Peaches
4/5
()
About this ebook
"He makes it known he's dead set on claiming my peach the first chance he gets, & the sooner the better..."
It doesn't have to be a best seller.
It doesn't have to be something new no one has ever read before.
So why am I over thinking and making this so damn difficult?
I need to focus.
To push past the writer's block, the fear, the taunting rejection that they'll all think this new book of mine sucks a big fat dick!
Am I allowed to say that?
Screw it because I just did.
I don't need distractions. Especially mouth-watering, panty-dropping, dirty talking, self-gratifying distractions. Distractions that cause my breath to catch, my thighs to clench, my center to quickly dampen, and my brain to scream only two self-gratifying words.
Yes fucking please!
OK, that was three.
Never mind the fact that he's my new boss. Forget the idea that he corners me into a fake engagement the first day we meet. Ignore the obvious attraction and the fact that I can't, for the life of me, stay away from Mr. Brettly Beckett. What's more, I don't want to, and he doesn't make it easy.
No, he's not backing down without putting in some very hard-to-resist, self-pleasure seeking efforts.
Gifting me with the nickname Peaches, he makes it known he's dead set on claiming my peach the first chance he gets, and the sooner the better. But I quickly learn that could prove too self-destructive if we let it. After all, it's like they say, not everything in life can be as sweet as a peach. Or can it?
Praise for Peaches:
"I started this book at two in the morning, planning to only read a few chapters, but I was automatically sucked in. I could not put it down until I finished."
"I devoured this book! I love Brett and Grace. The chemistry between them is explosive with a bit of comedy."
"I loved this book. More so because the protagonist is so believable. I loved the banter between her and Brett, it's absolutely the best! Definitely a book I would recommend to everyone!"
"The characters draw you in and their story will keep you entertained from beginning to end."
"The last few chapters had me laughing and crying. I've never seen a book wrapped up in quite the same manner, but I loved it!"
Evelyn Montgomery
Born & raised in California, Evelyn Montgomery now resides in Central Kentucky with her husband and three children.Her love stories include contemporary chick lit, romantic suspense, phycological thrillers, mysteries, RomCom & much more.One thing to always expect when reading an Evelyn Montgomery book is a plot twist somewhere between the pages you’d never see coming.With no plans to stop writing any time soon, her goal is to keep producing a fictional world that isn’t forced, but genuine, heartfelt, and desirable.
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Reviews for Peaches
3 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I received an ARC of this book in return for an honest review.
Peaches is a lighthearted, heart warming read, it is very different to what I have already read from Evelyn.
The heroine Grace, an author, has a lot of sass and banter. Brett, the hero/alpha in the story won me over pretty quickly. He was charming and sensitive but I could tell there was more to him.
This book follows their journey which was a very slow burn. I was willing them to get together early on ? but when the steamy scenes did arrive, they were worth waiting for as they were hot!
Personally I found the book got better as you read, I much preferred the second half as I found the characters much stronger.
Although this book is described as a rom com, it is lighter on the comedy side. - Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5My first time reading Evelyn's works and WOW!
Brett and Grace were an amazing couple. I absolutely loved their meet cute and how they were both doomed from that point on even if they didn't realize it. Fate just kept stepping up to the plate and putting those two together. The tension from them can only be described as a slow, slow, slow burn but when they finally give into temptation there is no going back for either of them.
A couple things I wasn't expecting and was totally blindsided by them (in a positive way) was Grace's background and the different events she had to experience at a younger age. I loved her fierce protectiveness of Archie. The other is where Evelyn is wrapping up the story and we get a brief in depth look at the many side characters and while most of them I was right in thinking what I thought about them there was one that completely surprised me and actually made me feel sad for them.
As stated above this is the first story of Evelyn's I have read and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I actually love a good slow burn. I loved the way this story was wrapped up and that ending was just perfect...talk about coming around full circle!
