Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 93727 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 469(@200wpm)___ 375(@250wpm)___ 312(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 93727 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 469(@200wpm)___ 375(@250wpm)___ 312(@300wpm)
“Is that a formal position?” I asked.
“IT shitter,” she replied, nodding. “Very lucrative.”
“We’ll figure it out, baby,” I assured her. “We have time.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because it’s true.”
I felt the moment that the reality of just how much time stretched out before her finally sank in. Her body seemed to sink into mine, going boneless against me.
“Shit,” she whispered.
Chapter 9
Rosemary
Iliked a plan. I liked executing that plan well. I liked making new plans once I’d completed the old ones. I liked structure. Predictability. I liked knowing where I’d be, when I’d be there, how I’d get there, and what steps I needed to take.
So waiting around my pop’s place for something to happen was basically torture.
When Daniel had reminded me that I had time to figure out what I wanted to do with my life, it had taken a moment for his words to sink in fully. It wasn’t just a platitude or a way to keep me from worrying. He’d meant it. The amount that stretched out before me was almost hard to comprehend.
I’d lived my entire life with an end in sight. Sure, I’d assumed that I wouldn’t die until I was old, barring any missions that went bad, but I’d always known, as everyone does, that there was an end date planned for me. Logically, I’d always understood that Uncle Dalton and Aunt Halle were different, but I’d never let myself imagine what that felt like.
It wasn’t for me, so I’d pushed it out of my head.
Now, it seemed to be the only thing I could think about.
Daniel left again. And again. And again.
I would’ve thought that it would get easier because he came back every time, but it didn’t. The panic and sorrow and pain seemed to be getting worse, not better, when he drove away.
I’d been reassuring myself since I was a child that I could get through anything, because nothing lasted forever. Dinner was gross? It only took fifteen minutes to eat, and then I was done. I couldn’t go out to play until my parents woke up? I only had to wait an hour, and then the whole day stretched out before me. I didn’t like my teacher? I only had her for one year. My arm needed to be set? It would only be a couple of minutes before the doctor was done. The mission I was on was miserable? A month, tops, and then I could leave the shithole behind.
I was tied up in some nasty-ass garage? I just needed to stay put until I heard something I could take back to Dalton.
It became a habit to break the tough times into bite-sized, accomplishable goals.
But when you had no idea how long something would last, it was harder to trick yourself into believing you could stick it out.
And the knowledge that Daniel could continue to leave me whenever he decided to, with no end in sight, made me feel like I was coming out of my skin.
For the rest of my very long life, assuming my immortality had come to fruition, I was tied to a mate that didn’t behave like one.
I knew he was going to check on his family. I knew he would make it back in less than three hours. I knew that he was conscious of every minute we spent apart because the moment he got back, he found me and held me and stripped me bare as he whispered how much he hated being away from me.
But he kept doing it. Over and over until I thought I might lose my mind.
It became all I could think about.
He’d brought back a laptop after one of his trips home, and he spent hours on it, searching for something that he never quite explained. He didn’t hide what he was doing, and he loved when I curled up next to him to read or watch TV while he worked, but the names he was researching meant nothing to me. I didn’t know if they were Vampires or humans, potential victims or villains—and Daniel was so adept at giving roundabout answers that I usually didn’t even realize that he hadn’t actually answered me until later.
When he wasn’t glued to the computer screen, Daniel teased and played and treated me like a queen. He was quick and funny, and he rarely took the bait when I was giving him shit. He had the filthiest mouth I’d ever heard. He knew exactly how to touch me. When we were together, there was nothing better, and as the days passed, I understood more and more how well we’d been made for each other.
But even when we were together, during what should’ve been the happiest period of my life, I was waiting for the moment he said he had to go again.
I couldn’t shake it. Couldn’t ignore it.