BOOKED EVERY NIGHT

Excerpt

 

The sun burned across a cloudless sky. I felt the intensity of it bake into the skin of my bare shoulders.

Waves crashed against the shore, some carrying surfers with them in the distance. A few feet ahead of me, a small child kicked a sand castle and giggled with his father.

I sat down on a step and slipped my sandals off.

The sand was warm underneath my feet as I dug my toes into it, staring out at the world in front of me. I rubbed a shell between my fingers as I watched a couple walk hand-in-hand toward the pier.

They looked happy. I tried to remember the last time Marcus held my hand, or even reached for it.

My chest burned when I couldn’t conjure up an image in my mind.

I looked down at the faint line marking my left ring finger. The token I was left with now that I no longer wore my ring. It was subtle, thanks to my naturally pale skin, but to me it stood out like embers glowing in the dark.

I hated it. I didn’t need a reminder of how I’d failed as a wife. Or how Marcus stopped seeing me as one.

Maybe I could coat my entire hand in sunblock except for that thin strip. Burn the memory away.

The idea seemed promising enough to consider.

From my back pocket, my cell beeped with an incoming message.

I wiped the tear from my cheek as I stood and palmed my phone, expecting to see Tori’s name lit up on my screen.

I froze on the step, my free hand on the railing as I stared curiously at the message and the number it was sent from.

 

Wild Girl. Eaten any innocent men alive today yet?

 

My lip twitched, the hint of a smile.

I sat back down, reading the message a second time as I remembered my conversation with this stranger yesterday.

My accidental verbal beat-down.

Jesus. I really let him have it.

I couldn’t think of the last time I was that embarrassed.

I told the guy to remove a dildo from his mouth, for Christ sakes.

All in all, whoever this was seemed to be a good sport about it. He could’ve laid into me and cussed me out. Made me feel even more like a complete shit for dialing the wrong number and not confirming the identity of my intended victim before I tore into him like he owed me money.

He was more than decent about the whole thing. Easily forgiving.

And now he was messaging me out of nowhere and striking up conversation.

Wild.

He wanted to talk to me.

Huh.

I tapped my thumb on the edge of the phone case, then hovered over the letters of my keypad as I stared at the message.

Did I even want to talk to this guy anymore? Wasn’t this weird? We didn’t know each other. Our encounter was a mistake. A one-time mishap, never to be repeated.

Right?