Leigh felt her body heat up, starting from where his skin tightly clutched hers and worked hard to swallow the lump that had formed in her throat. They walked the rest of the way in silence, hands in each other's and eyes on the road.
By the time they got to his car, the parking lot was nearly deserted.
"Won't you change your clothes?" Leigh jerked her chin towards his play vest.
"Nah," he shrugged, getting into the car.
"You stink!" Leigh said dryly as she got into the car with him. "I refuse to have lunch with a stinking guy."
Willis rolled his eyes, turning the key in ignition. "And here I was thinking my good looks and charm were enough to woo you," he replied cheerfully.
"Nuh-uh," she shook her head, letting her hair fall all over her face. "You’ve got to do better than that Stink," she smirked and smoothed her hair out of her face.
"Oh yeah?" his asked, intrigued. "I would absolutely love it if you could tell me more abou
Samantha had just put Tommy to sleep when she heard the front door slam shut. She moved to living room, intent on discovering what had kept her daughter out late on a school night. Again. The past few weeks had been hard on her, Sam knew, it had been hard on all of them. Geez even Leon. The happy go lucky dog felt it in her agile bones. But it would get better, it was supposed to. Only, it had not even show signs of improving but Samantha had hope yet, she was more worried about Leigh. It had however, been on her account that Leigh had transferred schools and still, months after the 'incident' her daughter refused to talk about it. She remembered the times when they had talked about everything and anything. The times when Leigh would return from school bubbling with excitement to recount her day. Only, then, it had been to Samantha and Jose, her father. Now, Sam was the only ear available to listen but the little kid did not come home anymore. In her place came a fast growin
Willis walked slowly along the boulevard of the busy street, enjoying the chilly air and buzz of Saturday morning activity. He had woken up early, not that he had gotten much sleep anyways and had been too restless to go back to sleep. He felt like something was missing, like the missing piece to a puzzle, he felt like a gaping hole was in his chest that needed to be filled. That same restlessness had driven him out of bed and into his car where he had driven around town in circles until his heart had led him to where he was.The Park.He had spent the first few minutes of his arrival in the car, contemplating whether it was a good idea to stay or just drive away, keep driving until he somehow manages to escape the surging feeling that was enveloping him. But even as he sat and considered it, he knew that it was not a feeling to be ignored or pushed till it somehow faded away into the throes of one's mind, however fiercely he wished it was. So he had gotten out of his
Leigh checked her phone for the thousandth time that day and it was not even mid-day yet. She had sent Willis a quick text before leaving her house for the subway that morning, the least he could do was acknowledge her text. At first thought it was because she had sent it early that morning, and he might not have woken up yet. Then later she had convinced herself that he was most probably busy with other things since everyone could not be like her who checked her phone for messages first thing in the morning. It was an old habit she hoped to break but then there was this saying about old habits and dying hard. Minutes later, she had checked her phone again to still find no reply for him, then her mind had gone as far as imagining what terrible fate might have befallen him that he could not reply her text. Maybe he had broken his hand playing basketball, or he had hit his head on the wall while sleep walking, or he had a very bad case of food poisoning. She had managed to sto
"Why won't these fit!" Thea cried for the umpteenth time in the thirty minutes they had been trying to get her into her dress. Her ass just refused to fit into it. Literally. "I’m so holding my breath to say 'I told you so," It was hours since they had left the mall for the salon then Thea insisted they get lunch first before getting pampered. It turned out Leigh actually let the dresser tamper with her hair and beat it into a suitable style. “Make up, check." Leigh began listing off her fingers "Nails, check. Hair, check." She eyeballed Thea "Fit Thea in her dress.... Not check." "You could actually do some good by helping me out here," Thea gave her dress frantic tugs as she spoke. "I" Tug. “Need" More tugs. "Help!" Tugs turned to yanks and finally, the dress slid up her ass and rested on its proper place just above her waistline. "Phew," Thea sagged in relief, "turns out I don’t ac
She was so screwed, Leigh thought, smiling sloppily into her second bottle of Tequila. It was a good thing that Thea's mom had them in store around the house for... certain visitors that preferred something stronger than wine and Leigh was more than happy to fill the shoes of 'certain visitors'. She, with the help of a grumbling Thea had helped a passed out cold Willis into a nearby hotel room and checked him in before dragging his very heavy and very drunk self into the elevators and then his room. At least he had not mumbled drunken words or –Thank Heavens—puked on her again. Then, they had abandoned him there, to deal with the repercussions of his stupid escapade and taken the cab home. But the night was still young, they had intended to spend it at the club before the idiot showed up. Now, Thea had not gotten laid – though that was one thing she was grateful for—and he had once again invaded her peace and privacy. The very reason why she had been in the club in the first