**I was given an advance copy in exchange for an honest review**
Book preview
Peaches - Evelyn Montgomery
1
"It doesn’t have to be a bestseller. It doesn’t have to be something new no one’s ever read, or hell, have a twist the world would never see coming. It just has to come from the heart! Why am I making this so damn difficult?" I whisper aloud to myself, as my head rolls back simultaneously with my eyes, and I let out a heavy sigh.
The sounds of the coffee shop meld together in the background and make me think I should’ve stayed home where it was quiet. Where there weren’t any distractions, so I could think, focus, and maybe somehow get it right.
That’s what they say, you know?
It doesn’t matter.
Let it come from the heart.
That’s what almost every reader, editor, publisher and personal assistant will tell you when you’ve been stumped as long as I have. Writer’s block is one heavy bitch, let me tell you. It’s a weight hanging over my head each and every day. A constant reminder that I feel like I’ve lost my edge. That I’ve fallen out of touch. Like a light switch has been flicked off just as I feared it always would be.
When’s the next book coming out?
I thought you were writing about that one story next, what did you say it was? What happened to that?
Whatever you write, it will be great, I just know it.
But what’s more, you have to believe it yourself, and you just have to write!
Ugh. I know! I promise, on my stumped brain's writer’s block of a stupid head, I know that! I feel it! But somehow, I can’t escape a tiny little fact that sits in my subconscious, blinding me with the piercing thought that it may be right. The one sitting strategically in the way of my next story idea that screams loudest of them all… I have no words left.
And what’s even more…
Who’s to say they matter if I do?
One more sigh. One more roll of my eyes as my head cracks from side to side.
You got this!
My self-mantra attempts to echo through my mind.
You know you do!
Besides, my readers won’t be the only ones wanting to crucify me if I never give them another story to read. My editor. My publisher. My personal assistant. Holy hell, I can hear them now.
You have to stay relevant!
You have to keep up and compete with the other authors in your genre.
Romance is the most competitive market there is.
If you go cold, if you waste too much time between releases, you’ll lose it all.
And don’t I know it!
Truer words were never spoken given the way I’ve been seeing it all slowly slip through my fingers in my absence this last year. A fact that’s made me take an even harder look at myself and ask that one question I never thought I would.
Do I even care?
The longer I’ve sat with that question, the easier it is to answer. I could never stop caring about my dream. My craft. My reason for breathing. After all, that’s why I do it, to begin with. I’m a writer! Even if my books never make it on any bestseller lists, or if they never win any awards, if my reviews are mixed equally between those that hate them and those who love them. I have to remember why I started in the first place.
For me. To just write.
I’m an author after all, aren’t I?
All I have to do is make it come from the heart.
I just have to write!
Another sigh.
Another roll of the eyes.
Alright!
It’s now or never!
And it has to be now!
I suddenly start to feel the wheels in my head clicking.
A story in the shadows slowly emerges. It’s kinda cute. Maybe it could work. At least, I think it could.
Ah, what the hell! I never thought I’d write a story like this, but in the context of staying relevant, as they say, here goes nothing…
I’m sorry, is this seat taken,
I hear a low, raspy, sexy as fucking hell voice say next to me.
I try to avoid the pull it has on every naughty part of my body and focus back on my computer. But if I’m being honest with myself, I’m silently begging to hear it again, just so I can feel one more time the way it ran its way around every curve of my body. Slowly. Like a drug you don’t want to give into, but can’t help and enjoy as you feel it hit your bloodstream.
Shit! Focus, Grace!
My hands hover over the keys, ready to get started on a project I’ve been putting off for almost twelve damn months. Besides, he was talking to the table next to me, wasn’t he? There is no reason I should get my panties all in a wet twist.
I know, I’m sorry, you look very busy. But it’s just that…
the voice trails off, and I can’t help but be tempted to glance up and see who it’s coming from.
