Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 73817 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 369(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73817 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 369(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
“Maybe this wasn’t a mistake,” he says after a thought. He lays a hand on the counter and starts drumming a little rhythm with his fingers—a specific, familiar rhythm. “You deserve to unleash your anger. You’ve probably had it pent up in you all these years. No one else deserves it but me.”
“If you came just to throw yourself a pity party …”
“I’m angry at me, too. Ten-years-younger me. I wish I could go back and talk to him. Yell at him. Make him see. Wipe away all his youthful arrogance …” His fingers drum harder. “Honestly, I want to join you in your anger. Vent with you. I have a lot of regrets. Yes, I will live with them forever, I can’t change what I did. But if there’s anything I can give you …” His drumming stops. “It’s knowing that the boy who hurt you is gone.”
I’m finished listening to him. “You should have stuck with your first instinct. That this was a mistake. If you have no further business in Dreamwood, then goodbye.”
“Cooper …”
The bathroom door swings open with a bang, and out struts a very relieved-looking Chase, positively beaming. “Man, that was one epic dump.” He comes right up to my side, oblivious to the tension. “Anyway, I’ve given it more thought, about the whole raise thing, and—Are you okay?”
I stare at him.
Drake stares at him.
Chase frowns, then notices Drake. “Oh! Sorry, sir. Am I … interrupting something …?”
Drake pulls his hand off the counter. “No. I was just on my way out.” He looks at me. “I leave tomorrow morning. When I go, it’s … for the very last time. Sunnyview, room 424. Just to talk. If you want to free your heart from the chains I put on it. You deserve more.” Then he slides off of the barstool and heads out without looking back.
I stare numbly at the door after it swings shut. Not a single thought seems to permeate the iron wall that was just erected in my mind. The man sleeping at the bar starts to snore. The couple playing darts break into laughter at some funny thing that happens during their game. The world just keeps moving, and all I can do is stare at that door.
“Boss? Did you, uh … know that guy …?”
I come to, grab the half-empty bowl off the counter, and refill it. “Not anymore.”
Chapter 14 - Seany
At first, it’s boring.
Then it’s crazy busy.
Toby’s boyfriend’s table is swarmed by a huge group of local college students who are apparently obsessed with his work. I step back and find myself just standing around picking at my fingernails and feeling useless. Vann isn’t at all like I expected him to be, judging from Toby. With his wild black hair, earrings, sleeveless black shirt, torn skinny jeans, and spiked cuffs on his wrists, the guy looks like he plays lead guitar in a 90s cover band. It’s no wonder his art is full of demons and monsters. But the longer I see the two of them together, the more I realize how perfectly they complement one another. Toby is the sweetness an artist like Vann needs to temper him. Vann is the wild side Toby needs to pull him out of his shell. Had Vann been on the beach that first day I met Toby, I doubt I would have made it out with that cash; something about Vann seems strong and protective, like he would never let his precious Toby be taken advantage of.
It makes me happy, but it also hurts a little, to watch the two of them together.
Then I think about the way Toby came to my rescue. It might be a good thing it was Toby I befriended and not Vann. Vann looks like the kind of guy who wouldn’t have held back in planting a fist into Ice’s face.
No, I haven’t seen Ice again. But this island is only so big. It’s inevitable I’ll run into him again. Unless luck is on my side, he grows bored, and Dreamwood Isle becomes a memory for him.
Somehow, I doubt that’ll happen.
Bad luck has a way of staying on my heels.
Toby keeps apologizing to me for the craziness while he juggles managing the customers and attending to (his very overwhelmed-looking) artist boyfriend. I remind him I can help, but he insists I just relax and enjoy myself.
I watch him count change for a customer.
Dollars slide from his hand to the table.
Counting them out one by one.
Dollars being folded up and slid neatly into a cash box.
Toby’s eyes wandering to mine, smiling sweetly, then returning his attention to the customers.
That’s about when I remember that just a few days ago, I stole from him. I admitted it, too. I remind myself of what he probably overheard in the bathroom between me and Ice—whether he believed it or not.