For the life of him, Willis could not fathom what he had done to warrant a cold shoulder or the anger that was simmering in her gaze. Had he said something wrong? Last he knew, they were on the right foot. She had even sent him a text over the weekend, informing him of her plans. What exactly had gone wrong? Deciding not to follow her since it was so obvious she wasn’t ready to talk to him, he retrieved his phone from his back pocket and brought up her message. It been very brief and concise. Hey. I won’t be around for the weekend. Date with Thea. Happy weekend. All friendly and cheerful. Had he missed something in her text? He reread it five more times before deciding he needed help. “Yo Jer!” He called out to his best friend when he reached the tracks. Jeremy was with a bunch of other guys, hanging out after school. It was the clique that Willis himself mostly moved with before ‘Project Leigh’ “What’s up man,” Jer looked surpris
The big game was only a few hours away. It hadn't come as much of a surprise to Leigh when in between Thea's excited ravings earlier that day, she'd learnt that Saints Academy was actually facing off against her former school, Brewers High. It turned out her best friend, along with a host of other angry birds she'd left back at her previous school, were going to flap their wings to her new nest, momentarily disturbing her plans. Not that she wasn't happy Thea was coming but the rest of the high school? No. Not when quite a few number of them knew why she had really transferred and might get really chatty about it once they lay eyes on her, hereby denting her entire plans. Leigh sighed, staring at her reflection in the vanity as she applied a thin layer of eye liner to give her eyes that smoky look and glossed pink, shiny liquid onto her full lips. She already had on the baggy sweats Willis had given her days before, it was long enough that it fell above her knees though she
A pretty blonde head walked up to them. She was holding a phone to her ear, apparently making a phone call. At the same time, Willis’ phone rang in Leigh’s hands. The lady zeroed her eyes in on the phone in Leigh’s hands and walked over to sit beside them on the bleachers. “Oh! Hey, You must be Leigh then,” she said in a voice that was both sassy and confident. “Yeah, and this is my friend Carol.” “Pleased to meet you,” Carol replied politely, but Leigh could see the mischief just brimming in her eyes and chose to ignore it. “Hi Carol,” The pretty lady—Willa smiled and Leigh caught herself comparing it to how the sun shone after a stormy day. How could someone so cheery have Willis as a brother? “I’m going to head out to grab a bite or something. I’ll be back in a few minutes.” Carol said and waltzed through the crowd before Leigh could say a word. Now she was left alone with the pretty lady. Not the best move considering she was sure
Dearest Readers,This author would like to say a big THANK YOU for being a part of Leigh and Willis’ story from the beginning. Now if your’re here, reading this note, you would know that it is not the end. We are only saying a temporary goodbye to our heroes. They would be back again very very soon in another book that is already in the works. So be on the lookout for it. I would also love to hear your thoughts. What do you think about the end? What do you think would happen next? Are there any scenes you would like to see? Drop them in the comments! In the meantime, I’d be starting a new book real soon! And guess what? It’s a werewolf dark fantasy. A big jump from young adult romance--I know. You can read the excerpt below! It’ll be out real soon so be on the lookout for it too! Again, thank you very much for all the love on Played In Thirty Days, I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. See you soon! Excerpt of my New Book...Long ago, when man and wolf hun
She ran. Even when her heart broke into shards and all she wanted to do was scream and scream, She ran. Past the elevators, past the gate, onto the busy streets, yet she kept on running. She could hear him behind her, the heavy footsteps that pounded the pavement just behind her could be none other than his, So she ran. She would not let him catch up with her, she would not let herself be drawn back into his arms. She ran. When her legs felt like logs of wood on fire, she did not slow down not even for a breath of fresh air her burning lungs so desperately craved. Running was all that was left, was all she could do. She had to get as far away from him as she could. She had spent her last bit of courage telling him that story, she had none left. How could she bear to face him now? She ran. She heard shouts, screams, someone was calling her name, saying something, telling her to stop. Throu
THE FINAL CHAPTERLeigh woke up to the intense feeling of pleasure coursing through her body. She turned, expecting to roll back into Willis’ arms but instead was yanked back by her hips which refused to budge. Confused she peered one eye open, then another and found quite shockingly, the reason for her pleasure and discomfort. Willis was down there. Right there between her legs and he was…Even as the realization of hit her, her body peaked sending her soaring and clearing every last trace of sleep. By the time her breathing had returned to a somewhat normalcy, she found him propped up on his elbow, smiling at her.What in the world? “What were you—why did you—what the…?” she trailed off unable to bring herself to finish the question, and glared at him with indignation and embarrassment.To her surprise and annoyance, he laughed. Willis threw his head back and let out his deep, rich la
