Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 142050 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 474(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142050 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 474(@300wpm)
“Hello! Hi!”
At the sound of the female voice, Dev closed his eyes and pictured the blonde in that sparkly dress floating into the gritty construction site on a pair of shoes better suited to a ballroom’s marble floors than the bald, frozen earth he was standing on.
The idea the other men were surely looking at her had him thinking fondly of strangulation again, and the surge of aggression was a surprise. For all his triggers, what was up with some woman had never been one, and not because he was into dudes. He wasn’t into anybody—
Oh, God, she smelled like heaven, he thought as the wind changed directions again.
“You left this,” she said from right behind him. “In the street.”
Dev opened his lids, and as another gust hit his chest, he let the force of it turn him around.
She was so close. Too close—
Man, her eyes were something else, one blue, one green… both boring right into his soul.
“Sorry,” she murmured when he kept silent. “I just thought you’d need it.”
As she put out his hard hat, he stared at the thing like he’d never seen one before, tracing the scratches in the fluorescent banding, the dent in the short brim, the Wabash logo on the side.
“It’s your hat. Isn’t it?”
Dev looked the woman up and down, lingering on her bare arms and her long legs. “It’s too cold for you out here.”
Before he could stop himself, he walked over to where he’d propped the jackhammer and picked up his waterproof, weatherproof jacket from off the building’s front steps. Going back to her, he swept the folds around her slender shoulders, and then took his stupid hat—after which, he promptly wondered what the hell he was thinking: He’d just wrapped a beauty queen up in some worn-out Carhartt bullcrap that was logo’d with “Wabash Construction Co.” She was probably allergic to anything that didn’t have a fancy label—
The woman curled her red-tipped nails around the rough canvas lapels and brought the two halves closer to her throat.
“But now you’re cold,” she said in a husky voice.
Yeah, the fuck he was cold when he was looking at her.
“Nah, I’m good.” He nodded across the street, at that club’s neon entrance. “You better get back to—”
“What did you say your name was?”
He glanced at the break area, and all the men who were NOT LOOKING, LIKE AT ALL. “I didn’t.”
“Oh. Well… I’m Lyric.” A slender hand extended out of the folds of his shitty jacket. “Pleased to meet you, and thanks for saving my life.”
He put his palms in the air, like it was a stickup. “I’m dirty.”
“I don’t care.”
“Skin’s rough.”
“That doesn’t bother me.” Her half smile was like a bomb going off in his chest. “And if you tell me you’ve never had a manicure—”
“Dev. Short for Devlin.” But he didn’t dare touch her. “And I’d take my hat off, but I already did—or you wouldn’t have had to bring it back to me.”
“Are you always so formal?” she murmured.
“You’re a lady. And my mother taught me certain manners.”
That smile got a little wider. “She’s certainly someone with standards and how lucky to have a son like you who—”
“She’s dead, and I didn’t like her.”
The blonde’s face froze, and, yup, he was reminded of why the monk thing for him was really the best option. For so many reasons.
“This is fantastic! Let me get a picture of you both!”
That little dark-haired woman with the bullhorn voice barreled through the pedestrian barrier like a tank, and what do you know: The crowd that had gathered out in the street followed her right in, all floodwaters after a dam burst.
He put his arms wide, knowing Bob was going to fricking love this. “You people got to get outta here—”
The brunette looked up at him like she’d never seen a stop sign, red light, or hold-your-horses hand motion in her life.
“Just a picture,” she said in a suddenly level voice. “With the jacket around her standing next to you—”
“Marcia,” the blonde started, “this is not the time or place—”
As the flashes from all those phone cameras blinded him, he knew he had to bolt—hell, he shouldn’t have gotten involved with this circus in the first place.
Yeah, except then she’d be dead in the street, and what a waste.
“Keep the jacket,” he told her gruffly. “And go back where you came from.”
“Wait, you should take it—”
“I have another,” he lied as he walked away.
He didn’t head over to the jackhammer because he knew she’d just give things another go with the give-back, and bring her entourage along with her. Instead, he two-stepped the stairs and went inside the old, cold building—and made sure the door couldn’t be opened behind him.
“Fucking… hell,” he muttered as the wind howled outside.
The lobby was nothing more than a ripped-clean cavern of dust and debris, the pathways through the buildup on the floor created by bins being dragged or equipment getting pulled or workers traipsing through as tributaries running off from the headwater of the entrance.