Total pages in book: 18
Estimated words: 16661 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 83(@200wpm)___ 67(@250wpm)___ 56(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 16661 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 83(@200wpm)___ 67(@250wpm)___ 56(@300wpm)
She smiled. “I’m good at it and this isn’t that difficult of a process. I’ll do the hard part. When I’m done, you’ll not understand why you waited so long to let this happen. I have to get a few more things from my vehicle, and I’ll be right in.”
“I’ll meet you at the front desk.”
She turned on her boot heels and went back out the door. Her SUV sat in the parking lot, which was mostly devoid of other vehicles. But not people.
Her heart thundered in her chest as she found a tall, bearded man striding across the snow-covered lot. No, not correct, it wasn’t a man, it was Ronan Milo.
Broad shoulders covered by a jacket he’d not had when they were together. Dark brown leather, the collar covered in a fleece. Thick legs were wrapped with stonewashed denim that had seen better days but were obviously well worn and a favorite pair. Black boots carried him safely over the snowy ground.
Even though his ballcap was tugged low, she felt his gaze on her and froze at the top of the library steps. He pushed his hands deeper into his pockets and lengthened his stride. Her insides flipped and flopped as he made it easily up to her side, surrounding her with the familiar warmth and masculine scent she had come to associate with Ronan.
“Hello, angel.”
She nearly melted. There was no freezing biting wind, no snow, no chill. All she experienced was heat. From him.
When they’d parted ways, she held no assumptions on anything. For her it had been an incredible experience and time with a man who had shown her what it was like to be loved. Yes, loved. Had she fallen for him?
Absolutely.
Would she try to keep him when he had a new job coming up and she didn’t even know where that was?
Not a chance. She wanted him to find that happiness which would erase some of the pain and shadows in his gaze. More than that, she longed to be that person for him. Before she met this man, her belief in love at first sight was only in the books she loved to read. Everlasting love was what she saw with her parents, her father not having moved on from losing her mother. She wanted that. Desperately.
But her relationships in the past had left her with, a frosted heart on the notion of love. But along came Ronan Milo and he melted it from the beginning. His soul full of life and fire breathed it into hers.
It hadn’t even been two full days since she’d seen him.
Damn it!
She’d missed him like hell.
Vivyan opened her mouth to say something. Anything.
“Ronan Milo!”
A man stomped up the steps and nearly shoved her aside. Ronan shifted faster than she had ever seen him move and put her behind him.
“Watch it, Jorgansen,” he snarled. Facing her, his expression softened. “You okay, angel?” He stroked his knuckles down her cheek.
She nodded, settling her hand upon his chest, and not even questioning the feeling of security that pulsed through her.
“You shouldn’t have come back to town and there’s no reason for you to be in front of the library. Still trying to con women to head in the stacks with you?”
Ronan had pivoted back to the man speaking, still keeping his body between hers and him. She would have had to have been blind not to see the tensing her man did as he remained in front of her, like he would protect her from anything.
Her man?
My man?
This was what happened when she spent two nights of bliss with a man who knew how to work her body like nobody’s business. Her mind, her book loving, romance adoring, happily ever after craving mind and heart had focused on him like they needed one another to breathe.
“Still living at home, expecting your parents to support your habits, Jorgansen?”
Okay, there was definitely something between them. And it wasn’t nice. She flashed to his admission of how his youth had been growing up here and she frowned, protective instincts flaring.
“Still sleeping in that clapboard house your mother had as a whore house?”
“Excuse me?” Indignation rolled off her and she shoved in front of Ronan. “You don’t talk to him that way.”
Jorgansen, whoever he was, took two steps back from the ferocity in her tone. Long brown hair hung limply from beneath the edge of his ballcap. Also dirty and greasy. Thin pale face with a look of superiority that she instantly wanted to smack away.
“Let the men talk, little lady.” A sneer. “Then again, you’re not that little are you? You seem to be new in this town so let me help you out, you want to get somewhere in this town and you come to me, you want to slum it? You’re in the right place.”