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)
“Which is what’s supposed to happen.”
There was a long silence. Then L.W. seemed to talk to himself. “It wasn’t that bad, really. Right after. For, like, years, I was okay. I think the compensations started without my even being aware of them.”
The male moved on to the next painting, the one to the left of the white marble hearth that had never had a fire in it. Never would.
He hated the smell of hardwood burning, and then there was the mess.
“Lately, though…”
L.W. shook his head as he walked around to the twinsie canvas on the other side.
“I haven’t been able to keep things right,” he concluded as he turned to face Shuli. “You remember when you told me not to fuck around with Bitty? That she was too good for me.”
“I don’t remember phrasing it like that.”
“That was what you meant.”
“Not really. You’re the King’s son—from a bloodline perspective, you can’t get any better than your station.”
“I’m not talking about family trees. You said she deserved better, and you meant it.”
A strange feeling of foreboding came over Shuli, tightening the back of his neck. “What the fuck are we talking about here. Are you… do we have a psychological issue here. Like, a real one.”
The kind that made people you thought you knew turn out to be the sort of monsters that true crime enthusiasts talked about for generations.
Shuli measured L.W.’s upper body. Even if that leg wound slowed the guy down a little, it went without saying who was going to win if the fucker had a psychotic break right here, right now.
He eyed the duffle bag where the weapons were. He had a nine in the little table next to him, but there was no reaching for it without a big show of movement—and that was before you added in the injury to his own side.
L.W. took a long, slow inhale. “I can smell your fear.”
Okay, so there was no way to respond to that—
“I just… can’t see it properly.”
Shuli got real fucking still. “What are you talking about.”
The heir to the throne was silent for what felt like forever. And then he said in a low voice:
“I’m going blind.”
CHAPTER THIRTY
As Dev and Lyric emerged from Roberto’s, she was all up in her head, wondering if he was going to bring up the what-next, whether she was going to do it, if they were going to go back to his place and finish what they’d started. Or… maybe just take it a little further—
“This was great.” He turned and faced her. “And not the food.”
“You didn’t like your Bolognese?”
As he laughed, she watched his face, seeing the crinkling at the sides of his eyes, something she’d come to look for when he smiled. It made him seem younger, somehow, even though for a human he was only in his late twenties. Had she asked him his age? She didn’t remember. And P.S., check them out, being all regular-people, regular-problems: Date commentary, lingering in the glow of an Italian eatery’s sign, hesitating to go forward, not wanting to leave.
Big difference from the night before—and for that matter, the night before that.
“I liked you.” His hand came up and brushed a strand of her hair that had caught the wind. “But the food was good, too.”
“Yes,” she whispered.
Was that an answer to the question he hadn’t asked? Hell yeah, it was. Except as their pause turned into an actual silence, she wondered once again whether a brush-off was coming—
“I wish I could take you back to my place.”
“Oh.” She shook her head to clear it. “I mean, sure. That’s… fine. I get it—”
“It’s not because I don’t want to be with you. I’m actually moving.”
“You are?” She tried to tamper down a shock that resonated way too much. “From Caldwell?”
No, North Dakota, you idiot, she thought.
“I don’t know where I’ll end up.”
She waited for him to say more. “Oh. Okay.”
But come on, where did she think this was all going? He didn’t know what she really was, she didn’t know who he really was—and now that she looked back on it, the talk over their table had all been very superficial. He’d never once asked about her family or her life, and she’d been relieved because what could she share other than mother, father, father, father, and brother? And even that buried the lead, as the saying went.
Come to think of it… what the hell had they talked about? She couldn’t remember now—no, wait. That wasn’t completely true. She’d asked him on a third date and he hadn’t said yes. He’d just changed the subject to whatever she was going to order, or something equally banal. As disappointment crested, she decided that she needed to be real here. They hadn’t been thoughtfully set up by friends, or met over a shared interest. They had… collided.