Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 87573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 438(@200wpm)___ 350(@250wpm)___ 292(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 438(@200wpm)___ 350(@250wpm)___ 292(@300wpm)
“My car wouldn’t start this morning,” Eve filled in.
“And you were together…why?”
“We’re working together,” I told her. “Eve is the agent for my new survey project in Midland.”
Piper’s eyes widened, and she and Eve spoke volumes without saying anything.
“Ohhh,” she drawled. “Well, that sounds…fun. You told me about your new job. I didn’t know you’d be working with Whitt.”
“Neither did I,” Eve said. She knocked her fist into Piper’s shoulder. A clear sign to tell her to shut up. Piper just smirked. “Can you give me a jump?”
“Oh, I would,” Piper said, her eyes flickering between us, “but I have to get back to work. Could Whitt do it? Sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it. I can do it,” I told Piper. “Tell Hollin I said hi.”
Piper snorted. “Tell him yourself. He’s a pain in my ass.”
“Literally?” Eve asked.
Piper and Hollin had been dating for a year, and sometimes, it was still hard to decipher whether they liked or hated each other. Somehow, constantly being at each other’s throat worked for them.
“I’m going to forget you asked that,” Piper said as she strode to her Jeep. “Thanks for taking care of my girl, Whitt.”
“Anytime.”
“See y’all tomorrow.”
Then, she was pulling away, leaving us alone once more. Eve looked after her friend in dismay. Maybe she’d hoped to get out of my presence sooner. Too late now.
“You have cables?”
She jolted out of the reverie and nodded. She dug around in her bag and tossed me her car keys. “They’re in the back. I’m just going to change.”
I watched her practically hustle to get inside. Once again, I wasn’t sure what to make of her. It was apparent that she was flirting with me. Just like she had the first time around. Because Eve had come on to me when we first started talking. I’d been a willing participant. But I’d dated enough back in Seattle to know that I preferred a relationship to a situationship. It was fine if that was what she wanted. It just wasn’t what I wanted. No matter how my dick reminded me that I couldn’t stop fucking thinking about getting her naked.
I ran a hand back through my hair. She’d made herself clear the first time, and I wasn’t going to do this again. We were working together. That was it.
4
Eve
I leaned back against the front door and ran a hand down my face. “Get it together, Houston.”
Whitt was just a guy that it hadn’t worked out with. He was no different from the parade of exes who had masqueraded through my life. In fact, we hadn’t even gotten far enough for that. He’d wanted more than I could offer, and I shouldn’t still be interested just because he was hot as fucking sin. I shouldn’t make an exception for him.
Once it was over, it was over. I’d learned my lesson to never look back. What was in the past was only ever going to drag down my future. Or completely blow up my future, like Arnold Sinclair had done. One moment, I’d been on a pedestal, and the next, I’d discovered he wasn’t separated from his wife. Suddenly, I was a homewrecker and not just trailer trash.
It had been hard to want any kind of relationship since then. Especially from someone like Whitton. He was Wright royalty, smart, driven, and intensely attractive. He was everything a girl could want. But girls like me, who had grown up in a trailer park and been crowned the town slut, didn’t end up with guys like him. And contemplating what it would be like to live through this fantasy didn’t help anything.
I wasn’t about to let another rich, pretty guy implode my life. Not when I was finally in a good place again.
“Right,” I whispered and pushed off of the door.
With a clear mind, I headed back into my room and stripped out of my professional attire. I still wasn’t used to wearing dress clothes. Not where I’d grown up. I’d always be more comfortable in my cowboy boots over my Louboutins. No matter how incredible my ass looked when I wore them.
I put my work heels in their place of honor. They gave me legitimacy for my clients, even here in West Texas. But I was over them, and I needed a different kind of armor to go deal with Whitt.
I pulled on a pair of short frayed-edge jean shorts and a baby-blue crop top. My hair went up into a sleek ponytail. Then, I slid my feet into my trusty boots. They weren’t the decorative kind that the girls wore on campus with their little minidresses. I’d gotten these in the Stockyards. I’d ridden horses in them. They were sturdy leather and made to last. The last vestiges of my home.
After reapplying a slick of lipstick, I grabbed two bottles of water from the fridge. It really was a thousand degrees out there, and Whitt didn’t have the convenience of changing out of his presumably wool suit and long-sleeved button-up. It was too hot for that mess. No matter how good he looked in it.