Total pages in book: 130
Estimated words: 123579 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 618(@200wpm)___ 494(@250wpm)___ 412(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 123579 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 618(@200wpm)___ 494(@250wpm)___ 412(@300wpm)
“Trevor!”
It feels like everyone on this street looks at me except him. He keeps moving forward, every step taking him farther away. I’m gripped by a sick urgency that I’m letting something special die before it draws its first breath. If that kiss in the studio was the first time I moved in his direction, then this is the second. I’m rushing after him now. Plowing through shoulders, bumping against briefcases without so much as a pardon me.
“Trevor, wait!”
He still doesn’t stop. Maybe his resolve shifted that fast from having to have me to being determined to never see me again. I don’t know, but I have to find out. I stop in the street, lean over, and press my hands to my knees to work up a scream that he can choose to ignore but will have no choice but to hear.
“Bishop!”
I bellow it. Even over the horns blaring and the collective hum of the early morning commute, he hears it. I know he does because he turns around, not even a block away, and stares back at me. He makes no move to meet me halfway. He won’t. The angry set of his mouth, the stiffness of his posture, the fists balled into the front pocket of his hoodie—all signals that if anyone’s taking steps this time, it will have to be me. I ignore the stares of everyone around us on the sidewalk and eat up the block in rushed steps until I’m right in front of him. I’m so close I feel his displeasure like a heat wave in the cool morning air.
“Bishop, I’m sorry.”
Every time he’s looked at me, I felt like he was searching for something. Probing, plumbing, diving deep with every glance. Not now. His eyes are flat, guarded, not letting me in and not asking anything of me. Maybe waiting to be done with me.
“I…what I said back there about…” I can’t finish.
“You mean about my having no self-respect?”
Even though his words are so deep and low no one else could hear, I feel exposed and want him to stop immediately.
“What I meant—”
“Or maybe the part about my making a fool of myself?” He tilts his head, lifts both brows over dark, flinty eyes. “No? Oh, you must mean when you threatened to take out a fucking restraining order. Is that what you’re sorry for, Sofie?”
“Bishop, I—”
“I kept telling myself there had to be more to you than what everyone said, but maybe that was my imagination. Maybe you are just a pretty face and a great set of tits. I’m so sorry I was making things complicated for you by thinking there was more. By wanting more than just a quick fuck, which is obviously what you’re used to. I just thought I saw…forget it.”
He turns around and starts to walk away again.
“What did you see?”
I don’t even care anymore that people still mill around us, that they know who I am. I have to know what he saw to make him chase me all over this city when even I know I’m probably not worth his time. He stops walking, standing still facing away from me for a few moments. I wait, wondering if he’ll just keep walking, but finally he turns back around and stalks toward me until he’s standing close enough for me to see the anger has drained away, but I can’t tell what’s left.
“Hunger.” His eyes never leave my face, like he’s searching for glimpses of it again. “An appetite for significance. To feel like you’re contributing something, adding something. I thought I recognized it in you because I remember it in myself. Remember wondering where I fit in all the needs around me.”
I’m not sure how to respond. He’s articulated something that’s been skulking about inside me for months, maybe longer. I’d never put a word to it. Never really given it much thought, but as I look back at the things that mean something to me—the Walsh Foundation, Haven’s charitable partnerships—maybe he’s right, but I’m still not sure. Not of me. Not of him.
I drop my eyes to study the cracks in the sidewalk instead of looking at him, wondering how to crack the wall he’s raised against me.
“But you were wrong?”
He’s so quiet the moments stretch out and open, gaping enough for the sounds of the city to intrude. Everything around me is frenetic, but I’m still while I wait for him to let me know if he was wrong about me. He reaches out to cup my face, lifting my chin, his thumb tracing my cheekbone, his eyes searching mine.
“Was I, Sof?” He steps closer until the width, the height, the breadth of him, blocks out the scene around us. And it’s just us. “Was I wrong?”
I’m not sure how to respond without risking more of myself than I can afford to lose.