Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 107254 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 536(@200wpm)___ 429(@250wpm)___ 358(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107254 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 536(@200wpm)___ 429(@250wpm)___ 358(@300wpm)
“Lilah,” Emmett says my name, laughing. “Can we not scare her more?”
“I’m not scaring her.” I look over at him. “I’m just saying that there are scarier things.” I look at her. “You aren’t scared of birds, are you?” She shakes her head. “See.” I make a face to Emmett, who shakes his head and then walks away from us. “You can never be scared of birds or frogs,” I whisper to Lucy, “or else he’ll never let me help you again.”
She smiles for the first time. “There she is. Stuff can sometimes be really, really scary,” I say, “but the thing that helps me is thinking of your favorite place in the world.” Emmett comes back into the room with a towel in his hand. “Do you have a favorite place?”
“Yeah,” she replies, “the barn.” If I didn’t think it would scare her, I would gasp.
“There you go, so now when you are scared, it’s okay to close your eyes and pretend you are at the barn,” I advise her, and the thunder starts again. “Want to try it now?” She nods. “Close your eyes,” I instruct her, and she does, “and picture the horses.” She doesn’t open her eyes as another crack of lightning comes down.
“Lucy,” Emmett says her name, and when I turn my head, I see he’s squatting beside me. “Lilah is all wet. How about we let her get dry?” he tells her and opens the towel for me. “Come and sit with me while she dries off.”
Lucy looks at him, then back at me, seeing my hair plastered down on my head. He opens the towel, and she crawls over to him, and he wraps her with the towel. Shock fills his face, but his arms go around her. “I’m going to go and get another towel,” I tell him.
He mouths, “This one was for you.” I smile softly at him as I walk to Lucy’s bathroom, grabbing the towel hanging on the rack. Looking at myself in the mirror, I see my hair looks like the cat spent the night licking it.
When I finally walk into the room, I see Emmett is sitting with his back to the wall. “Is she okay?” I walk over to them, squatting down beside him, and see Lucy with her eyes still closed.
“Yeah, I think she’s sleeping,” he whispers, looking down at her. He looks back at me. “I don’t want to move.”
“I’m going to let myself out,” I tell him, wanting to sit beside him with my head on his shoulder. “You call me if you need anything.”
“I think my favors with you are all used up, don’t you think?” he asks, and I smile at him.
“It’s a good thing that you’re a good dad”—I wink—“and you are smoking hot even though you can be a pain in my ass.” The minute the words are out of my mouth, I want to die. Did I just tell him that he’s smoking hot to his face?
“Smoking hot?” He lifts his eyebrows, trying not to laugh.
“Goodbye.” I turn and walk to the door.
“Lilah,” he calls, and I turn to look over my shoulder. “I may be smoking hot,” he says, “but you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen in my life.” The air leaves my body.
“I’ll remember that the next time you call me a pain in the ass.” I take one more look at him before I walk out of the door and head to my truck. The rain is done, and the only raindrops that fall on me are the ones falling off the leaves of the trees.
“He thinks I’m beautiful.” I can’t help the smile that fills my face. “Who knew?”
Chapter Nineteen
LILAH
The door opens, and I look up from my desk and smile when I see Lucy bouncing inside. It’s been over a week since her breakdown from the thunder, and thankfully, there hasn’t been another storm since then. It’s crazy that every single day I get up and check the freaking weather now, something I haven’t done I think ever. “Good afternoon, Lucy,” I greet her when she walks toward my desk, dumping her bags on the floor, and the front door is then pulled open by her father.
“Hey, Lilah,” Lucy replies. “Guess what I got on my math test?” She bends to get something out of her bag, and I lean back in my chair, putting my hands on the armrests.
“Ummm, one hundred percent,” I guess, and she shakes her head, taking her test out.
“One hundred and four percent.” She holds the paper up in her hand. “It’s more than a hundred.” She points at the red mark with a sticker on the top and the word excellent written across. “I got the bonus right.”
“Aren’t you a smarty-pants,” I tease her, and she shrugs.