Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 70004 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 350(@200wpm)___ 280(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 70004 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 350(@200wpm)___ 280(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
Twelve
Getting your period right after a day of crying is so validating. I knew I wasn’t a weak little bitch.
—Mable to Cody
Mable
I woke up cocooned in a blanket, toasty warm, with the arms and legs of what felt like Hercules wrapped around me.
I didn’t automatically pull away, mostly because I felt like I was in heaven.
I’d never felt so safe and protected in my life.
“Are you awake yet?” a sleep-roughened voice asked.
I yawned huge, my head tilting back as I did.
“I guess so,” I murmured and opened my eyes.
It was light out, but you could barely tell due to the blackout curtains that were blocking most of the daylight.
There was enough light for me to see the color of butterscotch, though.
“Hey.” I cleared my throat, hoping to cause some of the sleepiness to clear from my morning voice. Birdee always liked to point out that I sounded like I smoked thirty packs of cigarettes in my sleep. “Um, how did I get here?”
He grunted out a sound that sounded amused. “You don’t remember anything you did or said last night?”
That had my belly dropping.
The only time I got like this was when…
“Did I take some Benadryl last night?”
Shit.
Shit, shit, shit.
This was bad.
Bad, bad, bad.
“What’s the last thing you remember?”
I thought about that answer for a long moment, my eyes on his, and eventually said, “Leaving work.”
He sighed. “Long story short, you went to eat at Hopps with Cody. Then y’all got to talking, and the anger at your father and sister started coming out. So you decided that a few drinks was the answer. You arrived at the bar where the bartender, Shade, decided to serve you a tequila with lime on the rim. Though he went out of his way to hide that he did it. Your lips started to swell, which clued you in on what he’d done. Cody went to the store next door and forced some Benadryl into you.”
“Fuck,” I murmured. “And how did I get here, with you?”
“You told Cody that you would be fine on your own. Cody and I made the executive decision that you wouldn’t be. So, you came home with me since Cody had to help her dad plow the streets.”
“The storm,” I mumbled. “Was it bad?”
“I have no clue if two feet of snow in one night is bad. But everything is shut down. Even Bunyan’s,” he muttered, unwrapping his arms and legs from around me.
I tried to block out how upset I was at the feeling of loss, but choked it down to focus on more practical matters.
The urge to pee was upon me.
I started to unroll myself, unsure just how I’d become so entangled in the sheets.
I finally freed myself from the sheet when I stood up and stretched.
When I felt bare air on my behind, I hastily tugged my t-shirt back down and gasped. “I’m so sorry.”
I had no clue what I’d done last night to warrant being completely changed into just a t-shirt—his t-shirt that smelled phenomenally good—but I knew that I’d done something.
Hopefully I didn’t try to sleep in the bathtub again…
“For what?” he asked from the other side of the bed, hand propping up his head.
“I don’t know what I did last night to warrant a change of clothes but…”
“You made snow angels in the snow,” he said. “You were soaked by the time I got you inside. You changed into one of my shirts on your own, and I ran a load of laundry with your wet clothes.”
“Oh.” I paused. “That’s not too bad.”
Not bad at all.
Definitely very tame for me and Benadryl Mable.
“Though, that was after you dove face first into the snow and told me you should probably just stay there overnight.”
I winced. “I swear I’m not this bad during my sober hours.”
He jerked his head toward the bathroom. “Bathroom’s through there.”
I took the hint and scurried to the bathroom, closing the door quietly behind me.
When I got the door firmly closed, I took a look around at the space.
The walls were made of pine, stained clear so you could see all the beautiful markings.
The floor was a darker brown, as was the ceiling. The sink was copper, with a massive faucet that matched.
But the shower area was what held me hostage.
It was…nice.
So very nice.
It was a huge walk-in, floor-to-ceiling white tile with a tub in the very corner that was calling my name.
“Hey, Romeo?”
“Yeah?” His voice sounded from the other side of the door. Close but not like he had his ear pressed to the door close.
“Can I take a bath?”
“Sure,” he called out. “I think there’s soap in there. Stuff underneath the sink that you can pour in to make bubbles and shit.”
I walked into the shower area, leaving the huge glass door wide open behind me, and started filling it up with the perfect temperature of water.