If the male behind it matches the way it pulls me under and makes me want to drown in it all night long, I might just let his voice make me forget about my deadline, my editor, publisher, and personal assistant… but never the readers.
No, never them.
My eyes raise ever so slowly and catch the light green ones staring back at me.
Sorry readers! This is where my story ends!
Sweet lord, have mercy!
His brown hair is short on the sides but sexily disheveled on the top of his head as if he just got out of bed. Stubble frames his chiseled jaw and my mouth waters at his full lips as they break out in a smile. But heaven please put me out of my misery and take me home now because I’m too tongue-tied to even speak. My eyes fall to his broad shoulders that fill out the tight-fitting white shirt that effortlessly, and oh sweet Jesus, ever so perfectly drapes over his torso. I can see the curves of his biceps and the definition of his abs under the sheer fabric. But that’s not what gets my heart racing.
No! Not that! There’s more! Sweet heaven above, there’s more!
Oh hell,
I hear myself grunt as my eyes close and I try and forget the grey sweatpants that hang on his lower hips.
I bite my bottom lip and squeeze my eyes shut harder, attempting to block out what I must’ve just imagined I saw out of my mind. Every curve, every hard inch of him. I suck in a breath and bite down on my bottom lip.
Forget it, Grace!
Block it out of your mind like you’ve blocked out this story idea for the last damn year.
You can do it!
Well, at least until I get home later and can fully let myself indulge in the fantasy that’s standing right in front of me.
It’s all in my mind, right?
But as I hear the stranger shuffles his feet, as time pauses and I know I’m still physically sitting in the coffee shop like an idiot with my eyes clenched shut, I realize it’s not a dream, and shit, I’m also one blessed girl because the tempting distraction that just walked into my life just so happens to be absolutely real.
As in pinch me and then make everyone disappear so I can indulge in this fantasy. Fuck my editor, my publisher, and everyone else because every nerve in my body is telling me I want to fuck him.
Excuse me?
comes that voice again, shaken and a little unsure of himself. I release a heavy sigh as my hands fall from my keyboard, and my brow furrows because I know I am not ready to meet his stare let alone speak back, but I know I have to force myself to open my eyes and try.
When I do, a defeated gaze meets my own. It’s okay, I’ll sit somewhere else,
he says, as he glances around the coffee shop. Except,
his voice lowers and then I hear him whisper in defeat, there is nowhere else.
The handsome intruder shuffles his feet once more and then attempts to walk away. I almost breathe out a sigh of relief because - yes, I was busy - and yes, I would gladly like to stare at him instead and maybe make some bad decisions we’d both regret come morning. Wouldn’t you? But I can’t let myself do that. For more reasons than one, I give his back a sad smile before looking at the screen in front of me and beginning to type once again. I’m almost a sentence in when, Mr. Perfect, from, ya know, out of nowhere, turns back around and takes a step closer.
It’s just,
he whispers once before clearing his throat and switching his coffee to his other hand. I’ve kinda had a shitty day and I’ve been watching you since I walked in the door.
My eyes raise once more as I sit up straighter in my seat and forget my work. Can you blame me? He grins again, and his breathtaking smile alone makes my stomach flutter.
Not in a creepy way, I swear. I just have a thing for reading people,
he shrugs, and like the red-blooded female I am, my eyes instantly fall to his waist as his shirt rises from the raise in his shoulders and I let my eyes memorize for a brief second the perfectly sculpted V that makes every girl go absolutely wild.
Like, say those two over there.
He points with his free hand to his right, totally not noticing what I was just salivating over, as he leans in and my eyes trail to the couple sitting across the room.
He thinks she called him here to start over, but honestly, she can’t wait to work up the nerves to actually end it so she can run through the front doors and into the arms of the guy she’s secretly been cheating with.
His hand points in the direction of the front window where I see a slightly nervous guy glancing down at his phone before looking up in the girl’s direction. He walks to the front door, almost opens it, shakes his head and then goes back to pacing around in front of the shop. I glance back at the girl in question and see her give the guy an I’m trying to hurry this up look when she thinks the guy she’s sitting with won’t notice.
