Total pages in book: 125
Estimated words: 115763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 579(@200wpm)___ 463(@250wpm)___ 386(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 115763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 579(@200wpm)___ 463(@250wpm)___ 386(@300wpm)
Chapter 3
Penny
Bang-bang-bang.
I don’t stop the delicate work I’m focused on, because the square-cut emerald in fourteen-karat gold on my worktable deserves my full concentration. Instead, I simply yell toward the apartment door, “Talia, did you forget your key again? I swear I’m gonna put it on a ribbon around your neck like a latchkey kid.”
Almost instantly, Mrs. Rosenthal bangs on the wall between our apartment and hers to let me know I’m being too loud.
I freeze, waiting for my roommate to answer me, or for whatever lost soul accidentally made their way to my doorstep to wander off. I don’t need a new internet provider or whatever crap they’re selling.
Unless . . . what if it’s cookies? I love when those adorable little girls come around selling boxes of yummy goodness.
I lift the magnifying lenses of my loupes so I can see. Still, I have to blink a few times for my eyes to adjust before I can stand and make my way across the room. I peek through the door’s peephole, crossing my fingers for some Thin Mints, and have to blink again because it’s not my roommate standing in the hall, nor is it adorable cookie-laden kids. It’s my pain-in-the-ass brother.
I swing the door open, already demanding, “What do you want, Mom’s Least Favorite?” It’s a long-running joke that I’m the most favorite and he’s the least, but truthfully, Mom has always been determined to love us equally, which is why we can make the joke without hurt feelings.
Immediately, I regret opening the door at all, because it’s not only Dominic in the hallway. His best friend, and the bane of my existence, Griffin, is standing at his side. To put it mildly, he drives me fucking crazy, and if Dominic didn’t swear that he was redeemable to some degree, I’d downright hate him for the way he acts around me.
To him, I’m invisible. As if he deems me worthy of only looking at for a mere moment, like I’m a waste of his time. Like he hates me.
And I have no idea why.
I first met Griffin five years ago when Dom brought him home. I’d been so excited to see my brother, whom I’d missed desperately, and wanted to share basically everything that had happened during the first few months of my sophomore year of college, like that I was dropping out and hadn’t told Mom and Dad yet and wanted him to back me up when I did. Instead, he’d come home with a new friend.
Which was fine, and I’d been welcoming . . . at first. After all, a friend of my brother’s is a friend of mine.
My first impression of Griffin was that he was smoking hot, all huge and muscly, with a soft smile of appreciation for my parents for letting him “tag along with Dom,” as he called it. But my impression changed, quickly and drastically. He stole Dominic’s attention the whole week while Mom and Dad treated him like a royal guest, both of which would’ve been 100 percent A-okay with me, except, almost instantly, he started glaring at me for reasons I didn’t know then and still don’t know now.
It was like he hated me on first sight, and I have no idea why.
“That’s no way to greet your favorite brother,” Dom says as he strides in without an invitation. Not that he needs one. He’s annoying, but he’s my brother, and I love him despite his overbearing nature.
“You mispronounced only brother, though I’m still hoping the DNA test comes back with some good news about that.” I cross my fingers and close my eyes like I’m making a wish, but don’t bother hiding the grin that ruins the image of some hardcore sibling rivalry between us.
We love each other. We’ve just perfected shit-giving as a form of affection.
I watch him pass, and turn back, locking eyes with Griffin. His lips are curled, and his nose is wrinkled like I have body odor so bad that he can smell me from three feet away. Frowning, I glare back at him. I showered with vanilla-scented body wash after my hike, and I’m 100 percent certain I don’t stink. I probably smell delicious, and he’s some rare freak who hates vanilla.
Griffin moves to follow Dom but pauses directly in front of me. I crane my neck to look up at him, finding that he’s peering down the crooked length of his nose at me. His dark-brown eyes, with their cold depths and unfairly long lashes, scan my face and then lift to my forehead. With a hint of a smirk on his stupidly full lips, he murmurs flatly, “Cute.”
As he walks in, I furrow my brow in confusion, then raise a hand, realizing that my dorky loupes with the magnifiers are likely making every pore on my forehead look humongous. “Of course,” I utter, ripping the glasses off but folding them carefully. I shut the door, resigned to the next few minutes of interrogation at my brother’s behest. Might as well get this over with, I tell myself in what’s probably the worst cheerleader pep talk ever.