Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 100628 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 503(@200wpm)___ 403(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100628 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 503(@200wpm)___ 403(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
Brody chuckled.
“I’m offended,” Olive replied, crossing her arms over her chest. “Why were you two the only ones invited to Charlie’s last night?”
“I helped Bishop with some shit and they paid me in dinner and more booze than I wanted,” I replied in exasperation, motioning for her to go.
“What are you doing with your hands?” Olive asked in mock confusion.
“Christ,” I muttered with a sigh. “You know, your sister wouldn’t give me shit like this.”
“You know that isn’t true,” she joked, throwing an empty cup at me. “You’re lucky Meg’s at school, or she’d be singing at the top of her lungs and drumming on the tabletop just to fuck with you.”
“Fine, you’re right,” I groaned. “She’s worse than you.”
“Thank you,” she replied with satisfaction. “You’re a shitty host, you know that?”
“Boo hoo,” I shot back, unconcerned. That was the magic of my cousins being my closest group of friends. Nothing I said or did ever really offended them.
Brody and Olive left together as usual since he rarely drank and she liked to take advantage of any designated driver she could find. Then it was just me and my big brother. I liked Mick. I mean, I loved him, of course, but I actually liked him, too. He’d been an ass when we were growing up, but as we’d gotten older, things had mellowed between us and—
“You gonna tell me what the fuck is goin’ on?” he asked, leaning back in his chair like he was settling in.
I’d lied. I couldn’t stand him. He was a huge nosy pain in my ass.
“Nothin’ is goin’ on.”
“You and Nova get in a fight or somethin’?” he pushed.
“We didn’t get in a fight.”
“You always make up,” he continued like I hadn’t said anything.
“We’re not fightin’,” I snapped. “Jesus Christ.”
“Uh-huh,” he muttered with a laugh.
“Would you just go?” I got to my feet and swallowed hard as my mouth started to water. Fuck. I was going to puke. “I wanna go to bed, man. I’m tired, and I feel like shit.”
“Fine,” he replied, throwing up his hands. “You know I’m around if there’s anythin’ you wanna talk about.”
“There’s nothin’ to talk about.”
“Still,” he said as he walked toward the front door. “If there is.”
I waved tiredly as he left and then stood there in the middle of the room, debating whether or not I should just go to the bathroom and make myself throw up. On the one hand, it might make me feel better. On the other, I seriously fucking hated throwing up, especially when I was sober.
Resting my ass against the back of the couch, I reached up and rubbed at my eyes with the heels of my hands. It had been a hell of a day. Saturdays were usually the days when I worked on shit around the house and I’d planned on re-grouting the bathroom, but I hadn’t had the energy. Or maybe I’d had too much energy. I hadn’t had the patience to do it right, that was for sure, so instead, I’d sat in front of the TV and turned on animal documentaries.
I couldn’t remember a single thing about any of them. The entire time I’d sat there, I just kept replaying the night before on a loop. I couldn’t remember all of it, just bits and pieces, but those bits and pieces were of Nova’s bits and pieces. And they were fucking phenomenal bits and pieces. I’d imagined Nova naked a million times, but I hadn’t ever actually seen her fully naked and now that I had, I didn’t think I would ever forget it.
Nova had never been described as petite, even when we were kids, and I knew that used to bug her though she’d never admit it, but goddamn, she’d grown into her height. She was strong and trim, but her ass was so fucking round and perfect and her tits were full and heavy. Just the memory of her legs wrapping around my waist made me sweat.
We’d been drunk and sloppy, but it hadn’t slowed us down any. It had been really fucking good.
I dropped my hands from my eyes and stared at the wall I still needed to paint. It had been really fucking good for me, but what if it had sucked for her? Maybe that’s why she’d try to play it off like it hadn’t happened. She was trying to let me down easy.
No. Letting me down easy would imply that I was trying to get with her, and I wasn’t. We were friends, and we’d had sex. Neither of us was trying to make it more than that. If it had sucked for her, she would’ve said something, just like she’d told me that my favorite shirt was too small and I looked like a dude-bro, whatever that was. She’d never had any problem putting me in my place or telling me I was shitty at something and she wouldn’t have spared my feelings about this either. If anything, she would’ve told me flat out that I’d sucked and laughed as I’d tried to argue how great I was.