Total pages in book: 106
Estimated words: 101398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 507(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 338(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 507(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 338(@300wpm)
Don’t get sassy, Norah. Just be polite and accept the damn ride.
“Thanks. I’ll get my bag,” I answer, keeping my manners intact. Quickly, I move back around the front of the truck to the side of the road where the dusty Louis sits.
I reach for the handle, but a big hand grabs it before I can, the weight of his presence behind me hitting like his truck, had he not managed to stop.
Is he some kind of ninja? I didn’t even hear his door open.
I have to look up, up, up to meet his eyes, and I realize just how tall the macho man is. He has to be well over six foot and makes my average five-foot-four frame look pint-sized.
If this were a rom-com movie, this would be our meet-cute. I’d be the petite damsel in distress, and he’d be the big, strong, and sexy hero ready to save the day. But I’m not Emma Stone, this isn’t a movie, and if I go by his tight jawline or furrowed brow, this guy isn’t thrilled with his supposed hero role. Or me, for that matter.
Without a word, he lifts my suitcase and carries it to his truck, tossing it in the bed like it weighs less than a trash bag full of feathers. And then, he’s back in the driver’s seat before I can say thank you. Before I can say or do anything, actually.
I guess this is the part where I get inside the truck?
Bennett
I glance through my windshield and see the woman just standing in the middle of the road, looking at my truck and not moving.
What is she doing?
First, she asked me for a ride by playing a game of chicken with my truck, and now that I’ve agreed and tossed her suitcase in the bed, she’s…not going to take it?
It’d certainly be the smart thing to do. Hitchhiking a ride from a total stranger isn’t generally touted as safe.
I let out a sigh and reach forward to fiddle with the radio, turning up the volume on the only station available in Red Bridge to drown out my growing irritation.
I don’t know what she’s doing out here, on the outskirts of Red Bridge, but she’s not a local. Her expensive suitcase and designer boots and the T-shirt that molds tightly over her perky tits, and that probably costs more than most people’s entire wardrobes, is proof of that.
I’d say she’s from Boston or Chicago or…New York.
Yeah. I scoff to myself. Definitely a New Yorker.
I should know; I was born and raised there.
And since she doesn’t look a day over midtwenties, I’d guess she’s the worst kind of New Yorker—a trust-fund baby New Yorker. Probably a daughter of some rich asshole who works in tech or makes a living out of stealing people’s money under the guise of investments or some shit.
I glance through the windshield again and note that she’s still giving her best impression of a statue. My eyes scan the black letters on her white T-shirt, J’adore Dior.
Give me a break.
It looks like something my sister Breezy would wear. And she looks like the kind of woman who spends her afternoons on Fifth Avenue, contemplating if she should get the Chanel or the Dior handbag to match the cocktail dress she’s going to wear to some stupid charity function where the money very rarely goes to charity and serves as one hell of a tax write-off for the wealthy attendees.
I know that scene all too well. The posh “I have money, and I can buy anything or anyone I want because of it” scene. I lived in it for most of my life.
But why this woman chose Red Bridge? I haven’t a clue. For all I know, she read Eat Pray Love or some shit, and this is the first leg of her big journey to “find herself.” I guarantee the sushi Earl carries in the only grocery store in town isn’t going to provide any kind of spiritual awakening, but none of that matters to me.
Make up your mind, sweetheart.
The wind blows her wild mane of brunette curls around, and her big brown doe eyes stare back at me. I can’t help myself from taking in the rest of her body again, painfully noting that she has the kind of curves that used to tempt a man like me. Used to being the operative words. I might’ve enjoyed the fun curves like that could bring me when I was still living the superficial high life, but that ship sailed a long-ass time ago.
I’m no longer the kind of man who is easily distracted by shiny, pretty things. The only thing I’m busy with right now is that I have three full kegs of beer in the bed of my truck to drop off before I can get back home to my biggest priority of all.