Total pages in book: 49
Estimated words: 47716 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 239(@200wpm)___ 191(@250wpm)___ 159(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 47716 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 239(@200wpm)___ 191(@250wpm)___ 159(@300wpm)
Never-ending, likely.
Nothing else really explained him, though.
“Love’s complicated,” Anton said.
“Not for me. I’ve always loved you.”
“You loved the idea of me.”
“And then I met you,” she replied. “So, your point is ... well, pointless.”
“Moot, the point is moot.”
Viviana grinned. “Glad you see it, too.”
Yeah, he was so fucking in love with this girl.
“Smart mouth,” Anton muttered. “Love is still complicated.”
“You still love me.”
“A little.”
Her private smile, like she’d just won a battle, made him laugh.
“Can I try it, or not?” Viviana asked.
“It’ll make you choke a lung out,” he tried to explain.
Viviana scoffed. “I doubt it.”
“Fine, get over here.”
Instead of climbing into the bed like he thought she would, Viviana climbed on top of him and straddled his waist. Anton’s air cut past his lips like a cat’s hiss at the feeling of her shifting over his groin.
“Viviana ...”
“Yeah?”
The girl didn’t even know.
Anton wouldn’t tell her.
“Never mind.”
Viviana snatched the joint from Anton’s fingers, immediately sticking it to her lips and taking way too big of a drag. The violent coughing started before she had even finished inhaling properly.
In a blink, Anton stole the joint back. There wasn’t a hint of satisfaction in his tone at all when he said, “Told you.”
Viviana continued with her coughing spell until he pulled a bottle of water from his bedside table and cracked it open for her. Her eyes watered and her cheeks heated up as she drank. Anton rubbed his hand along her outer thigh from her knee to the hem of her shorts, soothing her.
Once her hacking calmed, her eyes watered and she shook her head. “That is ...”
“Strong.”
“Let’s go with that.”
“I told you not to,” Anton reminded her before taking a hit from the joint. He held the smoke in his lungs, letting it roll around and burn, softening the harshness of the weed. Pinching Viviana’s chin between his forefinger and thumb, he pulled her down until her lips were just a centimetre away from his. A bit of smoke escaped his mouth when he said, “Open up and inhale.”
She did as he asked and without a second coughing fit, took the shotgunned hit from his lungs like a pro. One after another, after another, Viviana took every drag he offered until the stub of a roach was left. Anton dropped the snuffed out joint into his metal tin as Viviana climbed off him and snuggled under the blanket.
“Don’t know why there’s comforters on these beds,” she mused. “It’s too hot to use them.”
Anton laughed at her random statement. “And there you are, underneath one.”
“So? It’s very soft.”
“You’re a little high.”
Viviana watched him as he clicked the lamp off, shrouding them in darkness. “A little.”
“Feel okay?”
“So far.”
“Tell me if you don’t, baby.”
“Okay. Come here.”
Anton, despite being hot enough in the basement bedroom, did as his girl demanded. Because she was his. And she wanted him to.
Simple as that.
“Why do you call me Viviana?” she asked.
“I like it.”
“Everyone calls me Vine.”
Yeah, but nobody thought to tell her he gave her that name, so.
“I like Viviana better.”
“But everybody calls me it, even the nurses at the doctor’s office. I fill out forms with that name instead of my own.”
Anton found that hard to believe. “Come on, they don’t all call you Vine, right?”
His hand found her naked legs under the blanket, skimming over her skin to feel the heat and have her closer. One week. That was all it took for this. One day, really. But he’d say the week tied him like silk ropes to her.
She was everywhere in him, and he didn’t understand why.
“Mom calls me Ant,” Anton said, cringing when he thought about it. “I hate that.”
Anton covered her face with a pillow when the high she was experiencing turned her into a giggling mess. “Ant, really? Oh, God, that’s horrible.”
“Shut up, or you’ll wake the house.”
“Don’t think your bull doesn’t already know someone is in here with you.”
Anton let go of the pillow and she batted it from her face. Rolling to his back, he realized he didn’t care about Boris across the hall.
Or if someone found them.
“He won’t tell, and they wouldn’t care. Well, maybe Roman would; the good little Catholic girl you are shouldn’t be in a boy’s room in the middle of the night, Vine.”
Viviana grinned a sinful sight, her bottom lip catching between her teeth. “I thought you liked Viviana better. And yeah, no one ever calls me that anymore.”
He did. Because he liked it. So, he said it again, wanting to taste it on his tongue.
“So, Viviana, why did you sneak out of your warm, safe bed to climb into mine?”
Like she had that first time in the water, Viviana kissed him with no warning. Anton cussed under his breath, already hard as a fucking rock and willing his urges to go away.
He wanted to defile this girl.