Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 83756 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 419(@200wpm)___ 335(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83756 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 419(@200wpm)___ 335(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
“But I did,” I stress as the toe of his sneakers touches my bare ones. “I missed you daily. I wished you were with me, working by my side and helping me succeed. But damn it, I let fear win. Our relationship was toxic and messy. I take full responsibility for it. As much as I wanted you, and as good as you made me feel, the fear of the unknown kept fucking with me. I pushed you away the moment I realized I loved you more than you could ever love me. I have spent years watching and listening to stories of people murdering each other, and all I could think was that getting my heart broken by you would be so much worse than any of the terror they experienced.”
His eyes soften, but his brows stay furrowed. “Why did you think you loved me more? I did everything I could to prove my love to you.”
I swallow hard, and here goes the big one. “When you didn’t want to run EMQUINNY with me.”
His eyes widen a fraction before he sighs. “We had different goals, Em.”
“I know,” I say softly. “But I started a company named after us, and you didn’t want any part of it. It made me feel like you didn’t want any part of me. It was like our baby, and you didn’t want it.”
He slowly shakes his head. “That wasn’t it at all,” he insists, his eyes searching mine. “To do that with you, I would want to put my whole self into it. I’d have had to give up everything I had been working for my whole life. I knew you could do it on your own, and I wasn’t worried. Plus, you know, I had to make my dad proud—”
“Quinn, he loves you because of you, not because you are following in those big hockey footsteps. He just loves you.” He swallows. “Ask him, and he’ll tell you the same.”
“I don’t want to talk about my family,” he says, shaking his head.
“It felt like you chose your career over one that was something we did together. Then I realized I’d give up everything to follow you, and I got scared. I ran.”
His brows pull in tighter. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I was embarrassed. I didn’t want you thinking I was a lunatic.”
“I already knew that,” he says in a teasing tone, his lips tilted up at the side. “And I still want you.”
I smile. “Quinn—”
“I still can’t believe you thought you loved me more,” he whispers, and then we both stare as he brings his hand up to cup my jaw. He moves his thumb along my bottom lip just as our eyes meet. “Not when every time I look at you, I fall even deeper for you. And when you smile, my heart feels like it’s exploding. I feel you everywhere, like a fucking tattoo along my skin. Lovebug, you’re in my fucking DNA. You are and always will be everything to me. It doesn’t have to be a contest. It can just be two people in love.”
His words slam into my chest, knocking the breath out of me. “You said you didn’t love me.”
“I lied,” he admits, his eyes burning into mine.
“You did?”
He nods, dropping his eyes to my lips, and my breath catches as I prepare for what I hope is coming. “I did, and I hate that I hurt you. But Em, not a day goes by when I am not completely in love with you.”
“Please, Quinn,” I whisper. “Kiss me, lick me, take me—just fucking destroy me.”
“In that order?” he asks, his eyes ping-ponging from my lips to my eyes.
“I don’t care. Put us both out of this misery I caused.”
“Fuck it,” he growls, and then his mouth crashes to mine.
Chapter
Twenty-Seven
Quinn
I am the son of Shea and Elli Adler.
The most talked-about love story of two of the greatest people in the world. I’m not kidding; they’re on YouTube from when my mom sang to my dad in the hopes of getting him to be hers. Makes sense why I do what I do, now that I think about that. I’m pretty sure someone has written a book about them—off the record, of course—and one day, it’ll probably be a damn movie. They loved us kids hard and raised us to have good morals, to be loyal, and to be honest.
But it doesn’t matter what morals they instilled in me or even whether I’m really engaged; there is no way in hell I’m not kissing Emery after she bared her soul to me. After she served me everything I’ve been wanting to hear on a silver platter and looked up at me with pure guilt and longing in her wicked gaze.
Yeah, put a fork in me. I’m done. I’m Emery’s.