Total pages in book: 73
Estimated words: 69018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 345(@200wpm)___ 276(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 345(@200wpm)___ 276(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
He’s definitely not used to money not being able to solve all his problems.
“Is this going to turn into a weird sex thing where you won’t let me sleep in any bedroom except yours, and you won’t let me wear my own clothes, and I’ll have to wear yours because you like seeing me in them, and then suddenly I’m your prisoner?”
Admittedly, those horrid thoughts should be more in the horrid department and less of a punch in the reproductive organ department. In all his muscly glory, he’s too muscly. Certainly, no one’s fantasy is to procreate with a granite block. Some women like muscles on muscles, snapping dark eyes, a hint of mystery, and a few scars. You know what my jam is? For the past while, it’s been nothing. Life problems and stress affecting the libido and all that, but in the very distant past? My jam is kindness. Courtesy. A gentleman. Cat guys—not furries, goodness. I mean, guys who like cats more than dogs.
This guy is blocky and broody. He doesn’t like cats or kids. He doesn’t like me, and he’s grumpy. All he cares about is work, which means he probably only gives a rat’s behind about the money at the end of the day. While I’m alone by circumstance, he’s alone by choice.
He was shocked into flabbergasted silence for about ten point two nine seconds, long enough for my brain to bounce those thoughts off my ovaries. What’s going on, babymakers? What’s the malfunction? And my ovaries were all, brain, we’re okay. Just a momentary blip of irrational craziness. Those happen sometimes, you know. You’re the one producing the hormones and sending the signals. We’re just along for the ride.
His face morphs into a fearsome, thunderous scowl with a hint of mystified whatthefuckness. “What the hell? No! You were the one who just told me how the retribution was going to play out.”
“Right. Well, you were the one who ruined my life.”
“I haven’t done anything to ruin your life. Let’s get that straight.”
I scoff. “We’ll have to agree to disagree.”
“You can agree to disagree about where you’re going to end up, but it’s not going to be at my house.”
“You just said it would be at your house.”
Double eye twitches. “I’ve changed my mind.” More muscle flexing.
Bro, get a shirt already. “Why? Do you have some heinous secret? Bodies in the freezer?”
“What is it with you and the bodies? I’m not even going to dignify that with an answer. The only bodies in my freezer are frozen corn and steaks.”
He did dignify it. “Cow bodies then.”
“I suppose so. Go ahead, judge me.”
I stroke my cat’s head, scratching lightly behind her ears. She gives a light purr and keeps it up but doesn’t open her eyes. “Peach Lips and I both eat meat. There’s no judgment here. If you do, you do. If you don’t, you don’t. That’s where I stand on pretty much all the hot-button issues.”
“What are you going to do if you won’t go on vacation while I get this sorted?”
He’s already given in. Putting on this show of protest isn’t fooling either of us. “Oh, I am. At your penthouse.”
“I don’t have a penthouse.”
I roll my eyes and snort. My nose is suddenly clear enough that the snort sounds good and not nasally. “All rich people have penthouses. I looked up your net worth. Well, technically, I looked you and your company up, and I just happened to read the rest.”
“Hmph. In that case, let me offer you three million dollars as compensation for your troubles, let me fix said troubles, and give you a free vacation on top of it all to a destination of your choosing, which is not my house.”
“Here’s the deal. Your house. One week.” Yeah, I know I’m compromising here, but if that’s what it takes to tunnel into Thorn’s life, bad graces, and utter annoyance as much as he’s tunneled under my skin, it’s worth it. “Then, I come back to my bus and go back to my sort of home and wait for you to fix this or for people to just forget and hopefully resume the circuit. If that doesn’t pan out, then well… I hope, in that time, I can think of something else I can do to help the world. Animals, people, nature. All of it. I thought this was my calling.” Plenty of times, I’ve thought my life would turn out differently. “The only thing to be done is to pick your gyat up and keep on going.”
At last, he loses it and gapes at me. “Did you just use the word ‘gyat’?”
“It rhymes with cat. Cat gyat. Maybe suggest to your team that they can use that in their new marketing for my new rebranding or whatever it is they’re doing.”