Total pages in book: 112
Estimated words: 105709 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105709 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
I’d already looked at it from Millie’s perspective, so nothing she says is new. “I think if I don't push her away, I'll destroy her.” I flick ash onto the floor. “Better she hates me now than watches me become the monster she's terrified of.”
“Hella—”
“How's the stalker situation?” I cut her off, needing to change the subject before I crack. “Any new notes?”
Her face goes tight. “Two more. I don't know how he's getting the shots.”
“We'll figure it out.” I pull out my phone, scrolling through the photos she sent me last week. Cryptic riddles in emails. A photo of her at the grocery store. Another of her sleeping at the nunnery.
“Beast has someone working on it.”
“What if he's here?” Her voice drops. “What if he followed me?”
“Then we'll deal with it.”
“That's it? We'll deal with it?”
“What else do you want me to say?” I pocket my phone, jaw clenching. “You stayed with me because you were scared and didn’t want to involve your sister or niece. I'm keeping you safe. End of fucking story.”
She laughs, but it's brittle. Hollow. Like something cracking apart.
“You know what's funny? When I first got here, I thought maybe God sent me to help you. To be some kind of—” She stops. Swallows. “I don't know—light in the darkness or whatever.”
My lip curls. “How's that working out?”
“Starting to think I’m delulu.” She finishes her Coke. Before I can respond, Millie's eyes track across the room. “She's leaving.”
I follow her gaze. Melissa's pushing through the crowd toward the exit, her shoulders hunched and tense.
Fuck.
“You should go after her,” Millie says.
“No.”
“Hella—”
“I said no.” But my hands are shaking. My pulse is hammering. Every instinct screams at me to follow. To fix this. To fall to my fucking knees and beg her to stay.
Can't do that. Won't do that.
Millie watches me for a long moment. Then she smiles. Actually smiles. “You're such an idiot.”
“Excuse me?” Fucking nun.
“You love her. She loves you. And you're both too stubborn to admit it.” She pushes off the wall. “I'm going to check on her. Make sure she's okay.”
“Millie—”
“Don't worry. I'll tell her the truth.” She starts walking. “That we're friends. That I've been helping you with ‘research’ while you help me with my problem. Nothing more.”
“You don't have to—”
“Yes, I do.” She glances back. “Because despite being an asshole, you're a good man, Hella. And she deserves to know that.”
Then she's gone, disappearing through the same exit Melissa took.
I stand there, cigarette burning down to my knuckles, fighting the urge to follow them both.
Hart women are going to be the fucking death of me.
My hand moves to my wallet without thinking. I pull out the worn photograph I've been carrying for fifteen years. The edges are soft from constant handling. The colours faded.
Tippy stares back at me, his weathered face split in a gap-toothed grin. And next to him, small and blonde and gap-toothed herself — Melissa.
She couldn't have been more than five. Six, maybe. Wearing a too-big rugby jersey and holding a hot dog bigger than her head. She's laughing at something off-camera. Tippy's hand rests on her shoulder.
I've memorized every detail in this photo. The bridge in the background. The vendor cart to the left. The way Tippy's looking at the little girl like she hung the fucking moon. Don’t know why he never had Millie, and when he mentioned his “girls”, I assumed he meant his daughter and wife.
“Everyone needs someone, kid. Even strays like us.”
“They think I'm dead,” he told me once. “Better that way. Better they have a chance at a real life without me dragging them down.”
When Melissa walked into my life, I recognized her immediately. Those eyes. That smile. The way she moves like she's two seconds from starting a fight or running away.
Tippy's Wild Child.
All grown up.
Struggled to tell her since figuring it out. That her father is for real dead and how I know this. I definitely don’t want to until I can separate my gratitude to Tippy from what I feel for her.
Because loving Melissa Hart has nothing to do with owing her father a debt. It has nothing to do with guilt or obligation or some misguided form of repayment.
I love her because she's fierce and damaged and whole all at once. Because she looks at the worst parts of me and doesn't flinch. Because when I'm with her, I feel human instead of monstrous.
But that's exactly why I can't have her.
She deserves better than a monster.
I pocket the photo and drain my beer. Across the room, Beast and Yana are tucked into a corner booth. She's talking animatedly about something, her hands moving in wild gestures. Beast stares at the wall behind her head, his expression blank.
Wrong.
She's all wrong for him.
Yana's sweet. Nice. The kind of woman who volunteers at animal shelters. The kind of woman any sane man would be lucky to have.