Total pages in book: 180
Estimated words: 176012 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 880(@200wpm)___ 704(@250wpm)___ 587(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 176012 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 880(@200wpm)___ 704(@250wpm)___ 587(@300wpm)
“I just wanted to repeat my warning,” she points out. “Some consider the house a landmark of sorts. They might not be entirely welcoming to someone else taking possession of it. You understand?”
I catch movement next door, seeing Farrow and some other guy standing in front of the side window, facing me and pinching each other’s nipples.
I snort and turn away, trying to cover it with a cough.
“I’m not worried,” I choke out.
I’ve got a powerful friend close who will give me his endorsement.
Ms. Doucet fondles the stud in her ear before ushering me up the stairs. “Let’s take another look before I leave you to your new home.”
Lucas
Farrow’s motorcycle rumbles in her driveway, and I stand in the kitchen, frozen like my feet have sprouted roots into her floor.
Make her stay. It’s quiet here, just how she likes. It could be just the two of us without any overbearing older brothers or parents or curious eyes. We could make dinner and watch a movie, but…
I listen to her speed away, closing my eyes with my heart in my fucking stomach, because all I could think about with her in the room was her naked on my bed last night. I can’t get the images out of my head and how much I loved finding out she dreams of me. Can I be her friend now? Can I trust myself to be alone with her?
Fuck.
She’ll be moving soon. I’ll be close, but not too close. I need to keep myself under control, so she trusts me again. I don’t want her latching on to Noah or Farrow because they have rides.
My house was paid for in cash. Does Quinn really have access to that much money? Without a loan?
Then she can damn well afford a vehicle of her own. Two guys she barely knows, and who won’t be there the rest of her life, aren’t an excuse to put off the inevitable.
And…they’re not going to give her something for nothing.
The next morning, I step into Fallon’s workshop, a former chimney service business in a black brick house, far off the road with ivy climbing the wall on the right side of the door. The creak of the screen door sounds like it’s from the fifties, and Quinn immediately enters my thoughts again. She probably insisted Fallon keep the rusted, aluminum door because it’s louder than a doorbell, but better because anyone just entering your place doesn’t mean strangers. She would say it means friends, and the sound would make us smile.
Or something weird like that. Everything makes Quinn feel, and so much of how she associates with the world is rooted in memory. Of which, I’m a part.
I want to laugh with her again. So badly. And I want Madoc and Fallon and everyone else back in my life. As my love of Dubai starts to sink to the back of my brain, and the Falls takes its place, I know that what I gave up here wasn’t worth any price.
“Who’s there?” Fallon calls out.
I round a glass partition adorned with plants and enter a large room with multiple desks, drafting tables, and a seating area in the corner. Emerald green subway tiles adorn the walls, and I look up, seeing a small conference room through the glass walls upstairs.
Fallon is the only one here. Madoc said she often mentored college students and took in interns, but for the most part, there was no staff. Just her small passion projects. Technically, she’s on an extended leave from the company we both work for, which simply means she can have her job back any time. I think the kids and Madoc’s building political aspirations were the excuse she was looking for to have some creative freedom again.
She stands in the middle of the room, a VR headset on as she swipes her hands to move through whatever world she’s in.
I chuckle quietly as I pull it off her head. “What’s this?”
She spins around, startled. “Lucas.”
I pull the headset on over my own eyes. A neighborhood spans before me, and I turn, taking in the new world.
“Madoc mentioned you stayed,” she says, trying to sound nonchalant when I know she just wants to grill me. “How long?”
“For a bit,” I muse, quickly changing the subject. “You didn’t answer my question.”
“Oh.” I can tell she’s smiling by her tone. “It’s my marketing plan. You know I hate to type.”
She puts her gloves on me, and I wave my hands through the air to move the graphics and proceed to the next street. We learned how to design models on a computer, but this really would be a selling point. Being able to put a client into the future to see their skyscraper or home—explore the interiors—before it’s even built? Incredible.
But as I move around, past businesses and down streets, familiar landmarks show up. Jared’s shop, the gym, the statue of the sleeping fox that sits on a bench in front the tree at the middle school…