Total pages in book: 71
Estimated words: 73230 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73230 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
“Your birthday’s tomorrow. If we’d done it tomorrow, you would’ve known what we were doing,” my mother said.
I sighed.
“That’s just wrong,” I stomped my foot.
I wasn’t a big fan of surprises.
In fact, I’d much rather have known this was happening. So I could prepare.
Crowds made me nervous.
I really couldn’t say why, either.
Nothing had ever happened to me to make me dislike them…it was just that I knew I hated crowds since I was forced to take a public speaking class in high school.
My heart started to pound in my throat as I was passed around to everyone, but Casten saved the day when he tugged on my hand and pulled me to a corner.
“You alright?” he wanted to know.
I nodded, swallowing thickly.
“Yeah,” I cleared my throat. “Just not a big fan of people…or crowds. Or crowds of people.”
He snorted.
“Welcome to the club. This many people gives me the hives. All I can see when there’re this many people in a confined space is a fire code violation,” he snorted.
I blinked in surprise.
“That’s…different. When would you have run a fire code?” I asked.
He gave me a droll look.
“Fire code isn’t necessarily just firefighters. Police officers have to come and enforce the code,” he said, sounding somewhat offended that I would’ve suggested he know anything about firefighters.
“Do you miss it?” I asked.
“Miss what?” he evaded, pulling my hand and leading me to the bar where he grabbed both of us a drink. Me a water, and himself a blackened voodoo.
“Being a police officer,” I drawled.
He grimaced. “Yes and no. I miss having the backup when I need it, but I don’t miss the fact that I don’t have anyone to answer to. I’m not constantly worried that I’m going to offend some poor, innocent soul and get my badge pulled because of it. I make my own hours. I take time off when I want to. I can pick and choose which cases I want. If one’s too dangerous, I just don’t do it. And if I need money, I’ll choose a higher bond one that’ll net me a shit ton more money.”
That sounded…reasonable.
“Those cases are the ones that require me to go all over the fuckin’ place to look for ‘em. I had one last spring that I took and followed him all the way to Hawaii. Took him all the way home, then flew back to spend some time there because I met some girl that wan…”
I gave him a look to shut up, and he did. Only he grinned in the process.
“That last part was a joke,” he lied.
“Uh-huh,” I snorted, turning my eyes to my sister.
She had her arms wrapped around Mig, her face pressed into his chest as he spoke to my parents.
“Do you want kids?” I blurted abruptly.
His face sort of fell, and I got a sinking feeling that I wasn’t going to like what he had to say next.
“I can’t…I can’t have kids,” he said after a long moment of silence.
I blinked.
“You can’t?” I asked. “Are you sure?”
He nodded, then shrugged. “Fairly sure, anyway. The trauma that I received when that bomb exploded was pretty bad. I got a good chunk of my arm and shoulder muscle taken out. Followed by some extensive damage to my lower stomach and top of my thighs. Which, in turn, got infected; the doctors think it might’ve caused me to be sterile.” He sipped his beer. “I got one of those sperm count tests done shortly after I healed almost all the way, and it was so low that it was almost nonexistent.”
I worried my lip.
“So…what about adoption?” I asked.
He shrugged.
“Never thought about it, to be honest.”
I would’ve explored the subject more, but my father chose that moment to walk up from the back of the clubhouse, carrying what looked to be a very large box, which looked like it was wrapped by him.
I smiled.
“Hey Daddy,” I called.
He grinned. “Hi, baby.”
He placed the box down in front of me, and I stared at it in wonder.
“What’d you get me?” I asked.
He shrugged. “Something your man thought you’d like.”
I turned to ‘my man.’
“So you know my daddy?” I concluded.
He nodded.
“Met a couple days ago,” he sipped his beer. “Explained what was happening to you, and why you were staying at my place.”
“Hmmm,” I hummed. “And what’d you tell him I wanted?”
I small grin kicked up the corner of his mouth.
“You’ll have to open it and see,” he tipped his bottle in the direction of my present.
Warily, I walked to the package and started ripping off the duct tape that my father had used to paste down the edges.
Then worked on the duct tape that held the box closed.
And grinned when I saw what was inside.
“You remembered!” I cried.
Offhandedly I’d mentioned to Casten that I wanted a pink riding jacket like some girl had been wearing on a crotch rocket.