Total pages in book: 191
Estimated words: 182070 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 910(@200wpm)___ 728(@250wpm)___ 607(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 182070 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 910(@200wpm)___ 728(@250wpm)___ 607(@300wpm)
And I understood her completely. Now. So many freaking years later. It was that smile and the earnestness in his face—but mostly that freaking smile—that tugged at me despite everything.
He was here, and he was Zac, and maybe he’d hurt my feelings for forgetting about me, but….
He was here. Being all… himself, or at least showing me the bits and pieces that had made up the person I’d known.
The important parts.
Damn it.
I was going to be fine. I wasn’t going to show him he’d hurt me, because I knew… somehow… he hadn’t meant to do that.
The world was a heavy place, and I had a finicky back.
Plus, if anyone had to feel bad, it was me for how I’d behaved in the first place.
His eyebrows went up. “So… yeah?”
So… yeah?
I stood aside and gestured Zac in. “Sure. Come in.”
That smile of his went wide.
Yeah, there was a reason Mamá Lupe had loved him and why I’d been so in love with him, both as a friend and more, back in the day.
“I was in the middle of making dinner,” I told him, waving at Zac to follow me toward the island that separated the kitchen from the living room. I had two stools lined up along it. “Do you want something to drink? I have water, Pepsi, and pink lemonade powder.”
When I’d first moved in about a year and a half ago, I hadn’t bought too many things for the living room because the deposit on this place had been so pricey. There was a sofa bed, a chair that was only there because I thought it was cute, because it sure as hell wasn’t comfortable, and a TV that my sister and her family had bought me, claiming it was my birthday and Christmas present for the next two years. She hadn’t been joking either. For Christmas, she’d given me a card with a picture of the television in it. I’d cried from how hard I’d laughed. I had old movie posters of Mulan and The Lion King framed on my wall that a friend had gifted me.
The kitchen was the whole reason that I’d moved into this expensive complex in the first place. I’d taken one tour of it and known that this was what I wanted. With white cabinets, pull-out drawers, white granite counters, light blue subway glass tile backsplash, stainless steel appliances, and a cute little island in the middle, I’d immediately envisioned filming video blogs in the small but perfect kitchen. It had been love at first sight.
One day, maybe, I could buy a house with a beautiful, big kitchen. But I’d settle for renting a studio to film. Someday.
“I’ll take some water,” Zac replied, bringing me back to the present and getting me to stop admiring my kitchen.
I nodded as I grabbed a clean glass and filled it up through the tabletop water filter I’d spent an arm and a leg on as the sound of him pulling out a stool told me what he was doing. Getting comfortable. Sure enough, he was sitting on the other side of the counter, giving me another tight-lipped smile when I set the glass in front of him and pushed it just a little closer.
Zac looked… off. His light brown eyebrows were drawn tight, his forehead was scrunched, and the lines along his mouth were deep, and I didn’t like it. I only partially disliked that I didn’t like it.
“You okay?” I went right out there and asked, taking in his strong, tan face.
He really did still look like some kind of fairy-tale prince.
A fairy-tale prince who a lot of women wanted to do dirty, dirty things to, according to some of the comments on his Picturegram posts. I’d read some of them after his TSN Anatomy Issue had come out—the one with his naked butt cheeks on it—and woo-wee. I thought I liked dirty shit. Not compared to some people.
“Apart from feeling like a shit about what I did, sure, honey,” he answered back, bringing me back to the moment, those baby blue eyes locking on me as he lifted the glass and took a sip out of it.
I mean… if he wanted to feel terrible….
I didn’t miss the way he glanced down at it before he took another sip and licked those cotton candy pink lips. “Is this water delicious or am I imagining it?”
Of course he was going to make this hard.
I snorted, and that earned me half a smile from a handsome face. “It is. It’s a reverse osmosis machine-thing. It filters everything out.”
That blue gaze flicked back down to the glass. “You gotta write the name down for me,” he said after taking another sip, and I’d swear on my life he smacked his lips a little. “This is good stuff, Peewee.”
Talking about water filters was fine and safe. That worked for me. “I will. It’s worth every penny.”