Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 92930 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92930 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
With my back against the wall, I shut my eyes again and wondered if she was getting the meaning of the song.
Her soft voice startled me. “Who sings this?”
“It’s a song I found online called Stuck in the Elevator by Edie Brickell. You like it?”
“Yeah. I do.”
“Good.”
“You’re still insane, though,” she said quietly.
I opened my eyes to find her mouth spread into the most beautiful smile she’d given me yet. It should have felt good, but instead, it triggered a feeling of dreadful longing inside my gut.
I had a crush on her—like a fucking kid. I couldn’t remember the last time I felt like this. Forced to grow up too fast, my teenage years before Ivy were all a blur. I definitely couldn’t recall feeling anything remotely similar before. If I were that teenager, life would be simple and nothing would be holding me back from pursuing her. Instead, I was a twenty-four-year-old legally married man playing a dangerous game with my heart. Getting closer to her, knowing that we couldn’t ever really be together was a bad idea.
Two voices in my head seemed to be competing with each other as the song continued to play.
The voice of reason was the loudest: Don’t think for a second this girl could ever accept your marriage to Ivy. After you help Nina through this shit, you need to stay the fuck away from her. You hear me?
Deep beneath that voice, was a weaker one that I was pretty sure lived in an insane asylum somewhere inside my heart. That one seemed to come out with a single message whenever I would lay eyes on her: Maybe there’s a way.
***
After we returned home that night, Nina knocked on my bedroom door which was half-way open.
I straightened my back against the headboard and put aside my laptop. “Come in.”
She walked over to the bed and sat at the edge of my feet.
“I just want to thank you again for today. I know I must have seemed like a crazy person for a while there.”
I shrugged jokingly. “No…no. Not at all.”
I winked.
She smiled.
I smiled back.
Our eyes locked for a few tension-filled seconds before she looked away. We sat in silence until she looked up at me again. The expression on her face turned serious.
“No one has ever done anything like that for me, Jake. I mean, you put so much thought into it.”
Shaking my head, I said, “It was nothing. If anything, it was fun for me.”
She covered her face. “I hit you, for Christ’s sake!”
I joked, “Eh. Not the first time a woman has hit me in the heat of the moment. Usually, I’m handcuffed and blindfolded, though.”
I winked again.
She smiled again.
I smiled back again.
Nina leaned in a little, causing my pulse to race. “You put yourself through all of that, knowing damn well that I was gonna freak out on you. I mean, what was in it for you?”
You.
You were in it for me.
“What was in it for me?” I sat up and moved closer to where she was sitting on the bed and scratched my chin. “I got to watch you go from living in an imaginary place to living in the present. I was able to share it with you because you trusted me. It’s exhilarating for me to know I could show you how to live in the moment…because that’s all there ever is, Nina. So much stress could be eliminated if we all learned to do that.”
She nodded to herself, taking in my words. “This moment…right now…us sitting here….that’s all there is. I have to keep reminding myself of that. It’s easier to do when someone who is centered is guiding you through it. No one’s ever held my hand through anything like that. Thank you again.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“You know, everyone at home thinks I’m crazy. They never take my anxieties seriously. My parents, my ex-boyfriend…”
Ex-boyfriend.
I wanted to kick this guy’s ass, whoever he was. Fucker.
It was the perfect window to ask what I’d been wondering since she moved in.
“Is that the guy in the picture in your room?”
Nina shook her head. “No. No, that’s my brother.”
My heart started beating faster. “You don’t have a boyfriend now?”
“No.”
Relief coursed through me even though I had to remind myself that it shouldn’t have mattered since I wouldn’t be pursuing her.
I felt my dick move as her gaze travelled down my shirtless chest and down lower to my six-pack. My pulse quickened when she reached out her hand and placed it over the dragon tattoo on my left forearm.
“What is that?”
My arm tingled from her touch, which felt electric. At any given moment, I felt seconds away from grabbing her shirt and pulling her into a deep kiss. I wanted that so desperately.
I cleared my throat. “It’s a dragon.”
“I couldn’t tell at first if it was a seahorse or a dragon.”