Total pages in book: 23
Estimated words: 21851 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 109(@200wpm)___ 87(@250wpm)___ 73(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 21851 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 109(@200wpm)___ 87(@250wpm)___ 73(@300wpm)
She chuckles and shakes her head. “If you think that, then you’ve been spending too much time alone up there in that cabin of yours. You need a girl, son.”
“Only one girl has my heart,” he answers with a wink at her.
She chuckles and shakes her head as she pushes the joystick on her electric wheelchair and starts toward the door. I follow behind the two of them, half listening as they banter. It’s going to be a late night between editing my podcast episode and getting the shop inventory put away. Normally, this is something that my brothers would be there to help with. But the Taylor family helped us so much after Dad died that whenever they need anything, my brothers show up to help them.
I get Mom settled in the truck while Grizz loads her wheelchair into the truck bed and secures it. We’ll get a medical transport van soon, but we just now managed to get Mom comfortable with the idea of using the chair.
Mom is quieter than usual on the drive home, and I don’t work to fill the silence. I’m too busy thinking about Grizz. The last time I talked to him—really talked to him—was two years ago. After that, I realized I was being ridiculous. I’d never get Grizz to see me as anything other than Greer’s younger sister.
It’s not until we’re home that Mom opens my bag. She frowns. “There’s only one tablet in here.”
“I put both of them in there,” I explain and reach for the bag myself. But when I look inside, I realize she’s right. There’s only one tablet here. I open the case and quickly realize I took Mom’s, which means my tablet is still at the shop.
With Grizz.
A pit forms in my stomach. He wouldn’t have opened it. He wouldn’t have looked at it. Please don’t let him have looked at it.
2
GRIZZ
Longing. I finally figured out the word for that funny feeling I get in the pit of my stomach when I see Ginger.
Today, her curly hair is scooped up in a bun on top of her head. She brushes back her bangs from her eyes, letting me see a glimpse of those purple nails. She keeps them short, but they’re always painted a pretty color. Makes me wonder what it’d look like to see her hand wrapped around my girth, to feel her tugging on my cock, and to hear her tell me how big it is.
I’ve never really noticed my best friend’s little sister until that day two years ago. She showed up at the camping store with her thermos of hot chocolate and a plate full of sugar cookies.
I asked her in my barking way what the occasion was.
She wilted right in front of me and mumbled that it was my birthday. I still don’t know how she knew that. But it was the day this chasm started in my gut.
I thought it was bad at first. Now though, two years of barely talking to her, and it’s ripping me in two. It feels like my guts are all twisted up whenever I’m around her.
She always has a bright smile for me. A guy might read into it if he didn’t know that she gives it to everyone in town. So instead of sweeping her into my arms and kissing those plump lips, I’m accepting a plate filled with sandwiches.
An uncomfortable silence falls between us. She used to chatter my ear off a mile a minute when she was younger. I swear, it was like she saved up all the words she wanted to say for a week then spit them out at me in just a few minutes.
She doesn’t do that anymore. She doesn’t tell me all the things she’s thinking about in that breathy tone of hers. How can a person miss conversations that never even happened?
Is she sharing her words with someone else? Does some other guy listen to her chatter and watch her cheeks go pink when she realizes she’s babbling?
The thought has me crushing the paper plate in two. If it hasn’t happened already, it will at some point. Can I let my sweet Ginger go when that happens?
“Mom needs to go home.” She chews on the edge of her fingernail. She never used to be nervous around me. What changed? Did she realize that I’m always on edge, trying to hold back my animal instincts to knock her to the ground and rut into her?
“I’ll be back later to finish up. You don’t have to stay,” she says softly. I’m not sure if she was saying anything else. It’s hard to concentrate when she talks. Hell, it’s hard for me to concentrate when she’s in the same space with me.
I finish the food and stand, grunting out, “I’ll help with her chair.”