Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 86064 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 430(@200wpm)___ 344(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86064 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 430(@200wpm)___ 344(@250wpm)___ 287(@300wpm)
Nice. Why do I get the feeling that was not a compliment?
“You know you’re being super creepy, right? I’m trying to be real patient with your juvenile shenanigans but you’re quickly exceeding my limit.”
“No one is keeping you here, lady.”
His cavalier attitude ignites my temper, one I hardly have. “My son will be down in a minute. I suggest you cover yourself up.”
He grabs a dishtowel and covers his privates. Unbelievable.
Note to self: incinerate dishtowel.
“Happy?” he says, expression completely void of any natural human emotion.
My fake smile collapses. “No. No, I’m not happy. I’ll be happy when you leave.”
“I’m not going anywhere, lady.” A disturbing twinkle flickers in his usually flat, cold eyes. “So buckle up.”
Buckle up? Is he for real?
Dressed and ready to head to the studio after breakfast, Sam walks in with Roxy trailing behind him just in time to see Hendricks’ bare ass thankfully walking out of the kitchen. He looks at me and laughs, his dimples and the spaces between his teeth showing. It looks like I’ll be paying for braces in my near future. No matter. It does not matter. Nope. Not the bill hanging over my head, or the crap Hendricks is pulling can bring me down right now because Sam’s laughter, a sound so rare it pains me, is all I care about.
Smiling, I place a bowl of his favorite cereal in front of him and pour organic milk into it. Then I hook a thumb at the bare-assed bully. “What did I say about that?”
“Stay away from the angry dude.” With that, a troubling thought runs through my mind. The last thing I need is for Hendricks the unhappy nudist to create more problems for me. “Let’s not tell your dad about the angry dude living here. Okay?”
Scooping cereal into his mouth, he chews and nods.
“What do you mean, you can’t take out that wall?” I ask in an exasperated tone.
I’m ready to smack the contractor, Mr. Horvat, upside the head. The man has a perpetual question mark on his face––and the question is not a particularly deep or meaningful one. More like “What’s for lunch?” or “When is lunch?” It’s either that or his eyes are stuck to my boobs. No surprise he won the bid because he was the cheapest. He was also the only one willing to take on such a small job in a place where most jobs are multimillion-dollar homes. So in conclusion I guess you really do get what you pay for.
After rehab I needed to find a way to support us. The money I’d earned modeling for over a decade was long gone. Not that there was much of it to begin with since I was never a top earner. With no education to speak of, not even a high school diploma, my job prospects were practically nonexistent.
First order of business was to get a GED, which I did. I’d applied for sales positions all over Manhattan and had just received my umpteenth rejection when Devya suggested opening a yoga studio. It made perfect sense. I’d been diligently practicing Ashtanga yoga for close to a decade, the only good habit I picked up in France from one of the girls in the apartment we shared, so I jumped at the chance.
We researched New York rent, educated ourselves on everything from liability insurance to employee benefits, from marketing to branding. I got a loan from my brother with a favorable interest rate, Dev chipped in her fifty percent, and The Bend was created.
We were thinking something small, quaint. With only a single room walk-up in the Village, we didn’t have the space for anything else. Until Calvin, who at the time was the starting quarterback of the NY Titans, came to one of my classes and brought a few of his teammates. Even though they only tagged along due to a lost bet, they enjoyed it so much they kept coming. Add a few high-profile models, a socialite or two, and we were no longer small and quaint. We were on every New York hot list.
We’ve worked our tails off ever since, forgoing weekends and holidays, vacations and new shoes and everything in between. And it’s been worth it. Business has been good. So good everyone encouraged us to open a satellite studio in the Hamptons where most of our upscale New York clients migrate for the summer.
A decision that Horvat is presently forcing me to second-guess.
My condescending jerk of a contractor sighs loudly. “It means we can’t take the wall out, or the whole thing comes down.” Every word after or he pronounces slowly. Then his gaze falls to my breasts, as if they have an answer for him.
“You specifically said in your bid for this job that the wall would be no problem, Mr. Horvat,” I counter in the same imbecilic tone.