And these three,
he says again, gesturing towards three college girls in the corner.
A seat is empty at their table and they attempt dewy eyes with the stranger at my side briefly before boldly staring in my direction and telling me figuratively to back the hell off.
I’ve never been into the sorority type,
a statement that I must say surprises me by the looks of him, "and something tells me if their eyes can cling to me that much without speaking a word to any of them, heaven knows how clingy they’d be before I got my ass in the seat."
I have to stifle a laugh as I glance back in his direction and smile. His eyes finally return to mine and his defeated guard lowers as he smiles back. His head turns, and I know he is about to tell me his deep psychological diagnosis of someone else across the room, but I beat him to it.
And what about me?
I finally speak up, and then can't help but grin a little wider when I see it startled him.
His eyes fall back on me and widen. He cocks his gorgeous head to the side and waits before responding, making me grow anxious and worry maybe I don’t want his reply. But then again, he was the one that came over in search of the empty seat at my table. Not the other way around.
You,
he whispers, as he sets his cup down on my table, obviously confident that I’ll let him sit once he gives me his answer. I raise my eyebrows in a warning and wait to hear what he has to say. Well, you’re the girl everyone wants to know but is too scared to approach.
Doubt that, Mr. Handsome, but please go on.
You’re all business when you’d rather be enjoying pleasure.
My mind wanders at his choice of the word pleasure and I have to cross my legs tight and act like it didn’t just phase me the way Casanova in front of me knew it would.
"You live your life in your own lane, not wanting any distractions. But truth be told, a good distraction is all you crave, otherwise, you wouldn’t be trying to work in one of Savanah’s busiest coffee shops."
I glare at him as I try and fight my grin from getting any wider, taking a moment for myself while he pauses and sexily stares back into my eyes. I bite the inside of my cheek and tell myself to hold it together.
Why the sexy ass!
Who does he think he is?
Oh, that’s right, Mr. Too Good To Be True, at my service. God, if only! Suddenly, I find myself more than done with his analysis, but oddly still feel my brain begging for him to continue. His body lowers into the chair in front of me as he drops a bag that’s been draped over his shoulder to the floor. I cross my arms over my chest and give him a seriously look that just makes him smiler wider.
"And how would you know just what I crave?"
It’s the writer in me. I can’t help but feed him that line. The bait I hope he takes just so I can fantasize about his response later tonight when I know there really won’t be any distractions.
His smirk deepens, and God, please give me strength, because that smirk is enough to almost send me over the edge. Make me want to push my laptop, this table, and every damn thing standing in our way to the side so I can straddle that V I still can’t get my mind off of as I kiss his smug full lips and taste heaven on his smart tongue.
Your body gives you away,
he suggests, as his eyes roam and take in the body in question the same pleasurable way I allowed myself to take him in earlier. Something flashes in his green eyes that suddenly makes me squirm a little because this time I’m the one in the spotlight, and I find myself wiggling slightly in suspense in my chair. Tight. Stressed. Tense,
he suggests, as his eyes lift and lock with mine. You keep releasing heavy sighs that should only be reserved for sensual acts designed for self-gratifying pleasure.
Hell, am I the writer here, or is this guy?
Sensual acts designed for self-gratifying pleasure?
Hold the press, I have to go take care of all things self-gratifying if it means he’s the one making me heavily sigh later on.
You start, only to stop and take a moment, wishing, wanting, yearning for something, anything, to give you what you’re afraid to give yourself.
He takes a sip of his coffee and gives me time to sit with his last words. I’m not afraid of anything, except maybe the writer’s block that won’t lift when I need it to most. I go to speak, to enlighten him on how fearless I am, but he cuts me off.
"You’re so busy focusing on your lane, your path, that even if it did come, your distraction, you’d be too fixated on what you’re not getting to ever see what’s right in front of you."
