Total pages in book: 157
Estimated words: 161899 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 809(@200wpm)___ 648(@250wpm)___ 540(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 161899 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 809(@200wpm)___ 648(@250wpm)___ 540(@300wpm)
She took a breath.
No one said anything.
She kept going.
“There was a couple that hung there too. One of the times they were there, Aug told Mo that the chick was his thing. But she was taken, because she was always with this guy. Both Aug and Mo thought that was that. Except one day she came to the bar without her dude, and she sat beside Auggie. They struck up a conversation. They got on. She was his kind of people. She was meeting some friends that night, so she said good-bye and took off. But this connection meant enough, Auggie told Mo it happened.”
I wasn’t feeling super happy about this story, even though I had no idea where it was heading. I just knew the way she was telling it, wherever that was, wasn’t good.
But I kept my mouth shut.
Lottie continued her storytelling.
“But she came back, again without the guy she was always with, and she sat with Auggie. She wasn’t meeting friends that time, and made it clear she came back to hang with Aug. Like the first time they hung out, they clicked…big time.”
She hesitated.
I got what she meant by “big time,” so I nodded.
She carried on.
“And after he did her, he told her he wanted to see her again, and she admitted he was her freebie.”
Uh-oh.
My back straightened because I had a feeling I knew what that meant.
I asked anyway.
“Freebie?”
Lottie nodded. “Freebie. Auggie’s hot. She saw him. She wanted him. She had her guy. They weren’t open, but they made a deal. Kind of a modified celebrity deal you joke about with your partner, but you do that because you’ll never go there. For them, it was for real, and her seeing Auggie at that bar was what prompted it. Her dude got to pick a girl he could fuck no problems, no questions, no go-back-for-mores. She got to pick a guy. Auggie was that guy. She fucked him because he’s gorgeous and she wanted that notch. That experience. That was all he was to her. A hot guy she fucked.”
I felt chilly on the inside.
Lottie wasn’t finished.
“Needless to say, none of the guys went back to that bar, and shortly after that, Mo met me. And that’s the worst it’s happened, but similar things have happened to Auggie and they happened a lot. We think guys like him who have the bod and the face and the hair and the clothes and they make good bank have it made. But women can be bitches. It’s happened to all of them, even Mo. It’s just that Auggie is movie-star gorgeous, so he got it more. He’s a conquest. He’s spoils. In other words, from that chick to some friend posse making him the prize in some game, the opposite of a dogfight, but the end result is the same, he’s been seriously dicked around by women like you would not believe.”
The opposite of a dogfight, but the end result is the same.
“Boone didn’t tell me this either,” Ryn whispered.
“Mag mentioned something,” Evie murmured.
Hattie didn’t say anything.
So I knew she knew.
As for me, I was utterly unable to move for fear of what I’d do if I did.
“And that’s just that shit,” Lottie went on. “There are others who wanted a guy who looks like him that they can parade around. They didn’t want to get to know him. He didn’t have a brain or thoughts or feelings or opinions. He was just their trophy.”
Okay.
I’d had enough.
To express this, I didn’t take my eyes from Lottie even as I lifted both hands and pressed my fingers to my lips.
I drew in a long breath through my nose, held it, and exhaled.
I dropped my hands in my lap.
Then I leaned toward her and screamed, “Those fucking bitches!”
Lottie’s blonde hair swayed with her head jerk.
Ryn and Evie grinned at each other.
Hattie grinned at me.
See?
I knew I shouldn’t have moved.
Too late now.
“Are you fucking serious with that shit?” I demanded of Lottie.
“I wish I wasn’t, but I am,” Lottie replied.
I shot to standing.
And then I started pacing.
And muttering.
“Oh my God, this is fucked up. I mean, I can’t even believe this shit. Who would do that to somebody?”
“Maybe you should sit down and have a cinnamon roll,” Hattie suggested.
I stopped pacing, whirled on her and snapped, “I don’t want a cinnamon roll!”
“Okay, I’m feeling better about her and Aug now,” Ryn stage-whispered to Evie. “Serious, if she’s so upset on his behalf she turns down a cinnamon roll, she’s in deep for him.”
“Totes,” Evie agreed.
“Oh my God, this isn’t funny,” I declared with extreme exasperation.
“It isn’t,” Ryn said. “But you are.”
I turned on Lottie and asked (somewhat irately), “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”
“Before, it was none of your business. Now, I sense you’re finally wavering about him, in terms that you’re finally going to let him in, so it is.”