Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 122382 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 612(@200wpm)___ 490(@250wpm)___ 408(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122382 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 612(@200wpm)___ 490(@250wpm)___ 408(@300wpm)
How the hell do I know what a bed jacket looks like? No idea. But I’d like to see it on my bedroom floor. And that ribbon . . . Open me, it seems to taunt. Pull on my end!
I wish Ryan would—
Fucking brain. I discreetly adjust myself under the table. I’m definitely losing my marbles. By the day, it seems.
Ryan reaches for her glass again, holds it up to the light, and says something. Something about the wine, probably. I don’t know exactly what, my attention still pinned to that bow and all that lovely cleavage and the now you see it, now you don’t effect.
Fuck, how I ache to get my hands on her.
“Are you done?”
That I hear, though it’s more the tone that pulls me from my musing. Perving? Anyway, I lift my gaze to her very pointed one, but not without noting how glossy her lips look.
Did she just lick them?
“Done for now,” I answer in an easy tone. I drop my napkin to the table and lean back in my chair.
“I wasn’t talking about dinner.”
“I know you weren’t. But you can’t blame a man for looking. Not when you’re irresistible.”
“I’m practically the size of a house,” she scoffs.
“Must be a very compact house. A bijou abode.”
Her mouth curls reluctantly, though she ducks her head to hide it.
“Actually, come to think of it, can I move in?”
“You.” That’s all she says. You. Though her cheeks turn a lovely pink hue. She also gives a long-suffering shake of her head.
“I’ll take that as a no.”
“As you can see,” she says, putting her hands to her rounded stomach, “there’s no room at the inn.”
“Hmm. I do see. And you know what occurs to me?”
“I dread to think.”
“While it was no immaculate conception, it was pretty fuckin’ spectacular.”
“What has gotten into you tonight?”
You, I want to repeat. You’ve gotten into my head. And my heart. But she’s not ready to hear those admissions. Maybe it’s just practice she needs.
More time on the countertop?
I get that she’s alone in the world, that’s she’s had a shit upbringing, and there’s probably more to it than a lack of pets and a bad mother. I wish she’d confide in me.
And at the same time, I know the reveal has to be on her terms.
I can’t imagine being alone. I can’t even imagine being an only child, though plenty of times I wished for it. Especially in a house with as many kids as my parents had, where the arses outnumbered the bathrooms. But adolescence aside, I’d hate to be without my siblings. My parents. My friends. How does she cope? Who does she turn to when she needs a pep talk or a kick up the arse? Or a hedge fund ruining.
No wonder being dumped by that prick did a number on her. And it did, because let’s face it, no one goes to the lengths she did to be at his wedding. It wasn’t just about the dicks she worked with. Or maybe I should say about one of them. It was about saving face.
It was about saying: I’m here. I stand. You didn’t beat me.
How can anyone not admire her for that?
But I worry about it too. Her once-bitten-twice-shy attitude and her hyperindependence. Just the fact of these dinners, our time rationed, is absurd. Especially when I see how relaxed she becomes in my company. And how she looks at me when she thinks I’m not paying attention. I know I’d be good for her if she’d only let me try.
I’ve got time, I tell myself. There are more than ten weeks left of her pregnancy, for a start. Or maybe our time will come after the babe.
I just want that time now.
“So,” she says, her tone and her discomfited wiggle signaling a change in the conversation. “What’s new at the office?”
Work is such a big part of Ryan’s life. Not being in the office must feel a bit like losing a limb. Not for long, though.
“You know how it is. Another day at the coalface, preserving the time value of money.” The theory that a dollar today is worth more than a dollar next week due to its earning potential in the period between. In other words, investments. It’s what Maven is known for. We invest in real estate mostly, and at the moment, we’re big on urban redevelopment. This is partially down to Fin championing Mila’s social causes. And that’s fine for all concerned because we’re still making a shit ton of money. Though Oliver maintains he’s in debt up to his (still very wealthy) eyeballs, but that’s down to his love for Evie. And how she persuaded him a stately home and safari park would make a good fixer-upper project.
Lions and tigers and labradoodles, oh, hell!
The things they’ve done for their wives. The ways they’ve changed and bended for love—I find that shit amazing.