Total pages in book: 151
Estimated words: 142976 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 715(@200wpm)___ 572(@250wpm)___ 477(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142976 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 715(@200wpm)___ 572(@250wpm)___ 477(@300wpm)
“I had no idea you were such a slasher flick fan.”
Fern wrinkled her nose and shook her head.
“I’m not. One of my friends at school”—her only friend, the one who had tried to help her and had had her entire life destroyed in the process—“had a boyfriend who loved these movies. When they broke up, she had a bunch of his T-shirts and she gave them to me. Before that I slept in these long, restrictive awfully itchy nightgowns, courtesy of my loving stepsisters.”
“So, instead, you sleep in some random guy’s shirts every night?” He looked—well Fern couldn’t tell exactly how he looked, but the word that came to mind was displeased. His eyes had narrowed and his lips thinned. Yes… definitely displeased.
And affronted.
“I didn’t know him very well. Okay, suffice to say, I didn’t know him at all. Not in person. The only thing I really know about him is that he has questionable taste in movies.”
“And he’s not very tall,” Cade muttered between gritted teeth, his eyes falling to her thighs again. “My T-shirts on you would fall to a couple of inches above your knee.”
Why did he sound so smug about that?
Not certain how to react to his strange behavior, Fern closed her palm around the credit card and held it up.
“Thank you for this. It’s very thoughtful. And I will pay you back.”
She got nothing but a grim, unsmiling nod in response to that.
“Where are you and Beth going?”
“She’s meeting me here. She said something about the Waterfront?” His brow furrowed in response to her words but he didn’t say anything. “Oh, that reminds me… do you think you could arrange a driver for us?”
“That won’t be a problem. Tell Beth to park in the underground garage and come up when she gets here.”
“Okay. Thank you. I should get ready.”
Another grim nod.
“I’ll see you later then.”
Cade watched Fern retreat, his eyes once again falling to her slender thighs. He’d been tempted to drag the hideous thing off her for so many more reasons than the obvious desire to see her naked.
One: the violent subject matter was at odds with her quiet, gentle personality.
Two: yes okay, he was very aware that she only had on a pair of panties—if that—beneath that shirt and that all it would take to get her naked was a quick yank of the thing over her head.
Three: the ugly black T-shirt was a stark, unpleasant contrast against her skin.
Four through ten: it belonged to another man and had no fucking business being anywhere near her soft skin.
Cade pinched the bridge of his nose, in a vain attempt to ward off the encroaching headache. He scrubbed his hands over his face, and bit back a groan as he once again thought about those pretty, naked legs. He wished he’d never asked the doctor about sex during her pregnancy.
After their conversation he’d read up on it and fuck… now he couldn’t think of anything else. And seeing her in nothing but that shirt had had a depressingly predictable effect on his body.
It didn’t help that Cade hated failing and their one encounter together could not be classified as anything other than a failure. And while before—when there had been little chance of him ever seeing her again—he’d been happy to relegate it to the past. Now, when he was stuck seeing her every day, the idea of fixing that mistake was quickly becoming an all-encompassing obsession.
And he needed to put it the fuck out of his mind.
Or go insane.
He shook his head and reached for his phone, with a few quick taps on the screen he secured a driver/guard for Fern and Beth’s shopping excursion. He’d been tempted for a few seconds to do the driving and insert himself into their day, but reason had won out almost immediately.
It would be a dick thing to do. He recognized that. Fern needed friends, and Beth could be a real friend to her. Having him there would make both women too nervous to relax around each other.
He knew that, and yet, he still selfishly wanted to tag along. And he couldn’t isolate the reason why.
He glared unseeingly at his computer screen, hating the upheaval and confusion Fern’s presence in his life was creating. The least complicated thing about his marriage to Fern was removing her assets from Abernathy’s sticky grasp. Despite Abernathy’s pathetic attempts to delay the process, untangling that mess was proving shockingly easy compared to living with her, and seeing her every day. And knowing that inside her another heartbeat was growing stronger and more deafening by the minute.
A heartbeat Cade wouldn’t be able to ignore for much longer. Much as he might wish to.
It turned out that figuring out what she liked wasn’t as hard as Fern had imagined it would be. It helped to be around a confident shopper like Beth. The woman had a great eye for what would suit Fern and had prodded her in the direction of a few dresses and jumpsuits she would never have dared to try out by herself.