Total pages in book: 155
Estimated words: 144435 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 722(@200wpm)___ 578(@250wpm)___ 481(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 144435 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 722(@200wpm)___ 578(@250wpm)___ 481(@300wpm)
"No. They're facing their fears too. We made a pact. It's a whole thing." She scrolls through her messages, muttering under her breath at some. One makes her cackle.
"Please tell me they aren't in the mountains too."
"What? Oh, no. For some reason, half of them are stripping down in front of other people." She turns wide eyes on me and then giggles. "I guess the wind got that part out of the way for me yesterday. Peyton is saving the forest. You'd like her. And I don't know what Cleary is doing."
"Jesus," I mutter, shaking my head. I'm guessing they were all drunk when they made this pact. I'm almost afraid to ask who the ringleader was. I have a sneaking suspicion the responsible party is sitting beside me, scrolling through messages on her phone like her life depends on it.
"Holy Babe the Blue Ox!" she shouts. "Cleary is Anita Dix!"
"What?" I try not to choke on my own tongue. Did she just say clearly, she needs a dick? Because I've got nine inches ready and willing…
She taps out a message on her phone, ignoring me.
"What did you just say, Sunshine?"
"No," she groans, pressing her phone against the window again. When that doesn't work, she holds it up near the roof of the Jeep, and then contorts herself, shoving her arm into the backseat. Finally, she huffs and drops the phone onto her lap. "Stupid mountain with no stupid reception."
"Sunshine, focus," I growl, two seconds from pulling this car over to spank her little ass again. "What did you just say?"
"I said Cleary is Anita Dix," she says slowly, looking at me like I'm crazy. "The romance author."
Shit, maybe I am losing my mind.
Or maybe it's just wishful thinking, asshole. You played with fire last night, now you're burning for it.
"She just confessed that she's been writing this year as Anita Dix. She never told us." A bright smile stretches across her face, those damn dimples popping out again. "I'm so proud of her, Deacon."
"Good for her," I mutter, not sure what else to say.
"Do you read?"
"I'm guessing not the same things you read."
"Oh, really? So you don't read monster smut?" she sasses, smirking at me.
"I don't even know what the fuck that is, Cordelia."
"Romance between a human and a monster. Sometimes they have interesting things going on with their…um…nether regions. Like knots and things."
"Knots?" My brows fly upward.
"You know, on their penises, so when they, um…" She squirms in her seat, blushing bright red. "It gets stuck inside after they…" She huffs adorably. "It's so they can breed their mate without it leaking out."
"Sunshine?"
"Yeah?"
"Stop talking."
"Okay," she whispers.
I exhale a slow breath, my dick so hard he's about to break in half. Jesus. She's a kinky little thing, isn't she? I'd like to breed her. I won't need a damn knot, either. I'll just leave my cock in her between rounds until she's nice and pregnant.
"You think I talk too much, don't you?"
"I think if you keep talking about breeding, I'm going to be fucking you on the side of this mountain until you're screaming the goddamn thing down around us," I growl, glancing over at her. "Every word you say makes my dick harder, baby."
"Oh." Her gaze falls to my lap, her tongue skating across her bottom lip.
I fire a round of curses up at the roof of the Jeep.
This is going to be the longest goddamn hike in the history of hikes.
Chapter Seven
CORDELIA
"Are we there yet?" I pant, grasping onto a tree. My legs feel like rubber. Actually, that's not true. I can't feel my legs. All I feel is the burn in my chest and the knot in the pit of my stomach.
"Almost, Sunshine," Deacon promises, reaching out to run his hand down my back. "Ten more minutes."
"You said that ten minutes ago," I remind him. He said it ten minutes before that, too. I think he's trying to keep me from freaking out by giving me small increments of time to focus on, but the longer we're out here, the more my anxiety grows. It's cold and isolated and feels far too much like it did when I was a teenager. I don't like it at all.
Deacon has been surprisingly patient with me. I expected him to be cranky and annoyed, but he hasn't been. He's been…really sweet. He's talked more in the last two hours than he has since I got here. I'm sure if he were on his own, he and Tyr would already be at the cabins by now, but he doesn't seem to mind that I'm slowing him down. He's let me set the pace and just walks along at my side, helping me over fallen logs and grabbing me when I slip on icy patches or trip…which happens more than I care to admit.