Total pages in book: 111
Estimated words: 105665 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 528(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105665 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 528(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
Ian’s heart exploded in his chest like it did the first time he performed at a sold-out stadium years earlier. And just like then, he had to keep his composure. “Let me get this straight. You had no issue walking into the hotel last night in front of photographers when it was clear that you’d been seriously fucked in the back of the SUV, but you don’t want anyone to know that you ‘let me marry you?’”
“Coop, don’t complicate this. Do you want to marry me or not?” She broke off a piece of a pancake and slipped it past her lips, sliding her gaze to him.
He twisted his lips. “Let’s let it breathe.”
“Let it breathe?” Jersey narrowed her eyes.
“You might change your mind.”
“About marrying you?”
“About a wedding. A white dress. And little Coopers.”
She shook her head a half dozen times. “I won’t. And if that’s a dealbreaker for you, Coop, then speak now or forever hold your peace.”
She fucked another man when they were still together. Ian couldn’t figure out why Jersey thought anything was a dealbreaker. His love for her had no boundaries. Sure, he was human, and his heart broke like anyone else’s. However, the bond they had was eternal, and Ian knew it. He waited for Jersey to get it through her beautiful, stubborn head.
Glancing at his watch, Ian stood. “We have to leave in an hour. Do you want me to do borderline inappropriate things to your body in the privacy of the hotel room right now, or do you prefer the kind of screwing that ends with your clothes in pieces and your disheveled self trending the following morning all over social media?”
Jersey stood and sauntered past Ian, peeling off her T-shirt to reveal her naked body. “Both, and in your dressing room before the show … just for good luck.”
“Are you listening to Ian? Please tell me you’re not a groupie, too,” Jersey said to Max on the flight to Dallas.
Max pulled out her earbud. “It’s an audiobook.”
“Audiobook, huh?”
“I listen to several every week.”
Jersey nodded. “I wish I liked reading.”
“I’ll get you hooked up with a few of my favorite audiobooks. The reading will come easier when you fall in love with hearing good stories.”
Jersey didn’t believe her, but she didn’t argue.
Then…
Over the following four months, Jersey found a new addiction. Books. Lots and lots of books.
“Coop?” Jersey pulled on his hand just before they reached the stage in Denver.
He cupped his ear as the crowd screamed with the dimming of the lights.
She lifted onto her toes while he rested his hand on her lower back. “I have a dream.”
He pulled back, curiosity spreading along his face.
She scraped her teeth across her bottom lip several times. “But I uh … need to borrow a little money.”
His smile grew.
“I never graduated from high school.”
His hand moved from her back to her cheek. “You want your diploma?”
She nodded.
Ian kissed her lips. “We can do that. But dream bigger.”
Her eyes sparkled with possibilities while his lips brushed along her cheek, and he whispered in her ear.
She grinned. “Luck, Coop.”
EPILOGUE
Nine years later
“What’s the word of the day?” Ian knocked on the door to Jersey’s office.
She swiveled in her desk chair—her favorite spot in their 4000-square-foot penthouse in Central Park West, New York.
Tucking her bobbed hair behind her ear, she shot him a sexy look over the frames of her glasses. “Recalcitrant.”
“Sounds hot.” He prowled toward her.
She leaned back, folding her hands on her lap. “It’s very sexy. It’s an adjective meaning stubborn—defiant of authority. Difficult to control or manage.”
“Sounds like my wife.” Ian sat on the edge of her desk, pulling her leg up to massage her foot—perfectly manicured with pink polish on her toenails that matched her fingernails.
“Sounds like the author who wrote this manuscript.” Jersey nodded toward her computer screen.
“Still working on the same edits?”
“Yep.” She sighed. “This girl is brilliant. She’s eighteen and writing with the imagination of a soul that’s passed through a million lives. She’s meticulous with her world building, a literary savant. I have no idea where her mind goes to create this stuff. It’s incredible. But she’s oblivious, or allergic, or something … to punctuation!”
Ian chuckled.
“I’m serious. She’s recalcitrant!”
“I’m sure, babe.” He could not have been more proud of the girl with the bunny. She honored her past by chasing her dreams, not letting a single thing that happened to her define her as a person or cripple her ability to achieve anything.
Jersey toured with Ian and a private tutor to get her diploma. Then she attended college, pursuing her dream of “working with words.” It took her down many roads which ultimately led to freelancing for several of the Big Six publishing houses. On the side, she followed her other passion—narration. Ian set her up with her own booth in their home to narrate books.