“Don’t hold back Willis, give in and give me everything.” “You know I had a plan,” Willis began, voice deceitfully calm in a stark contrast to how his hands were racing along the fine lines of her body as he guided her or rather stumbled with her back into the penthouse.“Mmmm, you did?” Far from calm herself, Leigh struggled to keep her voice light and playful.“Sure I did,” they were more or less swaying together to the soft music now. “I was planning to seduce you with dinner,” he nuzzled her neck and she almost melted against him. “A little stargazing.”“I think…” Think straight Leigh! “I think we did stargaze.”“Mmmm, maybe. Then I thought if it wasn’t too cold then the pool…” He was nibbling on her throat now, tasting the sweet flesh just above her collarbone where her blood beat franti
"Oh my Gosh!" Leigh exclaimed, staring wide eyed at the really tall building in front of her. Willis was driving through the parking lot of the elaborate building. It stretched upwards for as far as she could see through the window of the car. That had to be some dope building Leigh thought, her mouth hanging open in awe."Where in the world are we?" She asked when she finally recovered from staring in wonder."We are at the Luminous Hotels." He announced like it was the most obvious thing in the world."The what?" Now, she stared at him in disbelief."Luminous." He provided. "Luminous Hotels.""The same one that won hotel of the year in the country?" She still couldn't believe it. She knew cause they had been given homework to write an essay on it and she had done her research."How can you.... Did you have this planned before hand?" No. He couldn't have. She knew that even when one made a reservation months in advance, they still had to wa
By the time they eventually made it inside, prom was well under way. The large assembly hall had been redecorated into a fancy dance hall for the prom. There were banners, confetti, posters and decorative pieces everywhere. Bright lights flooded the room from hanging tiny bulbs that splayed different colours and made the hall look like something out of a fairytale. About a dozen bouquets of flowers of gumdrop pink and cheery yellow were scattered carefully along the raised podium where an elaborate banner read Saints Academy Senior Prom! In bold letters that matched the colours of the flowers. Leigh tried to absorb everything at once and could only think of how dreamy it all looked.The DJ had on a classic song and there were a few people already dancing on the makeshift dancefloor. Some were at the food stand which really was just a long table that held a large bowl of fruit punch, small chops, pastries of all kinds, small plastic plates of chips and packs of bottle water. Knowing th
"Oh my gosh! You look absolutely radiant Hunny," Sam said, her eyes tearing up when Leigh came down the stairs."I didn’t look half as beautiful as you do now when I had my own prom years ago and I still totally killed it." She continued, moving over to check Leigh out more closely."Thank you Mom," Leigh said, feeling elated.Following his mother's footsteps, Tommy also took baby steps over and giggled at Leigh, clapping his hands in glee."See? Even Tommy thinks you look beautiful."She bent over to pick her little brother up. Throwing him on the air and rubbing her nose to his. "Thanks my little man.""How come you never told me thanks when I told you just how pretty you are over and over again upstairs?" Thea whined, coming down behind Leigh.Leigh rolled her eyes at the whine in her best friend's voice. "I thanked you Thea, but you wanted me to say thank you for every time you commented," Leigh pointed out, balancing Tommy
"Get your ass moving!" Carol grunted, pushing Leigh out of the car since she was sitting right by the door and refused to budge. "We’re going to miss the game!" She said fiercely, giving Leigh another hard push. She might look all small and petite but the girl was solid and as much as Carol pushed, she didn’t budge an inch. "Oh, come on. What is wrong with you? Are you having stage fright or something? You're not even going to be on stage," Carol let out a sigh of frustration. She would have gone out through the other door but Thea was busy retouching her make-up and refused to budge either. Did they both have something planned and were not letting her in on it? "Chill out Carol," Leigh told her. "Let's wait for Thea, then we can all go together." She reasoned. "Nah, don't wait for me. You guys go ahead and make sure we get the best seats in the house." Damn Thea and her big mouth. Did Thea not see that she was deliberately stalling here? Carol shot her a look and said "See? Even
Meanwhile, Willis was having after hours’ practice with his co-captain and best buddy Jeremy. It was barely two days to the biggest and final game of the season. As much as he wanted to get his head solely focused on the game, thoughts of Leigh kept popping up in them like the balls he was bouncing around Jeremy now. He knew she was out shopping and doing girly stuff with her friends but he also wished she would call him. He ached to hear her voice, to touch her, to feel her lips slide against his, to....Snap out of it Reeler, get your head in the game."You okay?" Jer asked when he shook his head for the third time in the space of minutes."Yeah..." Willis replied, bouncing the ball once and throwing it into the basket. It went round the rim once and dropped in the net.Unconvinced, Jeremy snatched the ball and went through basic routine with Willis. "That don't sound like you're okay man. Something's up?" Jer persisted, he knew if he pushed just