit. “Finished college early, started a business… In case you came home, I’d be ready.”
My mother never knew why I was racing to a finish line nearly all my life. I missed him when I was a kid and knew, even at thirteen, I didn’t want him to meet anyone. And when I turned eighteen, I was happy, because even if I was still too young for him, I was old enough. It was one barrier finally out of the way.
I’d never even wanted another guy.
I’m glad he came back. I needed to see him with adult eyes because now I know. He runs, and he’ll always run. There are better men out there.
“I’m ready.” I rub the insides of my thighs, heat pooling between my legs. “Just not for you.”
The ghost of his hand wraps around my throat and pushes me back onto the bed. I lift the hoodie over my head and open my legs.
“Never for you,” I gasp.
Lucas
The vein in my neck throbs, and I can barely take in a breath.
I watch her through the blinds in my closet doors, naked and writhing on my bed with her knees spread wide and her hand between her thighs.
What the fuck.
Her long torso arches on the mattress as she grips the inside of her leg with one hand and rubs herself with the other. And while her hand brushes slow and soft, she thrusts and moans, her breasts rocking like…
“Ah,” she groans. “Ah, ah, ah…”
…like she’s being fucked.
I close my eyes, heat flooding my groin. You can’t look at her.
She’s a kid. She’s always been a kid to me, and I can watch this—feel this—with any woman. Far away from here.
Her little whimper of pleasure drifts through my ears, and I open my eyes, trying to resist lifting them up to her.
But I do.
Long, toned legs. Smooth stomach. Round, full breasts. My hands ball into fists, empty. My lips part, nearly feeling her hard nipples over my mouth just before I envision myself sinking my teeth into her body.
I clench my jaw, my dick straining against my pants.
I should’ve cleared my throat by now. Done something to stop her. If I’d known it was her entering the house, I wouldn’t have hid. But it’s late, I’m drunk, and there are no more fucking knives in the house in case it was Green Street coming to ambush me. I’m late as hell for the airport, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the things she said to me at the party. My heart split in two, hearing how much I meant to her, and it nearly stopped when she said I wasn’t family anymore. Drinking with Noah, I couldn’t forget it, and I told myself that I just wanted to leave the hat and the compass here at the house for her. She would’ve found them when she moved in.