Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 142050 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 474(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142050 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 474(@300wpm)
He didn’t trust himself to fuck a blonde at this point. Why spin the wheel of shame and risk landing on such more-than-likelies as Impotence, Premature Ejaculation, or—worst of all—Crying Jag.
Putting his foot down on the heated floor, he checked the other one—which turned out to be in worse shape—and then forced himself up to the vertical. As he initiated forward momentum, the distance to the shower seemed to get longer and longer, but hey, at least he had plenty of time to enjoy the view of all his gold faucets and the gold-and-black monogrammed rug.
Oh, and also the black agate tub that had illumination running through it, the veins of white and gold crisscrossing like some kind of magical map to be deciphered.
He used the thing as his nightlight.
Over at the spacious shower alcove, which was the size of a garage and lit up thanks to a motion detector, he hit the water, and when things were warm enough, he stepped into the eight-headed spray—
“Fuck.”
All that raw skin on his tootsies screamed as the H2O ran over his feet, and he gritted his teeth as he let his head fall back. Like the tub, the black agate walls and ceiling of the shower room glowed through that subtle veining, and he felt like he was up in the sky and there were ribbons of clouds all around him.
Was he still stoned, too? He couldn’t remember whether he’d smoked a bowl before he’d crashed with the Absolutely Not Lyric escort.
Sweeping his hands back through his dripping hair, the shed water hit his ass with a slap that felt a lot like a cosmic spank. Was it about the sex worker? Or about all his unrequited?
The universe was going to have to be a little more specific if it was trying to teach him something.
God, he’d been watching Lyric from afar for so long now, he couldn’t remember a time when he’d not snuck glances at her, or pretended to be cool when she’d hugged him as a greeting or a goodbye—or hidden behind his cool, rich fuckboy cloak of don’t-care. When he’d seen that video last night, he’d been reminded that life didn’t last forever, and what the fuck was he waiting for? Maybe he should finally say something.
Yeah, well, the punchline to that stupid idea was that his lifestyle—the drinking, the drugs, the prostitutes—might well be why she wrote him off. And his Sisyphean boomerang on that was that he was self-medicating everything he felt the instant she walked into any room.
Plus, God, Rhamp would kill him.
Then again, that male was going to have to get the fuck in line. The Black Dagger Brotherhood was already first on that list—
Shit, they might actually bury him tonight…
As his reality sunk into his parboiled brain, Shuli realized he’d hit a brick wall and there was a kind of peace that came with the impact—maybe because of an existential head injury, but at this point, he wasn’t going to bother teasing out if this clarity was courtesy of destiny giving him CTE.
Bottom line, he had one hour to find that female and talk to her.
Before Lassiter only knew what was going to be done to him.
* * *
When the sky was finally dark enough, L.W. left the mansion, making sure to lock up behind himself. He was stiff as fuck after sleeping on the floor in front of the hearth, and he’d been a block of ice when he’d finally woken up, the embers of the fire having long drifted into their ashy deaths, the warmth gone, gone, gone.
Outside, he looked up over his shoulder. Atop the gargoyle’d roof’s slate peaks, the moon was peeking at him, like it was afraid of his mood and hiding in the forest of old iron lightning rods.
He told his brain to remember this sight, the silvery illumination broken up by those spiked diverters of bad weather strikes, the shapes of the purposely hideous creatures guarding the stone manse like something out of a fantasy novel.
Every time he left this place, he felt like it was a goodbye.
And some night, that was going to be true.
Closing his lids, he dematerialized and traveled in a scatter of molecules to the south, his destination one that he’d visited many times in his mind, and sometimes with his body. When he re-formed, it was in more knee-deep snow and in the shadows of a row of bare-branched trees. As he glanced across the drift-blanketed lawn to the well-lit, well-cared-for Colonial house, he shook his head.
There were footprints marring the snowpack. A lot of them. All his.
Fucking creeper, he thought as he followed his own trail.
Especially given that Safe Place was where females and their young were supposed to take shelter from dangerous males.
Not that he would ever hurt Bitty. Or anybody else in there.