Total pages in book: 185
Estimated words: 191421 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 957(@200wpm)___ 766(@250wpm)___ 638(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 191421 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 957(@200wpm)___ 766(@250wpm)___ 638(@300wpm)
He sighs, his fingers fisting my dress at my waist. “It doesn’t matter, all right? I don’t plan on sticking around for the draft and all that bullshit anyway.”
“What?”
His expression shutters then and I hate this even more.
I hate it to my core.
That he’s shutting me out. That there’s something he’s not telling me.
And I have a feeling that something is going to be the information that I’m really not going to like.
“Reign,” I prod, bringing my hand down to his face. “Tell me.”
His jaw tics for a few more seconds before he says, “I’m not staying.”
“What does… What does that mean?”
“It means,” he says, sighing, “that I’m not sticking around to work with my brother for a year and I’m not sticking around for college or the draft. I’m leaving.”
Fear seizes my breaths. “W-when? Where?”
Again, his shoulders move up and down casually, like this isn’t the most disastrous thing I’ve ever heard. “I don’t know where. Away from here. Far fucking away.”
I press his cheek. “That’s not an answer. That doesn’t tell me anything. That’s barely anything, Reign. That’s —”
“It’s the only answer I have,” he cuts me off. “And as for when…”
He pauses here and oh my God, I know.
I fucking know when.
I fucking know what he’s going to say and I don’t want him to say it.
I do not want him to say another word.
But before I can stop him, he continues, “When this is over.” He tightens his fist in my dress, pulling at the fabric as he adds, his teeth clenched, “When you go back to him.”
I know I should take a second here.
I should pause myself and frame my response correctly and tactfully.
Because I know it’s important.
But I’m freaking out. I’m losing my mind and so the words simply slip out. “What if I don’t want to go back to him?”
He stiffens beside me.
I feel his muscles turn to stone. His biceps stop flexing beneath my cheek and his chest stops breathing. Even his stomach plastered against mine grows all solid and dense.
Only thing moving on his reposed body is his eyes that grow blazing as they search my expression.
“This because of what just happened?” he asks, his words all low and growly. “Between us.”
Again, I should choose my words carefully but I don’t. “What if it is?”
He breathes then.
Long and hard, his inhale ending in a low growl and a heavy shake of his frame.
Then, almost ripping my dress with his hand, he goes, “Then I’d say that we’re already over.”
“What?”
He gets up all in my face, his hot breaths misting my skin. “Then I’d say, Echo, that you’re stupider than I thought. And last night I thought you were plenty stupid. You were plenty fucking stupid and naive when you took your clothes off for me and tossed me a fucking bone. Without knowing how much I’ve wanted to rip into it, into you.”
“Reign —”
“Because if you choose this, me, whatever the fuck I did to you back there, the way I fucking used you to ease the pain in my dick, over going back to the guy who loves you, who has loved you for fucking years, then I might as well leave now and never ever come back.”
This time my tears spill and I don’t — can’t — stop them at all. “N-no, Reign, please —”
He comes over me then.
He rolls me over on my back and hovers over me, looms both like a threat and my salvation. Framing my face in his rough hands, he says gutturally, “Do you understand what’s happening between us? Do you understand that this is just fucking? This is just sex. Okay, Echo? I’m just fucking you. I’m using you to cure myself. To get you out of my system so I can move on. The very thing you wanted to do yesterday. Do you realize that?”
I hiccup out a breath, as my tears keep pouring. “Y-yes.”
He comes down to lick them. “Then you have to go back to him. You have to go back to the life you’d planned for yourself, yeah? NYU, Lucas. New York, becoming a big-shot writer. You have to go back.”
I sob. “I —”
He starts to kiss me then, small tender kisses all over my wet cheeks. “You can’t let this, whatever we’re doing here, ruin it for you, understand? You can’t let me ruin your life, Echo. That’s the whole point. That’s why I did what I did back then, pushed you to him. That’s why I’ve done what I’ve done all these years. You can’t let me. Tell me you understand that. Tell me or I —”
I wind my arms around him then and hold him to me. “I do. I-I do.”
He stares down at me, his lips wet from my tears. “Yeah?”
“Yes.” I hiccup again, trying to calm myself down, calm my sobs.