Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 85950 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 430(@200wpm)___ 344(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 85950 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 430(@200wpm)___ 344(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Cash doesn’t speak as he walks toward the bathroom. I resist the urge and fail miserably when I try not to watch his ass flex as he goes. The limited light coming in from the hallway makes the sight of him mysterious and sexy, but the sting of our encounter is still stronger.
I get lost in thought for a moment, trying not to dwell in the hand I’ve been dealt, but Cash comes back into the room much too soon.
The information on the internet says I need to keep my hips elevated for fifteen to thirty minutes. As an overachiever, I know I’ll probably stay like this for over an hour.
He doesn’t speak as he picks up his clothes and begins to dress.
“You umm… touched me. Did you wash your hands?”
“Yes,” he says, sounding a little annoyed. “I used the hand soap, not one of those fancy soaps in there.”
I grind my teeth at the tone of his voice. It sounds like he’s mad at me for some reason.
“I mean, before you came here, did you wash your hands?”
“Yes, Adalynn. I wouldn’t touch you with dirty hands.”
He mutters something unintelligible under his breath, but I don’t ask for clarification.
“This can’t happen again,” I say, finally able to gather the courage to put my thoughts into words.
“Okay.”
I needed him to agree, but I honestly thought it would take him a little longer.
“I’ll see you later, okay?”
“Yeah, okay,” I tell him, turning my head to the side when he leans over and presses his lips to my temple. We’ve parted this way hundreds of times, but when he grabs his gun belt from my dresser and walks out of my room, it feels like I’m stuck under water without the ability to take a breath.
What have we done?
Tonight was supposed to be magical. We were supposed to look into each other’s eyes and share a moment. We were supposed to confess our feelings, the ones everyone else claims to see but we’ve been ignorant of.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
The first tear falls as the sound of the front door opening and closing reaches me. The second, third, and fourth follow shortly.
In my head, I imagine him still in the house and coming back to me, insisting that he can do better. My fantasy would have him begging to let him prove it to me.
Sexually incompatible.
I never thought that would be on my life’s bingo card where Cash was concerned.
It’s supposed to be perfect, the best I’ve ever had.
I fight the urge to blame either one of us. Sometimes things just don’t line up, but even I’m getting irritated by myself thinking these things.
Maybe he was upset that I wasn’t a virgin. Maybe he sees me as this sweet innocent girl who—
I jolt when my phone rings, the screen broadcasting light across the ceiling.
When I reach for it and see that it’s Madison calling, I second-guess my initial instinct to answer it. I know why she’s calling. It’s nearly nine o’clock, and she knows Cash was coming at seven. She wants the nitty-gritty details.
I sigh in relief when the call goes to voicemail, but then it immediately starts ringing again, telling me that she’ll keep calling until I answer.
“Hello,” I say after the call connects.
“What are you doing?” she asks, her voice light and airy, her tone salacious.
“Fixing to go to bed.”
Silence fills the line. I know what she wants, but I just can’t tell her. Maybe if some time passes, I can sink back into the fantasies that he’s utterly perfect in every way. Putting any truths out there will make that impossible.
“Tell me all the details,” she insists.
“I couldn’t go through with it,” I lie. “It would just be too weird, you know?”
Madison sighs on the other end of the line.
“Adalynn,” she grumbles. “How did he take it?”
“He umm… I did it by text. I figured it would be too weird to do it face-to-face.”
“You mean you’d jump his bones if he showed up there all horned up and ready for action?”
I huff. “Something like that. I’ll talk with you later,” I tell her, faking a yawn. “I have an early day tomorrow.”
I hang up before she can try and give me more unsolicited advice.
I should’ve started a timer for this hip prop thing, but I didn’t. I wait another twenty minutes before climbing off the bed. There’s nothing sexy about waddling to the bathroom with a towel smooshed between my legs, but I guess it’s on par with how the rest of the night was going.
As if the night isn’t bad enough, my smoke alarm is going off when I get out of the shower.
I forgot about the lasagna and burned it to a crisp.
It’s after eleven when I finally get to bed. It’s after two in the morning when I cry myself to sleep.