Total pages in book: 147
Estimated words: 142801 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142801 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
“If you want the truth, last night was just what I needed.”
“I can’t get my head around it. A one-night stand is so unlike you.”
I hum a noncommittal sound and cross my legs, running my finger around the hole in the knee of my leggings. Well, not my leggings, but what Lori, Riley’s roommate, begrudgingly loaned me. Gosh, her face as she opened the front door for her morning run and found me about to stick the key in her mouth. In my wedding dress, with my hair bedraggled and my skin beard-burn pink. Trust Riley to have gotten it wrong because his roommate hadn’t gone away for the weekend after all. So much for raiding her closet in peace. But at least Riley got his cleaner to leave her key. Without it, Lori might not have let me in.
“It’s not every day you get humiliated at the altar.”
“I think you have that the wrong way around, Evie. Just do yourself a favor and avoid the hair salon.”
I reach up, snagging a lock of wayward hair and sliding it behind my ear. How spooky; I’d just been contemplating booking an appointment after I’d grown my hair out just for yesterday. “Why?”
“The effects of a revenge bang are usually short lived. Revenge bangs on the other hand . . . Remember the great tenth-grade hair experiment?”
“How could I forget? But last night wasn’t revenge.” It was an experience like no other—an experience I won’t ever have again. “I see it more as just returning the favor.”
Riley chuckles. “Oh, I bet Bitchell will just love that.”
“I don’t really care what he thinks. I am so over thinking about yesterday and what an idiot I’ve been. You know, when I read those texts, my love for that asshole was snuffed out like a cheap candle.” I click my finger and thumb together. It’s the truth but not the whole truth.
“I’d like to snuff him out,” Riley mutters.
“I mean, if I never really knew him, how could I have loved him?”
“Evie, honey. Love is like an orgasm. If you have to ask yourself if you felt it, the answer is, you didn’t.”
“Maybe we both fooled ourselves into thinking we were in love, or else why did he cheat? And if I really loved him, wouldn’t I still be distraught?”
“I don’t know. I’m still trying to figure out a reaction to your one-night stand.”
“Is the air a little thin up there on your high horse? Because I recall a certain someone taking twins home recently. Twins! That’s just nasty.” I frown as the doorbell rings. “Who can that be?”
“Sadly, my psychic powers are on the fritz, along with this damn leg.”
“You’re so crabby. Do you need better pain meds?”
“Put it this way: if you were here, I might ask you to put me out of my misery. Let Lori get it in case it’s him.”
“He doesn’t know where you live.” Never cared to ask, I guess. “Besides, Lori is upstairs, probably sticking pins in the puppet that looks like me.”
“She doesn’t hate you.”
“Then why is there a note on her bedroom door that reads The We Hate Evie Club—Meeting in Session?”
Riley laughs as the bell rings again.
“Who the heck visits on Sunday?” I complain, climbing from the couch.
“Wild idea, go find out, because we’re not done here.”
“We are so done. Telling you about last night wasn’t an act of confession,” I mutter, trudging my way along the hallway. “I don’t need your absolution, Father Filthy.” But I do need my new bank card to arrive. I reported it and my credit card lost this morning. They said three business days until a new one is mailed out. It’ll be good to be solvent again.
“I just don’t want to see you hurt.” Riley’s sigh is audible down the line.
“I don’t need to know him,” I reply as I unlock the front door. “I’m not seeing him again. One and done.”
“Yeah, but—”
“Riley, I am not all heart-eye emojis over the guy. As usual, you’re missing the point, because when I said he was my unicorn, I was referring to his magical horn. And by horn, I mean—”
“His dick!”
Riley’s pronouncement is shrill as I swing the door open, and my entire stomach flips, somehow landing on my ovaries. Because out in the street stands Oliver, looking like he’s just stepped from a yacht in Saint-Tropez. His jet hair is sun dappled, and the hem of his linen shirt flutters in the summer breeze.
“His magical dick,” Riley repeats, oblivious to the man with the magical member standing in front of me. “Come to think of it, I think I heard you yelling last night. From all the way over here. In France. Harder, pony boy, harder!” he cries in some approximation of Evie ecstasy. And then he whinnies.
“You were enthusiastic.” The vision in front of me is all smoky tone and devilish grin as he slips off his sunglasses, those strangely lovely eyes pinning me where I stand. “Hello, Eve.”