Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 107306 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 537(@200wpm)___ 429(@250wpm)___ 358(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107306 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 537(@200wpm)___ 429(@250wpm)___ 358(@300wpm)
He rolls to his side, pushes up on his elbow, cocking his head, studying me. I don’t get him. I’m not sure how to respond or what the fuck he’s thinking. “Would she sacrifice herself for you?”
“Fuck off.”
“I’m not trying to be a dick. Just curious.”
I shrug. “Probably not.”
“And you don’t care?”
“I don’t stress about things I can’t change.”
He nods slowly, gaze still penetrating.
“What do you want?” I ask again.
“I haven’t figured it out yet. I should kill you. Let’s be real, I probably will, but…you’re intriguing. Plus, my bunny likes you, and I don’t want to disappoint him.”
“Your bunny?” What the hell is he talking about? “Is there something wrong with you?”
“Yes. And Ollie is my bunny. He wouldn’t like you anymore if he knew you robbed me, and Cillian would kill you, which again, is likely where we’ll end up, but…I want to play with you first.”
Either my brain is scrambled from the hit I took, or there really is something wrong with this man. And I’m fucking lost about the relationship dynamics. He said Cillian is like a brother to him, but he talks about Ollie like they’re together. I don’t have the mental capacity right now to disentangle that, and really, I shouldn’t care. But I don’t want these bastards to take advantage of Ollie.
For now, I choose to focus on his intentions toward me. “Play with me? I’m not a fucking toy.”
His brows draw together. “Yes, you are. I’ve been playing with you for days. Going to the Pizza Palace, following you, watching your house. Now I must find a new game. Why did you steal from me?”
He bounces around topics, I’ve noticed, from playing with me to my stealing from him without any kind of bridge. “Rent money. Our landlord is a prick. I’m pretty sure he’s into illegal shit. He’s got this bodyguard that follows him around. Anyway, my mom spent all the rent money, so I did what I had to do.”
“Yet you’d still sacrifice yourself for her?” He sits up on the edge of the bed and continues when I don’t answer him. “She said you’re her best friend, that she had you at fifteen. She seems to love you even if she’s a shitty mom.”
“Hey, fuck off. Don’t call her that.” I mean, he’s right. She’s a terrible mom and always has been, but he doesn’t have the right to say it.
“I had shitty parents too. Most of us do. So, you sling pizzas by day and steal by night?”
I rub a hand over my face, then notice the ibuprofen on my desk. I swallow three of them dry.
His forehead wrinkles as he takes me in, like he’s trying to see below the surface. “Was I your first?”
I don’t want to answer, but I don’t have the energy to fight with him. And he has a gun.
“Yes and no.”
“It can only be one.”
“I’ve hurt people before, I’ve stolen before, but I’ve never staked out a place in the hopes to rob a random guy.”
“But now you’ve done it again after me.”
“Jesus. Yes. You’re giving me a fucking headache.”
“You liked it.” He grins, but it’s one that makes me shift uncomfortably…and one I want to dissect. He said he finds me intriguing, and clearly, I do with him as well. I wish I didn’t, wish I was disgusted by him, but the truth is, I’m not. “Were you hard too? When you stole from me and I wasn’t afraid? When I told you I would kill you?”
I shake my head. I want to throw this guy out of my trailer and never see him again. I want to fight him, and God, I think I want to fuck him too.
“Who are you?”
“Rory Fitzpatrick.” He holds his hand out. “Nice to meet you.”
I swat it away, and he chuckles.
“Why did Shai Burrows appear out of thin air?”
“New start. Different last name.”
“You’re running from someone?” His leg bounces up and down.
“You change the subject so often, I’m getting whiplash.”
“Yeah, my mind is an interesting place. Are you?”
“None of your business.”
“That means yes. Is Bunny in trouble if he spends time with you?”
I shake my head. “No.” I have nothing to hide, and I have a feeling he could find out whatever he wanted—hell, he could probably ask my mom, and she would tell him, if she hasn’t already, so I answer truthfully. “My sperm donor…he’s a pimp. Sells women and sex.”
“Your mom?”
“Yes.”
“She doesn’t like it? The selling sex, I mean.”
Interesting question. “I don’t know. She still does it, but at least it’s on her terms now, when and how she wants. She gets to keep the money, and she doesn’t have a pimp beating her ass every other day.”
His pupils blow wide. Huh. He doesn’t like that. He didn’t strike me as the type who’d give a fuck about a woman being hit.