Total pages in book: 140
Estimated words: 135539 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135539 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
“March said that you’d been into me for a while. I didn’t believe him because, well, you’re you and I’m me. Now you’re telling me it’s true.”
August shakes his head with a huff. “Sweets, it truly amazes me how you don’t want to believe this.”
“Excuse me, but I’ve only had . . . oh, a lifetime of thinking something entirely different. It takes me a bit to do a one-eighty.”
“I get it,” he says with a tinge of irony.
“I’m not sure you do. August, I like who I am. I know my worth. Which means I know, without hyperbole or subterfuge that, when it comes to the outside world, you and I couldn’t be more different. With or without football, you are a star. People draw close as though you’re their center of gravity. I don’t begrudge you that. In truth, I love that about you. But me? I like to observe. I like the sidelines. I’m not the heroine who goes on adventures. I’m the side character who blends into the background. The idea that you even saw me . . . well, it’s a surprise, is all.”
“I told you before, you never see yourself the way I do.” He leans in, a fierce look in his eyes. “You say you’re a side character in everyone else’s story. In my story, Pen, you are the main character. You always will be.”
I breathe out a soft “Oh!”
“Yes, oh,” he snaps gently. “You stubborn woman.”
“I’m stubborn. That’s rich.”
His lips twitch, humor lighting his eyes. “Fine. How about fairly clueless?”
I should be insulted. But the fact is I have been clueless. I’m amazed about how much. Besides, he keeps looking at me with that tender gaze, as if, even in annoyance, I’m precious to him. It squeezes at my heart and makes me all fluttery.
“I’ve never been able to think clearly when it comes to you,” I confess.
At this, he smiles, a slow unfurling that pulls wide. “All right, then. Let me be crystal clear. No more lies or evasions. Just the truth.”
Slowly, he rises from his chair to sit at my side and take my hand. “Penelope Morrow, I have been in love with you since I was ten years old.”
My world flips over on its axis. “What?”
He gives me a pained grimace. “I don’t claim to understand it fully, but that day you cut your brow open and I held on to you while Jan ran to get help, I knew with bone-deep conviction that you were mine to love. Back then, it was the innocent love of a child.
“But it never faded. I was always aware of you. It was like some superpower, a built-in Penelope radar. The mere mention of your name grabbed my complete attention. Whenever you were around, I’d light up. And you never saw.”
The darks slashes of his brows snap together as he looks at me in bafflement. “How could you not see that? Honestly, it pissed me off some days. But then I realized, you weren’t ever going to see me when you never bothered to even look. You’d just run, and it broke my heart every time.”
August huffs out a half laugh full of self-deprecation. “I tried to get over it, over you. But I couldn’t. The heart knows what the heart knows.”
So great is my surprise, it takes a bit for his words to truly sink in, for me to really hear him. When I do, however, it’s as though I’m champagne uncorked. Giddy, effervescent joy bubbles up and overflows. And I start to laugh. Really laugh. I can’t help it.
Unfortunately, August takes it the wrong way. He rears back as though struck. “You’re laughing?”
“Yes. I’m sorry. It’s nerves. Irony. Both.” Weakly, I reach out and catch hold of his hand, squeezing it. “You loved me the whole time? I can’t believe . . . August Luck, I have been in love with you since I was nine years old and you cuddled me close while I bled all over your shirt. You were my hero. You’ve always been. It’s always been you.”
My words seem to bounce around in the following silence as he simply looks at me blankly. Then, as if snapping out of it, his brows lift in clear shock. “How . . .” He frowns and narrows his eyes in annoyance. “You always looked at me like I was something foul the cat dragged in!”
And he talks of me not seeing things as they are.
“I looked at you the way a painfully shy girl does when facing the object of her affection and being totally overwhelmed with feeling.”
“Damn it, Pen. I didn’t have a clue.” With a huff, he stands and grasps the back of his neck with both hands like he doesn’t know what to do with this information.