Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 68509 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68509 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 343(@200wpm)___ 274(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
“What the actual fuck?” Violet shrieked, rushing backward and plowing right into me.
My hands went to her hips to steady her, making my mind flash back to one of those same hands in her panties, teasing up her wet cleft, sinking into her tight pussy…
Fuck.
No.
I needed to focus.
She was scrambling my brain.
“What is it?”
“You don’t see that?” she asked, throwing out an arm to point at an old fallen tree.
It took me a second. Because, honestly, I didn’t think she’d be freaking out about a bug.
“The beetle?”
“If beetles took anabolic steroids or were the result of some sort of failed government experiment, sure, ‘the beetle.’”
“It’s a Titan beetle.”
“No way that thing hatched from an egg. He just emerged in the forest one day, fully formed, briefcase in hand. He’s got a social security number, a mortgage, and a 401k. He probably has an ex-wife and kids he bitches don’t call him enough. Oh, shit, he’s looking at me. Take him,” she demanded, scrambling behind me and pushing me forward.
“They’re harmless.” I was barely managing to keep a laugh in as she ducked down to peek out from behind me.
“He wants to eat me. I can tell.”
“Can you blame him?”
“Be serious.” Violet grumbled, then let out a shriek as the beetle took a few steps in our general direction.
To be fair, Titan beetles were fucking enormous. If I picked it up, it would cover my whole hand. But it was a beetle.
“We should have brought one of those bug zapper things in with us. I think if we tried to step on him, it would hurt us more than him.”
“We’re not gonna kill him. He’s just living his life. Eating the dead wood.”
“Sure, that’s what he wants you to think. Until you lay down to sleep and wake up to him eating your intestines.”
“In this scenario of yours, I slept hard enough for him to chew through my whole outer stomach?”
“Maybe you ate some… hallucinogenic mushroom or something.”
“Did you eat a hallucinogenic mushroom?” I asked, turning around to face her, lips stretched wide because, well, she was being ridiculous. “You alright? Got a fever?” I asked, pressing my inner wrist to her flushed and sweaty forehead, but finding her just the normal kind of heated from exertion.
“It is not crazy to be freaked out by a beetle that you could put a saddle on and ride.”
There was no stopping the laugh that bubbled up and burst out, making me throw my head back and let it roll through me. I hadn’t realized just how tense I’d been until she helped me release some of it.
It’d started on the last leg of the car ride as the weight pressed down on me. If I was wrong, my life as I knew it was over. I’d have to live my life hiding from the law, looking over my shoulder, praying no one ever found me. I’d have to be a different person, like my new fake passport claimed. I’d need to lie to everyone I tried to make connections with moving forward.
If I was right, well, I still had a hell of a mess to try to clean up ahead of me.
And it all hinged on finding this damn eco-resort location.
“It’s not funny.”
“Oh, duchess,” I said, throwing an arm around her shoulders and pulling her close to my side. “It’s hilarious. Are you afraid of household spiders too?”
“Depends,” she said as I led her past the beetle.
“On?”
“Is it one of those little white wall spiders? Then no. Is it one of those big, black ones with venom dripping from their fangs when they look at me? Then yes.”
“Venom, huh? Where do you live that has all these fanged spiders?”
“Navesink Bank.”
“New Jersey?” I asked, letting out a huff of a laugh. “The scariest thing in New Jersey is the drivers on the turnpike.”
“Says someone who has never had a showdown with a cave cricket.”
“Who won?” I asked, realizing she was letting me keep my arm around her as we continued to walk. I shouldn’t have liked that as much as I did.
“Well, we came to an agreement.”
“What’s that?”
“He got to have the basement. I would do my laundry at the laundromat.”
“For a badass recovery agent, your insect phobia is kind of cute.”
“I am not cute,” she objected, narrowing her eyes up at me.
She sure as hell was.
But I was getting to know her well enough to know not to push it.
At least we weren’t being acrimonious anymore.
“Oh, hey!” she said, voice going singsong a while later. “Oh, my God. Look at you and your fancy little beard.”
My gaze followed hers up to the trees, seeing an Emperor Tamarin—a small black monkey with an impressively long white beard.
“You look like you are guarding the portal to another world,” Violet went on as the monkey stared down at us. “You need a solid staff and a monocle, yes, you do.”