Total pages in book: 38
Estimated words: 35111 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 176(@200wpm)___ 140(@250wpm)___ 117(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 35111 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 176(@200wpm)___ 140(@250wpm)___ 117(@300wpm)
Of course Mykolas Sallis had not meant it when he called her his love. How could she expect someone like him to love her when even her own dad thought a gram of marijuana was more important than her life?
No matter what she did, no matter how much she had changed, she was not really Velvet Lambert. She was Dotty Garfield, and she had to remember that so she wouldn’t end up believing she could have her own happy ever after.
Chapter Nine
Mykolas was restless. Something had happened last night, something that had changed Velvet. When they had gotten home, she had pretended to have a headache. And this morning, she had pretended to be asleep. It was clear that she did not want to talk to him, and he had no fucking idea why.
Or did he?
Color stained Mykolas’ high-boned cheeks as he recalled the time he had taken her at the ladies’ room and he had called her something he had never called any woman before.
My love.
He leaned back on his seat and closed his eyes wearily. Goddammit, why did he end up saying those words anyway? And why did she have to make such a huge deal out of it? She hadn’t batted an eyelash even when he called her the same thing in Greek. So why now?
Besides, he was marrying her tomorrow. What more could she ask for?
But still the feeling persisted. He was not in the habit of leaving the office early, but he found himself curtly informing his secretary to cancel all his meetings for the day and driving back home at ten in the morning.
Damn you, Velvet, Mykolas thought even as he overtook another car in his haste to get back. He had a fucking feeling that if he didn’t get back as soon as he could, the worst kind of shit would hit the fan.
And he was right.
****
Velvet counted ten full minutes since Mykolas left before she got out of bed. Leaving herself no time to think, she moved as quickly as she could as she took a shower and began packing her things. She might not have a job now, but at least she had enough money saved to tide her over until she figured things out.
Memories crowded her as she went through each room of Mykolas’ penthouse residence, which was really more like a one-floor mansion. A single floor that was probably the size of a basketball court –bleachers included.
The spacious kitchen with its gleaming granite countertops and shiny silver equipment, rarely used until she had come to live with Mykolas. Now, it was one of the most used rooms in the house because Mykolas liked having her as breakfast before the actual thing.
The balcony, with its marble balustrade, was where she and Mykolas sometimes had coffee before he left for work and if she was in the mood to tease him, where she would insist on giving him a blowjob because she knew that only with her was he amenable to risking what he considered as exhibitionist sex.
And there was the library. There, he would work at night after dinner, and she would be with him reading a book. Sometimes, she would get him to talk and other times he would get her to talk. They never went all out with their confidences, but it was easy to read between the lines when you loved the other person so much.
But it was not the same for him.
She had to remember that.
Their bedroom – no, his bedroom – had the most memories, and each one of them hurt. Sure, they had fantastic sex here all the time, but it wasn’t just that. She loved the after-sex part even more, the times when he would want her close and they would just talk. When he was tired, she would try to make him smile by telling him of her outrageous plans about what she would buy once she became Mrs. Sallis. His hard body rocking with his silent laughter would be her first reward, the second of course was having Mykolas go down on her.
It was here in this bedroom that he had also given Velvet her engagement ring, the first morning she had spent on his bed. She had woken up with a beautiful ring on her finger, with Mykolas cheerfully telling her he had bought the most audacious and gaudiest ring he could find.
This way, he had told her in a mock serious voice, you can make every woman envious when you tell them you only had to flutter your lashes to get me to buy the biggest rock in town.
Velvet blinked her eyes furiously. They were good memories, but she couldn’t hope it would be like that forever. She had to leave now before she lost herself in her dreams and made herself vulnerable again.