Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 87284 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 436(@200wpm)___ 349(@250wpm)___ 291(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87284 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 436(@200wpm)___ 349(@250wpm)___ 291(@300wpm)
“Okay, I think I have to confess something,” Mack said.
The way he said it made me frown, so I unhurriedly lowered Noodle back into his home before closing the lid. “What’s up? If you’re breaking up with me, you shouldn’t have spent freaking Christmas with me.”
He chuckled quietly and kissed my hand. “I’m not breaking up with you.”
Thank fuck. Our relationship was fairly new and nontraditional, but I’d come to adore him. My cousin had introduced us, so I owed him one. Possibly including the truth about Mack and me dating. We hadn’t told anyone whatsoever. We had our reasons. At least, we used to. Things were changing.
“This trip to Florida…” He cleared his throat and fixed his gaze to my hand. “I was invited to tag along before you introduced me to your, uh, reptile family. I mean, before…you always spent the night at my place.”
I quirked a brow, confused. Yeah, I’d waited to invite him over because until two weeks ago, my sister had lived with me. Now she’d moved back to our parents’ in Providence. I’d spent the holiday turning her old room into a tropical heaven for my pets and my collection of succulents. Blue and Noodle were moving there soon too.
Maybe I should move the aquarium in there as well. I could do it when it was time for a partial water change. It would be much easier. Dad could probably help me. He was coming down to visit soon. Since I’d bailed on Christmas.
“…so they kill the snakes.”
“Wait, what?” I shook my head quickly, realizing I’d zoned out. “Who’s killing snakes?”
“The guys I’m going to Florida with,” he said. Or repeated, I guessed. “They’re gonna help one of our new members kill snakes.”
I rubbed my forehead, finding it difficult to focus. Who was—right, he was going with a few friends from his kink community. They’d been invited down there by a new member—understood.
“What snake?” I asked, standing up. I opened my nightstand drawer and grabbed my meds, and I swallowed one pill dry.
“Some kind of python, I think?” he asked rather than stated.
I didn’t need any further information. “Undoubtedly the Burmese. Good. Good for them.”
I couldn’t sit still anymore, so I started picking up laundry off the floor. I kept my shit tidy, but Mack and I had gone out last night, and our clothes tended to land whereverthefuck.
“It doesn’t bother you?” he asked. He looked so surprised, it was almost funny.
“Why would it bother me?” I chuckled. “It’s an invasive species fucking with the entire ecosystem of the Everglades. Same with the damn iguanas. They shouldn’t be in Florida at all.”
I’d fostered two iguanas in my day. Lovely creatures, but I didn’t believe they were suitable as pets in many cases.
“I’m not some pet trade fanboy, Mack,” I told him. “I’ve adopted all my snakes, and I try to give them a good home, but…” I shook my head. If I said any more, I’d end up rambling for two hours, and I didn’t have the energy for that. “A ridiculously long story short, not all animals are suitable to be pets, and if more people agreed with me, they wouldn’t be buying a fucking Burmese python that they later on can’t take care of because, holy cow, apparently they can grow to be over twenty feet long—let’s set it free in the backyard swamp.” I hauled in a breath. “So yeah. I mean, I have Frank because of that reason. Some macho dad wanted to give his son a snake, and then the son got scared because the snake was suddenly bigger than him. It was my home or a screwdriver through the brain.”
Don’t even get me started on people who went out into the wild and captured reptiles to keep in a tank.
Christ.
Mack reached for my hand again, and he swatted away the laundry and pulled me onto his lap.
I smiled a little.
“Come here.” He drew me closer as I dipped down and kissed him, and he slipped his hands underneath my briefs. “So you don’t think any snakes should be pets?”
“I wouldn’t go that far.” I ghosted my knuckles over the five-o’clock shadow on his jaw. “People just need to realize they can’t be domesticized like a dog—and let’s leave the larger breeds alone.”
He smiled and pulled me in for a kiss. “I love seeing you so passionate. You know that?”
I was passionate about him.
Given our circumstances, we hadn’t planned to take this very far. We’d been instantly attracted to each other, we loved to have fun, we had fantastic sex, we liked going out on dates…but we hadn’t believed involving deeper feelings would be a smart idea, and now here we were. We’d spent Christmas together with his homemade pizza creations and movies. We’d exchanged gifts and eaten cupcake frosting from a jar.