And let me guess,
I blurt out, "this is the part where you feed me the bullshit line that what’s sitting right in front of me, what I’m missing out on, is you?"
His laugh fills my ears, and I can’t help but blush from the insecurity it brings me. Masking my doubt the best I can, I look to the table in front of us and wait, wishing he’d just disappear like the dream I thought he was all of five minutes ago so I don’t have to listen to the answer I might not want to hear to my bold question.
I like that,
he suggests, making me lift my eyes and give him a questioning look. You call people on their bullshit. That’s a gift, don’t let anyone tell you any different.
Didn’t plan on it, Mr. Suave. But remind me again just when I said it was okay that you sit at my table?
I’m about to speak, to ask him just that, when he looks up, catches the eye of someone at the door and gives them a quick nod. Rising, his body sexily lifts out of the chair, my heart feels the void of him leaving, and dare I say it stings a little knowing this brief, unexpected, yet fun-as-hell encounter, will soon be over.
My mouth hangs open as he looks into my eyes and I instinctively close it to not seem like a gaping fish out of water. I go to speak again, opening my stupid big mouth, and then slam it shut as my eyes nervously dart around him and avoid his stare.
Tell me,
he says, bringing my stare back to his as I wait again, just once more before he leaves, to hear his gorgeous, too-sexy-to-be-true, voice speak. I need to memorize his voice, just one more time. God the pleasure that alone brings me. I can only imagine the rest. And I will, oh Lord how I will. Later, remember?
Did you get it?
he asks.
Get what?
What you crave, Peaches.
Peaches? We’re on the level of nicknames already? Who is this guy and how did he just so happen to fall out of the sky and land at my table?
I look at him dumbfounded. A little from his question, and a lot from his use of the nickname Peaches. After all, we are in Georgia, but…
Your distraction,
his voice says, pulling me to him once again.
It clicks, and my lips smash together as I feel my cheeks blush and my eyes glimmer with only one thing.
Thanks.
Sure did,
I tease, as I let my eyes shamelessly roam his physique one last time before his chuckle fills the space between us.
Good,
he says, leaning in with one hand on the table so he’s close enough that I can feel his breath feather against my lips. Now get back to work before you make me ditch my friend and show you just how much your smile helped turn my day around, too.
He gives me a wink, making me absolutely speechless again for what seems like the millionth damn time in his presence, and then starts to walk away.
Besides,
he shouts, making my attention snap to him and his friend at the door. We both know that’s the way you’d prefer it anyways. For now, at least. The best self-gratifying pleasure comes to those who wait, who are patient, wouldn’t you agree?
Smug bastard, I think, as I smile to myself and he pushes out the main doors.
And just like that, Mr. Too Good To Be True walks out of the coffee shop and out of my life leaving me too distracted to work and oddly refreshed enough to feel the brain fog start lifting.
What are the odds I’d ever see his handsome face again? Twenty billion to one. Something like that, I’m sure. It doesn’t matter though, he’s right. I don’t need distractions. I’m glad he walked out the door and out of my life. At least, that’s what I decide I will keep telling myself.
A sinking premonition settles at the base of my spine and I find myself staring at the door wishing he’d walk back through. Show me all the distractions I’ve been missing in each and every self-gratifying way. My head shakes, attempting to loosen the hold he had on me as I ready myself to work and lift my fingers above the keyboard.
An hour or so passes and I promise myself if we ever do cross paths, me and Mr. Too Hot For My Own Damn Good, I’ll find a way to thank him because just like magic, my hands start typing and I’m more than five thousand words into my next novel when I finally realize - I never even asked his name!
I stop abruptly and look out into space, into nowhere in the middle of the coffee shop, with wide eyes and wonder just how all of that just happened.
Peaches.
I smile to myself.
Looks like I’m not the only one who didn’t get a name.
Peaches.
My grin widens.
