Total pages in book: 106
Estimated words: 98643 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 493(@200wpm)___ 395(@250wpm)___ 329(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98643 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 493(@200wpm)___ 395(@250wpm)___ 329(@300wpm)
“I’m fine,” I assured him. “Just tripped on the steps.” With a forced laugh, I added, “Considering it was my first time doing laundry and everything came out the same color as when it went in, a little stumble on the stairs is nothing.”
Brooks didn’t laugh, which made me nervous. Despite having known each other for years, the man and I weren’t super close. For whatever reason, we shared certain things with each other, but somehow we’d silently agreed to where the line was drawn when it came to our personal lives.
“Where’d your stud do you today?” I asked with a waggle of my eyebrows. For some reason, I felt like a fraud. Actually, I’d felt that way from the moment I’d landed in Wyoming a few days earlier.
No, that wasn’t true. There was one particular moment after landing in Wyoming and meeting up with Brooks when something had shifted inside of me. It was when I’d watched as the hardened man who was the epitome of strength—the one Brooks had been in love with since he was a kid—had begged Brooks for one simple thing.
Not asked.
Begged.
He’d begged Brooks.
Xavier, the man who’d betrayed Brooks when they’d been younger and had been cruel to my friend from the moment he’d returned to his true home, had begged Brooks not to let me touch him. Not to let anyone touch him.
That had been the moment Xavier, the hardened ex-con who’d pretended to care about no one but himself, had confirmed that he’d fallen just as hard as Brooks had. He hadn’t cared that there’d been strangers milling around other motel room doors, he hadn’t known that my relationship with Brooks was completely platonic, and he’d been absolutely clueless as to how desperately in love Brooks was with him, but none of it had mattered.
I’d literally watched a man offer up a painfully soul-wrenching admission through what appeared to have been one simple request.
As much as I’d hated the man for how cruelly he’d treated Brooks, he’d cemented a truth within me that even I hadn’t known I wanted.
For someone to want me that much. To need me that much. To know me for who I really was and still be willing to give a piece of himself to me.
I didn’t want it from Xavier, of course, and I definitely did not want those things from Hot Cowboy who’d managed to mess with my head not once, but twice now. I wanted them from someone out there who’d see me for who I really was. I wanted to see those things in them…
My envy of Brooks’s newfound reality made me feel like a major asshole, so I turned my back to him and went to my dresser, pretending to examine my array of makeup, most of which I hadn’t worn after having the crap beaten out of me in that alley. I doubted I’d be wearing any of it anytime soon, either.
The ploy worked because I could hear the pure joy in the loud rush of air that Brooks let out before he plopped down on my mattress. I turned to see him staring at the ceiling, though I doubted it was the ceiling that was making his cheeks bright pink. He probably didn’t even realize he was running his hand over his chest.
I went to the bed and lay flat on my back next to him. “Tell me.”
“His bed,” he said in bewilderment, like he still couldn’t believe it.
“Honey, you and I never really had ‘the talk’ before, but it’s okay to think outside the box when it comes to—”
“Shut up,” Brooks said with a light smile and a nudge of his shoulder against mine. He went silent for a moment and to my surprise, I felt his fingers link with mine farther down the bed where our arms were nearly touching. “It was the first time,” Brooks whispered.
“First time… wait, haven’t you been fucking like bunnies—”
“Jules!” Brooks interrupted. I loved how flushed and awkward he got when it came to talking about sex, especially when it came to colorful language.
I chuckled. I felt light and free for the first time since I’d stepped off the plane in Casper. Actually, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt this way.
“Okay, okay, so you did it in his bed. Tell me there were at least some toys—”
“Would you please shut up?” Brooks barked before slapping his hand over my mouth. He ended up rolling to face me, so I did the same thing. “Uncle Curtis will hear you!”
I rolled my eyes. “Ten bucks says if I called your uncle in here right now, he’d be a whole lot less personal with his questions.”
Brooks smiled. A real smile. Another of many that I’d seen since I’d arrived in Eden and seen Xavier and Brooks starting to deal with the intricacies of their newfound relationship.