Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 99399 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 497(@200wpm)___ 398(@250wpm)___ 331(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99399 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 497(@200wpm)___ 398(@250wpm)___ 331(@300wpm)
I wasn’t going to tell Trace about Fletcher—that was several bridges too far, solemn promises or not—but I’d thought maybe I could go to his place, casual-like. Find out how he was.
And not have my nosy-as-fuck sister on my case about it.
Rosie
Did you eat? I could bring leftover brisket?
Not hungry but thanks. Think I’m going to head to bed early since I have to get up at dawn.
Rosie
You okay?
Yeah.
My fingers hovered over the screen. Don’t do it. She already suspects. Don’t fucking do it.
Who’s Trace dating?
My back teeth hurt.
It took a minute for her to type the response.
Rosie
Patrick Cushnie, but I think they broke up? Avery heard it from Helen Kimball. Helen’s friends with Patrick’s mom.
Fucking small towns.
My fingers flew over the tiny screen until I found Patrick Cushnie’s Instagram account. He was a good-looking guy. Huge. Fit. Young. Outdoorsy in a Montana—hunting and fishing—way rather than a Trace—hiking and rock climbing—way. After scrolling his stupid pics for a minute and ignoring another incoming text from Rosie, I found what I was looking for.
A photo from his ten-year high school reunion last year.
The fucker was younger than I was.
Rage began to build inside of me. Clean and stark. Hot and all-consuming.
How. Fucking. Dare. He.
It was one thing to tell me he wasn’t interested in me. It was another to say it was because of my age. I was thirty fucking years old. No longer a child. Not like this fresh-faced… electrical line worker or whatever.
I was back in the Rover before I spared another thought, anger spurring me with only the slimmest of reason and consideration keeping me from spinning out on the snowy roads.
Instead of chickening out and parking in the general SERA lot like before, I pulled directly in front of his cabin, blocking his own truck in. I slammed out of the vehicle and raced up to the front door before banging on it with my fist.
“Open up!” I barked.
Part of me knew this was stupid. Knew my actions were drawing a line in the sand between us we’d never be able to cross over again. But what had being careful gotten me?
My feelings for Trace had suffocated me for half my life. Had stolen years from me by kneecapping my ability to have a decent, meaningful relationship with anyone else—and I’d fucking tried, over and over.
Until it became obvious I was broken. Broken into Trace-shaped pieces that didn’t even fucking fit together since the most important one was missing.
And would always be missing, as long as he was unwilling to even give me a chance.
I turned thirty weeks ago and had never kissed Trace Bishop.
What was the fucking point?
“Open the door, asshole!” I called again. The side of my fist was hot from banging it over and over.
When he finally opened the door, Trace was shirtless and bleary-eyed. Soft flannel pajama bottoms hung dangerously low on his hips, revealing acres of skin and muscle. Chest hair and dark hair below his navel. A thin, silvery scar on his flank. A hint of sharp bone at his hips and the soft curve of his ass just behind it.
Fuck me.
He steeled his expression into one of polite indifference threaded with familial, paternal concern. “Wolfe? Why are you banging on my door? Are you okay?”
“No. I’m not fucking okay.”
His skin prickled in the cold, hardening his nipples and making his stomach muscles bunch. “Why are you here?”
I pressed my fingers into the center of his chest to push him back so we could both go inside, into the warmth of his cabin, where he wouldn’t freeze to death. I didn’t dare let my entire hand touch him for fear of what it would unleash inside of me.
Trace’s eyes widened at the touch, but he let me push him back. “What are you doing?”
“You’ll get cold.”
“You shouldn’t be here. You should go.”
I continued to push him gently until he was backed against the console table in his small entryway. “Oh yeah? Why’s that?”
His eyes dropped to my lips, sending a flash of heat shooting into my groin. I wasn’t stupid, and this wasn’t the first time I’d caught him looking at me with desire. If I’d truly thought my attraction to him was one-sided, I wouldn’t have been nearly as angry about his supposed indifference.
Trace’s shoulders slumped. “Wolfe. Why are you here?”
“I’m here to call you a goddamned liar,” I hissed, surprising him. If there was one thing Wolfe Marian wasn’t, it was confrontational. But this particular confrontation had been a long time in the making. “You stood there on your fucking porch kissing a… a child after telling me you’d never consider dating someone seventeen years younger than you.”
I stood close enough to feel his chest brushing my own through my shirt. Somehow, I’d left the house without my parka and hadn’t felt a single thing. But here? Now? Now, I was feeling everything. Every short inhale of his breath. Every warm exhale tinged slightly with the scent of alcohol. The inevitability of this moment but also the ugliness of it.