Total pages in book: 146
Estimated words: 143842 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 719(@200wpm)___ 575(@250wpm)___ 479(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 143842 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 719(@200wpm)___ 575(@250wpm)___ 479(@300wpm)
Lunging forward, I caught it before it hit the ground.
I did my best to ignore the gravity rolling off her flesh, though I could feel it skating over mine when I stepped into her vicinity, the air feeling heavier than it should.
I forced the casual arch of my brow. “Looks to me like you do.”
I wrangled the rest of the boxes from her hold, taking two in one arm and the third in the other.
She gasped out a surprised sound. “Excuse me, what do you think you’re doing?”
I sent her a wide grin, the one I used that normally won me whatever favor I wanted. “I’m just doing what my momma taught me to do and helping out a neighbor.”
Turning on my heel, I ducked out of the trailer.
Rain pelted from above, the gusts of wind pushing it sideways, stinging my flesh as I hurried up the walkway toward the little house that was almost identical to mine except the floor plans were flopped.
Hers was painted white with blue trim, and there was a porch swing out front.
I could feel her right behind me, aghast, brimming with indignation.
“You can’t just come over here and put your nose in my business,” she spluttered.
I glanced back as she was trying to shove back the hair that was matted to her face. Her face that I caught the vaguest glimpse of.
Again, that familiarity speared me through the chest, though this time it didn’t feel so distant. It was right there. Waiting for me to catch onto it.
“I’m not pretending to know a thing about your business,” I tossed out.
I felt her come to a stop behind me, though her voice grew in strength. “I don’t need some muscled up cowboy coming around here thinking I’m weak.”
I faltered for the flash of a second before I continued on, my boots thudding on the wood as I took the three steps onto the covered porch. I stalked over to the door and dropped the boxes onto the mat.
She was still standing in the rain when I turned around, but it was me who was gasping when I fully was able to take her in.
The goddamn breath knocked from my lungs.
Because that was right when another strike of lightning lit the atmosphere, illuminating her face, and I was getting slammed by the intensity of these giant eyes.
The color of tumbled blue glass.
As distinct as the river that ran through the town.
Bright.
Clear.
Bottomless.
Rimmed in these full, long lashes that only made them appear larger, so powerful they could look right through the middle of you to every secret you’d ever tried to keep.
These eyes? These eyes I knew.
Dumbstruck, I gaped.
“Hailey?” Her name tumbled out like a question. Because the last time I’d seen her she’d been little more than eighteen. Young and innocent and sweet.
And now…now she was…
Fuck me—she was stunning.
Her face this perfect heart, cheeks high and full, and her jaw tapered down to an almost sharp chin, though it was softened with a dimple that sat right in the middle.
Right then, her expression roiled in a crash of turbulence. Violent and chaotic where she stood beneath the power of the storm.
Fierce.
Fiery.
Though there was no missing the way she was shaking.
My chest tightened.
She let go of a patronizing laugh. “What, you recognized me now?”
My brow pinched at the dislike she was tossing at me. “It was dark and…it’s been a lot of years.”
“Yeah, it has.” The fire inside her blazed, the woman wearing it like a shield.
I knew exactly what it looked like to barely be holding the broken pieces together. What it looked like to be holding on so tightly because your world was unraveling.
Hers trembled all around her.
My stomach twisted in a way that it shouldn’t. A swell of protectiveness rose from out of nowhere.
It took all my strength to bat it back down into nonexistence because Hailey Wagner was the last person I could care about. The last person I could get close to.
Just standing here talking to her was likely hazardous.
I’d long ago accepted my philosophy on life.
I was happy to lend a hand when I could. Keep it polite. Mind my manners the way my mother had taught me, and my father had insisted.
But other than for my friends and my family? My mother and my two sisters? It ended at that.
I didn’t form bonds or attachments. Never got too close or too deep.
I fucked a lot and made sure to please, then I left it at that.
I couldn’t take the chance of someone relying on me. Couldn’t risk the choices I’d made in my life affecting someone else. Because I didn’t know when my luck was going to fail.
It looked like right then, with Hailey staring back at me, that luck might have run out.
The problem was? I saw it written all over her. She’d been. Time and again.