I have to admit, I kinda like it.
Okay, Romeo, I decide, pinning him with a name that seems absolutely appropriate. If we do ever meet again, I promise I’ll admit we might just be some sort of star-crossed lovers addicted to the distraction we both give each other from the life we’d rather not be living.
Maybe.
Maybe not.
Well, okay, I will.
Only to myself.
A promise is a promise after all, am I right?
Now that’s a promise I know I can keep.
2
BRETT
Luscious. Succulent. Ripe. Desirable.
The words linger in my mind as my cock stirs and I close my eyes, running my tongue over my lips as if I can sample the smallest bit of what I know she’d taste like.
Her playful demeanor.
Rich, sweet.
Her heavenly body.
Mature, attractive, fucking juicy as hell.
I feel my mouth water just thinking about it.
Something about her tells me she’s something to cherish. Something I’ve always wanted, wished for, and desired. No woman has ever talked to me like that and gotten away with it, and God, as I think back to our flirtatious banter, I just want only one thing - more!
Peaches! Damn Peaches!
I smile once to myself as her memory floats through my brain, and then force my mind to focus, to snap back to reality as I pull myself from my daydream, open my eyes, pull the bag on my shoulder up higher, and attempt to shake the thought of her from my head as I follow Josh down River Street.
Care to explain why you’re dressed like the homeless and not in your normal three-piece Armani suit,
I hear my business partner and best friend say. He clicks his key fob as we walk a few more feet toward his Mercedes and I look down at my attire.
Not much you can find in a corner shop after being drenched by a four-wheeler going fifty in a thirty-five, mind you also after a sudden Savannah downpour, my dear friend,
I open the passenger door and throw my bag into the back seat and then adjust the waistband of my sweatpants.
After a late morning meeting downtown, I took to the street to clear my head and maybe find my sanity. It isn’t every day I force myself out of bed after getting barely any rest from a breakup that was one year in the making, and damn it if I have to admit, a breakup I am glad to finally be over.
Well, losing sleep over the breakup part is true. The no rest for the hungry, determined, and Wolf-of-Wall Street type - that’s just a regular occurrence in my world.
What I wasn’t expecting though, was to have a sudden tidal wave rise up from nowhere when I went to cross the street to one of my favorite hole-in-the-wall places. A coffee shop that reminds me of simpler times when I was young and naive before the world tainted me with its dream-crushing truths, and family was something I thought I’d never be without. Something I’d always cherish. Kinda like, Peaches.
Fucking hell, I shake my head and attempt to focus again.
But I can’t help myself, as my mind indulges in the daydream once more. The one involving a tempting, forbidden fruit. Oh, how those fucking peaches will kill me if I let them. This is why the best thing I could do is walk away and leave them for someone else to indulge in, even if the thought of someone else even remotely doing so has my lower stomach in knots and a sick feeling settling deep into my selfish bones.
Tell me again why we had to relocate to this town,
I hear Josh say as I look over the hood of the car and watch him surveying the street like a tourist who just found out his dream vacation is anything but the damn dream he had envisioned.
I glance around us, taking in the cobblestone streets, Spanish moss hanging from trees, the centuries-old buildings made of stone, and the steamboat that rests in the broad Savannah River to our left, and shrug. Once upon a time, I called this place home. Once upon a time, I swore I’d never leave. But the thing about tragedy is, sometimes the destruction, the suffering, it’s too much to bear and the only way to escape the oppressing shadow is to go somewhere else and start over. Much like I did several years ago when I relocated to the West Coast and met Josh.
It’s not that bad,
I say, knowing that the only light that shines in this town is the one I didn’t have even an hour ago.
Peaches.
Those tempting, seductive, heavenly Peaches!
It could have its perks,
I shrug again, thinking about things I know I shouldn’t when what I really need is to keep my head in the game. The business game, that is. I don’t have time for such - pleasures. Something I’m sure my ex could tell you all about.
