Total pages in book: 254
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
“I’ll sit on the bed, and you can stand between my legs while I work on them, deal? If they don’t look good, we’ll try again,” I offered the blonde.
Agnes’s nose wrinkled and she squinted, but she nodded in a way that reminded me a lot of Henri, all brisk and no-nonsense.
This was a test. For whatever reason, the idea of it made me more nervous than when I’d taken my SATs. I didn’t care if most people didn’t like me, but I wanted her to.
Everyone deserved love, especially the difficult ones.
This could have been me. This could have been Duncan. This could’ve been Matti or even Henri, here, without an adult they trusted enough to ask for help with a hairstyle.
I couldn’t cry.
But I blinked a whole bunch of times while I sat on the end of the bed and the girl came to stand between my legs, holding three different kinds of elastics.
She only made me redo her pigtails twice.
Child?
Can you hear me?
I gasped awake, jackknifing up into a seated position.
A low pulse of pain, a baby headache, pressed against my forehead, directly above my eyebrows. My heart was racing. My throat felt dry.
That hadn’t been a dream.
It hadn’t been a freaking dream in any way.
My bedroom door swung open, my sleeping puppy lifting his head groggily at the intrusion, his tail doing the same as a familiar body slipped inside.
“Cricket?” Henri’s voice was soft, navy blue sweatpants clung to his hips for dear life as his long legs brought him to my bed. He wasn’t wearing a shirt again. I wasn’t too out of it not to notice that.
Duncan took one look at him, peeked at me through bleary puppy eyes, and set his head back down.
I opened my mouth to say I was fine, but the only thing that came out of me was an exhale. It was a shaky one too. I tried again, and the same thing happened.
I felt… not scared, but worked up?
“I heard it.” Henri frowned as he sat on the edge of the mattress, his butt literally pushing my legs aside. “You all right?” he whispered.
My fingers were shaking. But nothing had happened. No one was hurt.
A warm hand covered mine, right where it was on my lap, jittery like I’d had the scare of a lifetime.
“Hey, you’re good.” Henri’s fingers curled over my own. His forehead wrinkled. “You’re here. You’re safe. You listening?”
I opened my mouth again, but another shaky breath was the only sound that left my body.
Fingertips touched my chin, tilting my head back.
Henri’s face leaned in so close, his cheekbones and eyes filled my vision, becoming my whole world in that moment. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you,” he told me.
The logical part of my brain was aware there was nothing to be worked up about.
But the rest of me wasn’t convinced of anything.
How the hell could someone be talking to me while I slept? How powerful was this MFer? Who was he?
“Same thing happen?” His thumb drew a line from the knuckle of mine up to my fingernail.
I nodded, feeling dumb for acting like this when I was fine. Duncan was fine. Henri was fine. That was what mattered. I was here, and I was safe, and whoever this person was, he wasn’t Freddy Krueger, and he didn’t seem to be wanting to hurt me.
He was just… asking for someone.
For maybe, possibly, me.
I had to pinch my lips together at that.
After a second, I said, “Yeah, it sounded like the same voice from before.” Flipping my hand up, I snuck it under his palm, shaken up but ultra aware of this man in only sleeping pants, inches away from me. His chest got better every time I saw it, covered in creamy tan skin and dark chest hair that I would’ve wanted to focus on if someone wasn’t visiting me in my dreams.
I didn’t want this. I wasn’t a child anymore who was different from everyone around her and needed some way to identify. I definitely didn’t need someone poking around, ruining my chances here.
I squeezed my eyes together and swallowed hard. “I’m sorry, Fluff.”
There was a soft touch to my jaw that had me peeking at him. Any sign of his neutral face was gone. He looked… concerned. “Why are you apologizing?”
I let my head droop forward, my forehead grazing the bare skin on his shoulder, nestling into the perfect crook right there. “Because you’re being woken up, and it might be my fault. I know you got home late. You need your sleep.” I’d happened to be standing in the hallway at the window, holding a heavy Duncan in my arms, while we’d been nosy. Henri had gotten home an hour later than usual. While I’d been outside with Agnes and Duncan, I’d caught the little girl sitting there, staring off at the parking lot almost expectantly.