Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 68735 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68735 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Ellis had run and hid, leaving Paisley all alone in the middle of a supermarket, scared out of her mind and paralyzed with fear.
Things had gone horribly wrong when a man had tried to intervene and had ended up getting shot for his attempts to help. The bullet had entered the man’s body, exited his body, and then found a home in Paisley’s chest.
The worst thing was, Audric’s dad had run that call, too.
Poor Carter.
He had the worst luck.
I wrung my hands together as I made my way out of the house down the street.
I veered into Audric’s grandmother’s yard and walked straight toward them.
His dad saw me coming and gave me a grateful smile. “I have to go now, kiddo. Looks like you have a friend to keep you company, though.”
A friend.
That was laugh-out-loud funny.
If he only knew what his son had done…
Audric’s dad placed his hand on my shoulder before he left, and I barely contained a flinch.
Touching of any kind now scared the crap out of me. But touch from men of any age where they had some height to them made my skin crawl.
I’d need to go get in the shower after this and wash off.
I still wouldn’t feel clean—likely I never would—but at least it’d give me the illusion that I was clean.
Audric turned woodenly and saw me standing there, his eyes narrowing. “What are you doing here?”
I chewed on the inside of my lip and kicked the grass underneath my foot before saying, “Just thought you could use some company.”
I knew what it was like having to deal with your own thoughts.
It wasn’t fun, and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
So that’s where I stayed, standing by his side with at least six feet of distance between us, not speaking a word.
Audric didn’t say anything, either, but I was there.
That had to count for something, right?
Two
Sometimes you have to hug the people you don’t like so you know how big of a hole you need to dig in the backyard.
—Audric’s secret thoughts
AUDRIC
Six Years Later
“What do you mean?” I was well and truly shocked at the words that had just slipped from her lips.
“I just need to marry for convenience,” Laney said. “And you’re the perfect person to piss my dad off, that I know won’t fall in love with me while we’re married for a year.”
She wasn’t lying.
When my mom decided to kill herself and fucked it up, I’d turned into a completely different person.
That full ride for football that I’d been aiming toward was gone, mostly because I’d realized that life was bigger than football.
I needed to be home.
I couldn’t leave and make a name for myself because my dad needed me here.
Hell, the four years I’d spent in the Army had felt like torture. I’d watched as the life had slowly slipped out of my dad’s eyes in those four years.
No more.
The moment that my dad had come into the house that day, all divorce proceedings had been halted.
Dad was still married to Mom.
Mom was in an assisted living facility with half of her face, and a quarter of her brain gone, living life with the knowledge that she’d fucked her life up forever.
She was forced to go to therapy—because she was very much aware of everything that she had done. And still had to do.
She was forced to face her fears.
Dad was miserable.
I was miserable.
Mom was certainly miserable.
Everyone was miserable.
“Laney, honey…” I said to my good friend. “This is a terrible idea.”
“But we have to sell it,” she continued, acting like I hadn’t said a thing. “We can’t do this half-ass. We have to make it look real when we’re in public.”
I stared at her, still not biting. “And the money that I get out of this…I can pay off your mom’s medical bills.”
That had my stomach somersaulting in my belly.
My mother.
My goddamn mother.
Fuck her.
Fuck everything about her.
I looked away.
“Audric,” she whispered. “This is going to work great.”
“I don’t think…”
“Just fucking do it,” Creole interjected as she came out of the bedroom looking as beautiful as ever. “We both know that you’re going to. Laney needs a husband to gain her half a billion-dollar inheritance. You need money to pay off your mother’s medical bills. And let’s not forget your family home in Hawaii that you were just about to list for sale.”
I gritted my teeth.
My great-grandmother and great-grandfather had died in a small plane crash when they’d been island hopping years ago. They’d left my grandmother the house in Oahu. My grandmother had then passed it on to me when she’d decided to move closer to her family. She’d left our other cousins the money.
Both had equaled out the same, but the bad thing about my part of the inheritance was that I couldn’t afford the taxes it was going to cost to keep the damn place.