Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 99967 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 500(@200wpm)___ 400(@250wpm)___ 333(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99967 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 500(@200wpm)___ 400(@250wpm)___ 333(@300wpm)
Of course, Harper’s also become friends with the one woman who turns me inside out just by existing.
The only woman I’ve ever loved.
And the one who makes me want to burn the world to the motherfucking ground.
Right now, Jules, my wildfire, is dancing with my sisters, either by blood or by marriage, laughing and acting like she belongs here.
She fucking doesn’t.
“I warned you she’d be here,” Blake says, his face grim as he watches the group of them. “Harper wouldn’t leave her out, and—”
“You already told me.” I shake my head and sip my beer. “I’m fine.”
“Neither of you is fine,” Beckett says.
“I said I’m fine.” If I thought I could get away with it without hurting my brother’s feelings, I wouldn’t be here. I’m not big on crowds anyway, and if she’s within a mile, I steer clear of it, but this is Blake’s engagement party, and I love my brother.
I’m thrilled for him. Despite his woman’s poor taste in friends, I’m crazy about her. She’s excellent for my reformed workaholic brother.
So I’ll stay and celebrate with them and ignore the gorgeous little blonde who’s set my soul on fire since I was sixteen fucking years old.
More than twenty years of loving her.
Fifteen of hating her.
It’s a fucking mess.
She’s been back in town for almost a year, and I was doing so well at ignoring that she even existed.
Until that goddamn day at the resort when I found her bent over the cooler, and every memory I have of her flashed through my mind as if no time had passed at all.
Her sweet laughter.
A body that would make the gods weep.
Every whispered secret, every second of being inside her, and the goddamn torment she caused.
She’s off. Fucking. Limits.
“So the wedding’s in two weeks,” I say to Beckett, trying to shift my focus.
“Twelve days,” he says with a nod. “I’d do it today. I just want to marry her. I don’t care about the party or any of the hype.”
“Women care,” Blake says. “Shit, I’m being flagged over. Sorry, guys.”
Blake hurries over to his fiancée, kisses her passionately right there in the middle of the dance floor, and everyone whoops.
Beckett’s pulled away, and I walk to a table and have a seat by myself, then check the time.
I’ve only been here for thirty minutes.
“Hi, Uncle Brooks.” Birdie climbs in my lap as if it’s as normal as breathing for her.
Which it is. This peanut knows that she has all of us wrapped around her little six-year-old finger.
“Hey, baby girl. Why aren’t you out there dancing with the others?”
She looks out at the dance floor and shrugs. “Because you looked sad.”
I nudge her chin up and smile down at her. “I’m not sad, sweet girl. It’s a happy day. Uncle Blake’s going to get married.”
“I know. I like Harper. She’s a baby nurse.”
Nodding, I kiss her hair.
“Now it’s your turn.”
Sure that I’ve misheard her, I raise an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”
“Everyone’s getting married, Uncle Brooks. Now it’s your turn.”
“Why do you sound like my mother?”
Birdie giggles and lays her head on my chest. Christ, I love this little girl.
“You know, not everyone ends up getting married. Sometimes, people are happy staying single.”
“Why?” She frowns up at me. “It’s so much more fun to have people around.”
“Not always.” I pat her back for a few seconds, then scoot her off my lap. “Go dance. You’re so good at it. Go show them how it’s done.”
“Will you watch me?”
“Of course, I’m right here.”
She smiles big, showing off a gap in her teeth where she recently lost one of them, and runs off to the dance floor.
I sense her before I see her, and every muscle tightens.
Juliet sits across from me and takes her shoe off, rubbing the arch of her foot.
“You can’t keep hating me,” she says, and just the sound of her voice sets every hair on my body on end.
I don’t reply. I can’t. Something is lodged in my throat.
“It’s been fifteen years. I live here, Brooks. This is my home, and these are my friends.”
I cross my arms over my chest as resentment bubbles up in my stomach.
“I mean, I get it. We don’t have to be friends.”