Total pages in book: 108
Estimated words: 104657 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 523(@200wpm)___ 419(@250wpm)___ 349(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 104657 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 523(@200wpm)___ 419(@250wpm)___ 349(@300wpm)
Our mouths collide the second he closes the door. My shirt hits the floor first, followed by his. Then he cradles my face, kissing me again because mere seconds feel too long without his lips on mine. My back meets the wall next to the door. We’re so close to the bed, yet too far at the same time. His calloused palm skates down my neck to my chest, pulling my breast from my bra. Squeezing it until I feel it everywhere.
“Shh,” he whispers in my ear, and I realize I’m moaning.
I quickly nod half a dozen times. I’ll be quiet. If he wants me on my knees, hands tied behind my back, scarf around my mouth, I’ll do it and sort through my unhealthy obsession with him later.
It doesn’t feel like eleven years since I fell for him. It barely feels like eleven minutes. He’s all-consuming, and I can’t get enough. If this fireman wants to eat me for all three meals a day, I’ll be the sacrificial lamb to keep him satiated.
We perform a clumsy dance of discarding the rest of our clothes on the way to the bed. He guides me to straddle his lap and lies back as we kiss. When he fills me, I close my eyes and still for a minute. My crippled heart aches with every beat. I’m so in love with William Landry, but I don’t know if his heart feels anything, even when he’s inside me.
He wants a release, a chance to let go. I want a connection, a chance to hold on.
Will hugs me and sits up, our bodies intertwined. His face ghosts along my neck the way my fingers feather down his back.
It’s different. More intimate.
“I love you . . . I’m sorry,” I whisper, closing my eyes.
Someone should take my medical license. How can someone with my level of infatuation possibly help anyone else?
Will pauses, punching me with regret. Tears burn my eyes as I rest my chin on his shoulder. When he says nothing, I turn my head and press my lips to his neck.
He cups the back of my head in his palm and kisses the shell of my ear. “You are the most beautiful woman I have ever known.”
I blink, releasing tears that are too big to contain. I thought I was okay with unrequited love—until now. Beautiful has never felt so ugly. On the heels of my declaration of love, this feels like a participation ribbon.
So I close my eyes and move with him, tucking every feeling into the nooks and crannies of my memory. Someday, I might need these beautiful memories to get me through the loneliness if IHOP goes out of business.
Minutes later, we lie on our sides, his front spooned to my back.
This is not about me. I repeat it over and over in my head until I fall asleep.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Will
This amazing woman and brilliant doctor will end up in therapy because of me—because she fell for the guy who broke her kite and then her heart.
I’m not used to being the villain. I’m the hero—to everyone except Everleigh Reichart.
Blinking my eyes open at the crack of dawn, I slide my hand along the mattress before turning my head to the empty space beside me. She’s never next to me when I wake up. On my way to the bathroom, I hear chatter. She’s on the deck with my mom.
After taking a piss, I pull on a shirt and jeans, then pour a cup of coffee. Before turning the corner to the deck door, I stop and listen—eavesdrop like Lola. The storm door is cracked, so it’s not my fault I can hear them.
“I think Will is going to struggle with Thatcher’s death more than his sister. Maybe even more than me. He has always looked up to his father. They spent many summers lost in the woods, living out of a tent, fishing, identifying every plant species imaginable. And so many nights under the stars. Thatcher loved astronomy. Also, his father was a firefighter, so you can imagine how excited and proud he was when Will decided to follow in Granddad Landry’s footsteps.”
“He never told me that,” Everleigh says. “If death were easy, I might not have a job.”
Mom laughs. “Touché.”
“Steffi, I think you and your children will heal together. Death has a way of giving perspective to life. When I die, I hope my kids will take time to see the beauty in life. The fragility of love. The ephemeral nature of this thing we call time.”
My mom hums softly. “I like how the world looks through your eyes. You’re far too wise to be twenty-nine.”
“Oh, I’m not wise. I’m just the product of overconsuming the writings of famous philosophers and thinkers: Socrates, Kant, Aristotle, Confucius, Buddha, Hippocrates. I’ve had a lot of food for thought for a twenty-nine-year-old.”