Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 84864 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 424(@200wpm)___ 339(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84864 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 424(@200wpm)___ 339(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
“You’re really hung up on that, aren’t you?” Ajax asked, his tone casual as if it were the most normal thing in the world to climb into a stranger’s car and strike up a conversation like we’d known each other for years.
“Well, yeah,” I said, pulling off the highway and heading toward Edgemont Thrills. “There is no other logical explanation of why someone who looks like you would follow me around.”
Ajax huffed a laugh, and the sound buzzed along my bones in the most delicious way.
There was a part of me—a really big part of me—that fully believed my tumor-addled brain had conjured Ajax from a collection of fantasies living in my subconscious. There was likely an eighty percent chance I was laughing and talking to myself as I parked in the lot of the amusement park, but I couldn’t really find a fuck to give. If he was a manifestation, then my brain had finally done one thing absolutely right, because he was utterly magnificent, the perfect combination of protective and dangerous.
“Have you been here before?” I asked him as he walked at my side, our arms nearly touching as we headed toward the park’s entrance.
“Can’t say that I have,” he said, dark eyes scanning the place with what I could only call an assessing gaze. Like he was searching for dangers and escape routes where I was only hunting for the fun.
“Of course not,” I said, paying the attendant for my park pass then studying Ajax’s interaction with the attendant. A slight breath of relief escaped me when she spoke to him and smiled up at him as he gave her a wad of cash.
But I knew better than anyone the power of the mind. I could’ve just conjured her speaking to him to validate my manifestation.
Wow, spin down the rabbit hole much?
“What do you want to ride first, Grace?” Ajax asked once he wore his bright blue wristband, something that looked totally out of sorts with his leather look but was somehow adorable all the same.
My eyes trailed the length of his powerful body, my cheeks heating at the idea of riding him for the night.
Ajax’s nostrils flared, eyes darkening for a second before he blinked it away.
“The big one,” I said, motioning behind me.
“I am the big one,” he teased, ripping a laugh from my lips.
“That one,” I said, pointing toward the coaster.
“Looks promising.”
We weaved our way through the crowd of people, making our way to the winding line for the biggest coaster the park offered. The one I’d always avoided on the rare times Maria was able to take me here as a special treat, usually for my birthday. The ride went up over forty-five stories high and broke speeds of one-hundred-and-thirty miles per hour. It was enough to warrant its own liability waiver and was exactly what I was looking for to kick off the end-of-my-life tour.
“You want to wait in line for a sixty-second ride?” Ajax asked as I moved to the line for the front of the coaster, signs displaying our wait time and the ride duration time.
“They say the front car is the scariest,” I answered, turning to face him as we waited.
He arched a brow at me, and I noticed he had a scar running through his left eyebrow. I had half a mind to ask him how he got it, but held back, since I didn’t want to tiptoe into the too-personal lane. Though, to be fair, he’d asked to hang out with me, even if he was a delicious manifestation.
“How scary can it be if it’s only sixty seconds?”
I glanced behind me where lights illuminated the insanely tall roller coaster. The tip of it looked like it touched the sky. I turned back to him. “You seem to be hung up on the time factor and not the thrill factor.”
He glanced up at the coaster, then back down to me and shrugged. “Doesn’t look very thrilling.”
I gaped up at him. “If the idea of dropping straight down from forty-five stories up doesn’t thrill you, then what does?”
A muscle in his jaw ticked, the mood shifting from playful barbing to something a little deeper. Which was exactly where I didn’t want to go. Because if he shared, then I’d have to share, and that was not what tonight was about. Tonight was about living.
I smiled up at him, reaching for that playfulness once more. “Guess you’re used to being up that high, huh?”
He furrowed his brow at me.
“Angel of death and all,” I teased. “Will you show me your wings later?”
Ajax moved closer to me as the line shifted forward. “Only if you say please,” he said, a smirk on his face and his voice lowered between us.
Lava shot through my veins, and I got lost in his eyes. The swirls of rich brown and almost black captivated me in a way nothing else had before. I had the most ridiculous urge to span the distance between us, to feel just how hard his muscles were, to brush my lips over—