Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 70489 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 352(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 70489 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 352(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
Once I finally fell asleep, I dreamed about Alex. He was in a burning building, and I was trying to save him. Even now that I was awake, I couldn’t shake the feeling that he was in danger, and he was mine to protect. What the fuck was that about?
I should have gone out last night and found someone to help me work off my sexual tension, but by the time I got home, all I wanted to do was stay in. Maybe a good, hard run to banish the dream—and Alex—from my mind.
I pulled on a pair of athletic shorts and slid my feet into my running shoes. After stretching in the blessed air-conditioning, I headed out to face the oppressive heat. Could I sweat out my interest in Alex? I was sure as hell going to try.
I headed toward campus and followed the trail around the pond. When I reached the part of the trail that ran by several sorority houses, Alex was leaning against a tree next to a bench. That’s when it hit me. He looked vaguely familiar because he’d been on that bench, which I’d run by a few days ago, looking like he’d ended a rough night there. I’d felt him staring at me as I’d passed by, but I’d ignored him.
And now he was back. Fuck.
He waved and made a show of stretching as I approached, and then he fell in beside me. I picked up my pace, and he did too.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Going for a run.”
“You were waiting for me.”
He glanced over at me with a smirk. “What makes you say that?”
“I saw you there the first day of class.”
“Forget about that. I wasn’t at my best.”
I huffed.
“It’s not what you think though.”
“So you weren’t sleeping off a night of binge-drinking that left you unable to find your bed? Then what was it?”
He was breathing hard, and I could tell he was fighting to keep up. I was sure he could run a good distance. He looked like he worked out regularly, but running wasn’t life or death to him. If I weren’t in shape, I could get killed or get my family killed. I pushed myself hard every day. I wasn’t going to be the reason one of us got hurt, even if I did wish to God we could all get out of the criminal world. I’d tried, but I hadn’t gotten far.
“I’ll tell you later,” he said, obviously far too winded for some long story justifying how getting drunk and ending up on a bench was for a higher purpose. “I didn’t think you saw me that day.”
“I notice everything about my surroundings. Why were you watching me?”
“Seriously? You have to know how you look.”
At least he wasn’t being coy. “I know that I’m your professor and much too old for you.”
“You can’t be that old.”
I was twenty-eight, but I felt so much older. I’d had to step up and be an adult at twenty when Lorenzo went to prison. I accelerated again, and it took Alex a few seconds to catch up.
“Damn. You’re fast.” He could barely speak.
“I can go faster.”
“For how long?”
“As long as I need to. See if you can keep up.” I sprinted ahead, and he did his best, but after about half a mile, he stepped off the trail and leaned against a tree, trying to catch his breath. I waved goodbye.
Alex didn’t interrupt my run again for the next few days, which was good. I absolutely had not hoped to see him again, no matter how many times I’d thought about him. I was hoping he wouldn’t be there, not wishing he would, because that would be wrong.
I really needed to find a casual fuck, but I spent Friday evening at the casino Rafe managed for the family, making sure he didn’t get himself into trouble. Earlier in the week, he’d started a fight with a man he’d accused of cheating. The fight had morphed into a huge brawl and brought way too much police attention to the place.
Rafe was twenty-five. Why did I still need to babysit him?
As if that wasn’t annoying enough, I was on edge all evening as I waited to hear how things had gone for Lorenzo. He had good reasons to hate Dimitri, but he had to be civil and negotiate a weapons deal with him. Why Remington wanted to keep working with such an evil fuck as Dimitri, I didn’t understand. I supposed most people thought of Remington that way, but he had standards—all the Theriots did.
Around the time we expected him back, Rafe and I went to his house to wait, but hours passed before he finally walked through the door. I scowled at him. “You said you weren’t going to stay long.”
He yanked off his suit jacket and tossed it onto a chair. “You’re always saying you don’t care about the family business, so why are you even here?”