Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 141428 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 707(@200wpm)___ 566(@250wpm)___ 471(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 141428 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 707(@200wpm)___ 566(@250wpm)___ 471(@300wpm)
He hated this.
Hated that everyone had done this to her.
“I know it must seem that way right now,” he told her. “You’ve been through some horrible stuff, baby. However, it isn’t always going to be like this.”
“So far this is what my life has been. One terrible thing after another. And just when things seem to be going well, something happens and boom, back to square one.”
He didn’t like that for her. And he understood why she sounded so exhausted.
But he wanted to make everything better for her. To see her smile again, to see her act carefree, without worry.
“Why would you pay for all of this? It’s too much, even a friend shouldn’t cover all of this. It would take me so long to pay it back.”
“Good thing you’re not paying any of it back then,” he said in a low voice.
“Friends don’t give their friends huge amounts of money.”
“Yeah, they do. I’m paying for the bills and your rehab. No. Arguments.”
End of story.
Devi wasn’t sure what to say to that statement.
He seemed to have taken a crazy pill today.
He hadn’t known her long.
So why would he want to do this for her?
And he expected no arguments?
Lord, if she had more energy, she’d totally argue with him about his ‘no arguments’ dictate.
Only problem was that she couldn’t really seem to gather up the energy to breathe, let alone argue. Emotion just took so much energy.
“Devi? Do you have anything you want to say?”
“You can’t.”
“I can, but don’t worry about it now,” he said as though he could hear what she was thinking.
“I have to talk to Rohan.”
“Gwen will want to visit him soon. We might be able to call him.”
“He’s going to be so upset. He’ll probably blame himself when he really shouldn’t.”
“He’ll feel guilty that he wasn’t there, that he didn’t protect you,” Hayes said.
“Yes.” She should have guessed that Hayes would understand. He and Rohan were similar in a lot of ways.
“I get that. But that doesn’t mean that he won’t want to know. That he doesn’t need to know.”
That was true.
“He’s only supposed to call me at certain times. I don’t think I’m allowed to call him.”
“I’ll talk to Gwen and get it set up.”
“All right,” she said sleepily.
Thinking was too tiring. Instead, she might sleep.
Yes, sleep sounded good.
27
Hayes looked up at the knock on the door. It opened and Mac poked his head in. Hayes held a finger up to his lips, not wanting him to wake her.
Mac nodded and crooked a finger at him.
Hayes wanted to refuse. He needed to stay here with Devi. He couldn’t leave her.
However, Mac was a good person who’d done his best to look after Devi. So he reluctantly got up and moved over to the door. He stepped out.
“What is it, Mac? I can’t leave her. She’s in a delicate state and it’s not safe for her to be alone.”
“Delicate state?” Mac asked in clear alarm. “Is there something I need to know?”
“Not at the moment. She’s just not herself and I don’t want to leave her.”
“Well, she’s asleep right now.”
“That doesn’t mean that she won’t wake up at any moment.”
“That’s why Silla is going to sit with her.” Mac waved at Silla who was rushing toward them holding a pink teddy bear that was half as tall as she was and a helium balloon that said ‘Happy 21st.’
That was . . . odd.
But then that was a word he often thought around Devi’s friends. The balloon had a long string and kept whacking into things.
A doctor stepped out of a room and the balloon smacked right onto his face.
“What on earth is going on?” the doctor demanded.
“Oops, sorry!” Silla said, pulling on the string of the balloon. “It’s got a life of its own.”
“Is it someone’s twenty-first birthday?” the doctor asked.
“No.” Silla continued on her way to them. She stopped in front of them, clearly breathless. “Sorry, I’m late. When I opened the car door, my balloon tried to escape. Thankfully, I managed to grab it. I don’t know why that doctor asked me if it was someone’s twenty-first birthday. Do I look like I’m going to a twenty-first birthday?” she demanded.
“Um, Silla. What does your balloon say?” Mac asked.
“It says happy twenty-first. Ohh. Now it all makes sense. Drat. I was rude. I should go apologize.”
“I don’t think that’s necessary,” Mac told her.
Don’t ask. Don’t ask.
In the end he couldn’t stop himself, though.
“Why does it say that?”
“Huh?” Silla asked. Then she glanced up at the balloon as though she’d just seen it.
“Oh no! I grabbed the wrong one! What an idiot.” She banged her hand against her forehead and let go of the balloon.
“Shoot!” she cried, jumping up, attempting to grab the string. “Oops. Why did I do that?”
Thankfully the ceiling wasn’t that high and he easily reached up and grabbed the string, pulling the balloon down and handing it back to her.