Seven Days by Josie Leigh

been my life for the last eight years. So, yeah, I’m fucking okay, Ryan,” I spat at him, showing him that I probably wasn’t okay. “Let’s go check out the damn river.” With that, I pulled my arm out of his grasp and headed back to the hotel door. Yanking it open, I stalked through the cacophony of slot machines paying out as I passed through the casino floor. Wrenching open the door to the Riverwalk, I crossed the path and leaned against the railing overlooking the river and waited for Ryan even though I wanted to run. I couldn’t believe how dangerously close I was to letting him in. For half a second, I was ready to spill all my secrets to a man that was starting to mean too much to me.
    I had to fight against everything in me to keep quiet. I knew the second he realized who I was, he’d leave me behind. Ryan deserved someone special, someone bright and shining. I was tarnished and broken.

Chapter 10
     
    The lights glittered over the water as we took the river taxi back to our hotel later that evening. I knew he’d wanted to distract me from my phone conversation and subsequent zone out when he suggested we play penny slots at every casino on the river. If it weren’t for the little boy grin on his face and the way he bounced on his heels as he asked, I would’ve called him out on it. Because we were in Laughlin and not Las Vegas, gambling in every casino only took up a couple of hours.
    However, I counted his mission to distract me a raving success. I’d even won a whole five dollars. The fact was, I needed an escape from the dark thoughts and swirling memories, since I still hadn’t heard from Britton or Tildy about the trip home. It had been hours with no word, and it was getting harder to push that fact to the back of my mind.
    Between our bets, we explored each hotel and tried to scope out where we would eat dinner. He tried to insist on eating some place ‘decent’ and maybe it was code for romantic. Nonetheless, our lack of proper attire and my refusal to let him buy me anything new relegated us to a really amazing but casual sushi bar. From the look on his face when I tried to explain my reservations about doing more than window-shopping told me that the subject wasn’t closed. I had a feeling I would end up with something new from him before the end of the week.
    Taking advantage of the quiet moment, I couldn’t hold back the question that had been bugging me all day, “Why Laughlin? Why not Havasu or near there?” The Colorado River was long and winding, so the fact that Ryan wanted to see it wasn’t surprising. Where he wanted to see it was though, because there were other locations throughout Arizona we could’ve visited.
    “Ah, but Lake Havasu has the London Bridge and is spring break famous, so I figured it would be another one of those off-limits places,” he enlightened me, leaning back against his seat and closing his eyes as the warm summer breeze from the river washed over us both.
    “I could make the same argument about Laughlin,” I responded, trying not to think about how we were one stop away from our hotel room and the fulfillment of Ryan’s earlier promise.
    “I believe you tried,” he looked up and scooted closer. His arm slipped around me and pulled my hip flush with his. “But, since we aren’t in Arizona, the cliché rule doesn’t apply. We are no longer in your home state,” he argued. “Which means your expert label is null and void here. You are just another Nevada tourist, baby,” he smirked in a way that seemed to shout “Checkmate!”
    “Yeah, but Arizona is right there,” I countered, pointing to the opposite side of the river and the sparse lights twinkling from Bullhead City.
    “Doesn’t matter,” he drawled, placing a sweet kiss on my shoulder. “It’s a loophole, and I found it. No need to pout, baby.”
    “Save it for your room,’ the driver called out as we approached the dock for our hotel.
    “I intend to,” Ryan called back,