Yeah! Like humidity, crime, and cost of living. Whenever it rains, it floods. Case in point,
he says, gesturing towards me and rolling his eyes. I look down at my white shirt and sweatpants and can’t help but smile. I doubt Peaches would’ve admired the man in front of her if I was in my normal suit and tie. Something about that woman tells me she’s not impressed by glitz and glamour. Something, I oddly find makes her even more appealing. If that’s possible.
Hell, that’s nothing. What you need to watch out for is the red bugs,
I say as we both climb into his car and fasten our seat belts.
Red bugs?
I can see his eyes grow wide behind his dark sunglasses and hear myself let out a laugh. What the fuck is a red bug?
Seeing as Josh has barely seen anything past the sunny West Coast, I grin as if I hold a dark secret that could be the one thing that gets him high-tailing it back to California and never, ever, thinking of stepping foot in the South again.
Red bugs. Mosquitos. Cicadas,
I chuckle, You’ll get used to them.
He pulls out onto River Street at a high speed and makes a couple of tourists jump out of the way. I shake my head and know he’ll learn to slow down around these parts, too, that is if he knows what’s good for him. Our conversation about the dreaded town he is now a permanent fixture in is left back where we were just parked. I take my phone out of my pocket and start to text Jeeves, my butler, at the Alida, Savannah. A posh hotel a little further down the road on Williamson Street. With any luck, he’ll have a new suit ready, pressed, and better than the last by the time I get back and shower.
How’d Kimberly take it,
Josh asks just as Jeeves responds and I breathe out a sigh of relief glancing at the time knowing I will still make my eleven o’clock.
Like the bitter, vindictive, spiteful debutant she is,
I exhale as I run my hand through my dark brown hair and focus on the street in front of us. Never thought such nasty words could fall from a ladies’ mouth that normally demands everyone cover their own, while she also insists on being pampered, spoiled rotten, and drenched in the finest clothes, diamonds, and Southern pearls.
"Want my pearls of wisdom? Josh laughs as he quickly cuts off a car to our right and swerves into the valet of the hotel. He shifts into first gear and pulls the parking brake as he turns to look at me over his shoulder.
You should’ve dumped that bitch a year ago after you walked in on her cheating with Sebastian. Why the hell your chivalrous ass didn’t, I’ll never know."
Climbing out of the car, I watch as he throws his keys to the valet while I grab my suit in the coffee shop bag from the backseat, and then fall in step at his side as we enter the lobby.
Call it the Southern gentleman in me,
I joke. Besides, I never witnessed them fully engaged in the act, and Kimberly can be very convincing, if you hadn’t noticed yourself over the five years we were together.
Convincing,
he laughs as we enter the elevator and I press the button for the penthouse. "How about mendacious? That better describes the type of woman she was, hell she is, and you’re all the better for finally being rid of her. Besides, we all knew the truth. Including you, though you try hard to deny it. You’ve been too busy building an empire to really care about anything else."
Truer words were never spoken.
I didn’t care.
Something that stings as it settles in my soul.
I should’ve, shouldn’t I have? I mean, I was engaged to marry the woman. Five years of my damn life I can’t get back. Five years that felt like fifty as I think of the weight of it.
But he’s right. I didn’t care who she was fucking. I couldn’t care less who she flirted with in front of me. She was arm candy at best. A position that could’ve been filled with an escort service, but those who know me well, know I could never be that type. This is why I wasted five years having a woman on my arm, that, when it came down to it, I didn’t care who she was sleeping with as long as it wasn’t me. Well, at least for the last year, that is.
I laugh at the irony because as much as she was unfaithful, I never once strayed. A thought that makes me realize maybe that’s why I was so attracted to the thought of peaches just a half hour ago. After all, three hundred and sixty-five days is a long time to go for any man. The nights are cold, and your hand can only satisfy you so much before you need the real deal. Something I haven’t been tempted to indulge in over the last year