Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 133655 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 668(@200wpm)___ 535(@250wpm)___ 446(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 133655 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 668(@200wpm)___ 535(@250wpm)___ 446(@300wpm)
She’s beautiful and smart and…way too fucking single to be pregnant. I’d know if some fucker slipped her the greasy knob. I’d know.
Right?
Right??
“Ace—” Julia starts, but I can’t fucking breathe. This VIP booth is suddenly the size of an anthill, and I am King Kong. I need space. I need air. I need answers.
“Whose is it, Julia? Because I’ll fucking kill him myself.”
Scottie leans toward Blake, but I barely hear her as she asks. “Is it just me, or has this night had a lot of talk of killing?”
My eyes are too clogged, my vision too red.
“Who, Jules? Tell me who. I swear to fucking everything, I will strangle whatever motherfucker—”
“Oh my God, Acer, relax!” Julia snaps, finally breaking character and sucking in her stomach. “I’m just kidding! I’m not pregnant!”
“You’re not?” My whole body shakes, sweat beading on my forehead and forcing me to wipe at it. “You’re not pregnant?”
Julia rolls her eyes like she didn’t just scramble my insides like motherfucking eggs. Hell, with the way I’m feeling, I’m certain she added an entire bottle of hot sauce on those fuckers.
“Of course I’m not freaking pregnant, Ace,” she responds through an oblivious snort. “I’m on birth control.”
Fucking birth control. Birth control.
Of course, Ace. I’m still sleeping with all these no-good fucks, but I’m protected.
I know Julia isn’t a virgin—I was there for the aftermath of senior prom and Tommy Gerkin’s little dick—but fuck me, she’s not a sleep-around type of girl. She’s not even a date-around or hookup kind of girl, and the mere idea of her having sex with rando college dudes makes me want to puke. Or break shit. Maybe both. I tug at the collar of my shirt. It’s hot, and I can’t swallow. For some reason, my tongue won’t allow it.
“Goodness, Jules,” Scottie says through a giggle. “You’re crazy, girl.”
Julia laughs and shrugs, taking a drink from her fancy cocktail and turning to face the dance floor, where the DJ is doing a remix of a familiar song.
My limbs won’t move, and my jaw has a permanent tic. The good vibes of the night are gone, and all I can see are visuals of my best friend—the most beautiful woman in the world—on her back with wide blue eyes and splayed blond hair while some schmuck pile-drives her on his patchwork dorm room couch.
My God. How didn’t I… How couldn’t I…
Julia. Jules…
Blake grabs Finn’s shoulder. “Hey, uh, why don’t you hold down the fort here with the girls while I take Ace outside for a minute?”
Finn nods, I think, but all I feel is Blake’s gentle guidance as he grabs on to me and moves me out of the booth, down the steps, and through the crowded club.
A few women brush up against us on our way out, but I can’t see anything but Julia’s face. Her smile, her laugh, her big blue eyes.
Our lives together, intertwined like vines, dance inside my head like a montage over the vibing crowd on the way to the exit.
We walk down the long hallway to the front door and step outside, moving down the sidewalk toward a group of people who’ve come out to smoke their cigarettes.
I welcome the cloying smell of smoke, hoping it’ll suffocate me. This…this feeling is not good. It’s not good at all.
Blake ushers me down the wall past them and into our own area and pushes me into the brick with a gentle hand.
“Take a breath, Ace,” he instructs, squeezing my shoulders tightly. “Come on, buddy.”
I shake my head and finally manage a breath that racks my entire body. As oxygen returns, panic invades with it. I pace from side to side, yanking at my hair with my hands as a million thoughts torture me.
Fuck. Fucking Julia fucking Brooks. Am I…am I in love with her?
She’s been my best friend since before I even knew what a best friend was. We’ve been attached at the hip since we were kids. Wherever I went, Julia followed. Whatever I did, she was doing it with me. And no matter how hard I try, I can’t come up with one singular childhood memory that doesn’t include Julia Brooks.
But the idea of her pregnant. The idea of another motherfucker enjoying her body and leaving her. The idea of some fucker falling in love with her and stealing her right from under my nose…
I suck in air.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
I spin in place, my whole world falling away with every turn.
“Dude, are you okay?” Blake asks as calmly as he can, but I am anything but composed. I am coming apart at the seams.
I shake my head. Back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. It’s like I can’t stop.
“Blake,” I say in this strange, completely pleading—though unintentional—way. I just…I need him to fix this. To fix me. I need my blinders back on, my happy attitude, my plausible deniability that the world—my world—is a narrowed channel of me and one other person while the rest of it means fuck all. I need…I need to be able to breathe.