Total pages in book: 210
Estimated words: 203847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1019(@200wpm)___ 815(@250wpm)___ 679(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 203847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1019(@200wpm)___ 815(@250wpm)___ 679(@300wpm)
“That happens when you run,” I say sarcastically, pulling away. I look around his apartment and sigh. “Do you have a dishwasher?”
“Do I look like I hand-wash dishes?”
Cocky bastard.
“You don’t look like you wash dishes at all.” I look at him flatly. “Okay, here’s the deal. You make breakfast and I’ll clean your apartment. I can’t eat in this mess.”
He smirks. “Calling in some of your twenty-four hours?”
“You bet I am. One hour.”
“Okay. Personally, I think it’s a waste of an hour. I mean, you could come, like, three times in sixty minutes, but whatever.”
I pick up one of his dirty socks from the floor and throw it at him. “Shut up and go and make me breakfast, bitch.”
He stops, raises an eyebrow, then roars with laughter. I grin.
Yep. I’m going to have so much fun with these twenty-four hours.
I’m pretty sure the bacon and pancakes just contradicted the effort I put in to run here. I’m even more certain that the sex after balanced it back out.
Apparently, my choice of what to do this morning was overruled. I don’t think I’m going to get my full twenty-four hours after all. The orgasms were great though…
“Do you have work today?”
I nod, tying my wet hair up in a messy bun. “At two. I’m on the long shift today. What are you doing?”
“Working. Engagement shoot.”
“Romantic.”
“They pay the bills.” He grins.
“Right. Because you need to work.” I raise my eyebrows and give him a pointed look.
“I don’t need to work, but I want to. I might have a cushy little trust fund courtesy of my parents—and the fact I sold my share in their company back to them—but I’d get bored sitting around on my ass all day. I need something to do.” He lies back on the sofa. “I used to teach photography, but then I decided to go freelance.”
“Why?” I sit on the other end of the sofa, nudging his ankles apart so I can squeeze in.
He shrugs. “I didn’t like teaching all that much.”
“How long did you do it for?” Bad question, Liv. Bad question.
I should get up and run now before I find out any more about him. Before this conversation delves any further into his past. Before it goes too far.
“A couple months. Like I said, it wasn’t for me.”
“But you teach Dayton now, right?”
“An apprenticeship isn’t really teaching. That’s why she’s in college one day a week.”
“But you still teach her stuff.”
“Yes…”
“I don’t get it.”
He frowns. “Don’t get what?”
I tuck a stray lock of hair behind my ear. “You said you didn’t like teaching, but you teach Dayton. Like, what—did you just wake up one morning and decide that you didn’t want to teach anymore? Then do it again, except the other way around?”
“Day’s basically family. It’s different.” His tone is a little tight, and instinct tells me that it’s a sore subject.
It’s a shame that my desire to know everything is a lot stronger than my instinct.
“Well, yeah, but no. I don’t particularly enjoy pulling pints for Donny in the bar, but I’ve worked there for a while now. I wouldn’t just stop and go and do something else randomly. Of course, I don’t have the means to, but—”
“Can we drop this now?”
“I don’t think you’re telling me the truth about why you stopped teaching.” The words blurt out of me before I can stop them.
Tyler’s eyes instantly harden. “Are you ready to sit and tell me everything about your past?”
“No.”
“Then don’t expect me to tell you everything about mine. And definitely don’t expect it when you still look at me as your fuck buddy.”
My lips form an ‘o.’ Shock—that’s what I’m feeling right now. Shock that he came right out and said it… Especially after what I admitted to him last night.
Yeah, I was drunk. Yeah, I was high off an orgasm. That doesn’t make what I said any less true.
That doesn’t mean my addiction isn’t grabbing hold of him, obsessing over him, desiring him.
It doesn’t mean I’m not.
“You know that isn’t true,” I say in a small voice.
“No, I don’t. What you said to me last night doesn’t tell me how you look at me. I’m a fucking addict, Liv. I’ve had sex with a whole bunch of bloody people I don’t see as anything more than a quick shag.”
A lump forms in my throat. I swallow once, twice, three times, but it doesn’t go away. It lingers, heavy, full of emotion.
“And me? Is that how you see me?”
“Don’t turn this shit round on me. You know exactly how I feel about you.”
I stand and lift my hand to run it through my hair before dropping it lamely when I remember that it’s up. “No. No, you know what, Ty? I don’t have a fucking clue because you’ve never actually told me. So until you’re ready to tell me, don’t sit there and tell me how I see you. Don’t sit there and fucking berate me for not telling you how I feel when you haven’t done it yourself.”