Total pages in book: 71
Estimated words: 70444 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 352(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 70444 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 352(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
I opened my mouth, then closed it. “You little shit!”
Then I burst out laughing.
And he was right. When he took me in there a few minutes later after I’d collected myself, I saw that he didn’t, indeed, have much. Amanda’s and my apartment was downright luxurious compared to his. No wonder he’d rather spend time at ours.
***
“I can’t believe you’ve lived two doors down from me all this time and haven’t said a word. Nor have I seen you. How does that even happen?” I asked, still confused on how he’d gotten something this monumental past me.
He shrugged. “Graveyard shift. Freight elevator. And I take the stairs most of the time. The stairwell is right beside my apartment door.”
I shook my head. “That’s insane.”
He started to laugh.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “But, to be fair, at first you were a skittish filly that wanted nothing to do with me. Once I hid it once, I had to keep hiding it.”
That was true.
I sighed. “You’re right.”
He winked. “I’m always right.”
I picked up a piece of shredded lettuce off of my plate and threw it at him. It hit his throat and fell into the small gap between his shirt and his collarbone.
He tried to fish it out and then grimaced. “I think I only pushed it down farther.”
I started to giggle, then got out of the booth and walked to his side, looking down his shirt.
The Kevlar vest that he was wearing made it damn near impossible to get my hand down inside, but I did manage to finally get the piece of lettuce. I did accidentally pull some chest hairs, though.
“I think you did that on purpose,” he said, pinching my ass.
I squeaked, happy that there was a wall on the side so that his hand had been hidden from view, and then looked around to see if anybody had seen his wandering hand.
I had the attention of two people. Beatrice, who was glaring at me with hate in her eyes, and Rosie, who was glaring with a lot more than hate. Unconcealed rage was more like it.
At least I knew why Beatrice hated me. She tried to talk to Coke at least twice a day while at work, and I fielded her calls. Either I took messages that Coke never returned, or I told her he was busy and to try back later. Either way, Coke never spoke with her, and I knew that she partially blamed me for that problem.
Not that it was my fault. Coke damn well got her messages because I took great pleasure in telling him why his ex-wife was mad at him that day.
It was nice to have someone else being hated on who wasn’t me for a change.
But Rosie? Yeah, my best guess was that she was jealous of mine and Johnny’s relationship—though she had no one to blame for that but herself.
She was the one who’d cheated on him, after all.
She’d dug her own grave.
“You ready?” Johnny asked, his hand sliding up the back of my thigh.
I looked down at him, and then leaned over and placed a soft kiss on his mouth.
I felt the eyes of more than just two people this time.
We were in the middle of one of the only restaurants in Hostel at dinnertime. Half the town was either here or out in the parking lot.
It was inevitable that we would draw attention.
Only, I wasn’t embarrassed like I would have been at one time. Who the hell would be embarrassed to be seen kissing a man like Johnny?
It sure the hell wasn’t ever going to be me.
I groaned and stepped away, reluctant to let him go, and even more reluctant to allow him to go to work.
I didn’t want our time together to end. We only had a very short amount of it today, and it’d been like this for the last few days since he’d been working nightshift.
I’d found that the longer that I had to deal with him working nights while I should be sleeping, that I did more worrying about him instead of sleeping.
Not that I’d tell him that.
Hostel really wasn’t all that dangerous of a town, but then I thought about those men who had nearly beaten the crap out of Johnny, and my ability to be rational flew out the window.
Though they were no longer a problem—thanks to the judge being very quick about handing out sentences since they beat the hell out of a cop—but there was always going to be someone else for me to worry about.
“You okay?”
I backed up a bit more, allowing Johnny to get up out of the booth.
He did so, and we came chest to chest. My breasts were rubbing against the planes of his vest.
“Yeah,” I smiled, offering him my cheery grin that always seemed to make the corners of his mouth soften. “I’m just thinking about tomorrow morning.”