Read Online Ashes to Ashes (Experiment in Terror #8) by Karina Halle - Free Book Online

thinking he sounded like he was going into a pitch for a
high-interest savings account.
    He sighed and reached for a
cookie, weighing it in his hands. “I just don’t want you to do
anything foolish.”
    I raised my brows. “That’s kind
of vague.”
    “ Dex is
foolish,” he said quickly, his words sharp like needles. “You may
think you’re in love with him, and I believe you are, and I also
believe the man is in love with you, but…come on, bella, you have
to step back from the situation for just one second and try and see
it all from someone else’s perspective.”
    I swallowed hard, a ball of
fire expanding painfully in my chest. “Someone else like my
parents?”
    “ They’re
older, they’ve been there, we’ve all been there. You’re living with
this man that you barely even know, a man who just broke your heart
and ruined you.”
    “ Barely even
know?” I managed to say. “I know Dex, okay? I know him more than
anyone in this world.”
    “ Perry,” he
said, his voice tinged with impatience. “When was the last time you
were here? Think about it.”
    I blinked stupidly. “Uh,
September?”
    “ Right.
September. You came here with Dex in September. What month is it
now?”
    “ May,” I said,
my throat tightening.
    “ And how many
months is that?”
    I stared at him, unwilling to
count. “I don’t know.”
    “ It’s eight
months. You’ve known this guy for eight months.”
    Holy fucking shit. Was that
true? I’d only met Dex eight months ago? It felt like I’d known him
for years, ages, eternity. After everything we’d been through…every
episode, every experience, it fused our souls together, time be
damned.
    “ It feels
longer than that,” I said feebly. But I wouldn’t let him, my
parents, win this argument. I straightened up in my seat and looked
my uncle in the eye. “But so what? Lots of couples move in together
when the moment is right. It’s different for every relationship. It
doesn’t have to be a big deal.”
    “ It will turn
into a big deal when you commit to someone you realize you don’t
know at all. I’m divorced for a reason. Don’t think I didn’t think
like you at one point.”
    I gave him a funny look. “I
live with Dex, Uncle Al. That’s it. We’re not getting married.
We’ve barely discussed the future at all. Calm down.”
    His eyes widened for a split
second. “He’s thirty-two. You’re twenty-three.”
    “ Age doesn’t
matter.”
    “ It does
sometimes. It does when you assume that just because you’re not
thinking of the future doesn’t mean he isn’t.”
    I nearly laughed. Uncle Al
clearly didn’t know Dex at all. “He just got out of a long-term
relationship. He’s not thinking about that shit.”
    “ And are
you?”
    I stared at the wisps of steam
coming off the mug of tea. Christ, I didn’t know what I was
thinking half the time. I wasn’t about to tell him about my white
picket fence idea, the conversation we had about doing something
after EIT, about houses in Seaside, Boston, or wherever I said. I
wasn’t going to tell him about the maternal instinct that started
kicking about when I saw him being a fur baby daddy to Fat
Rabbit.
    “ I…”I started.
“I’m just playing it by ear.”
    He shook his head slightly.
“You’re in love, Perry. You’re head over heels. You’re playing it
by heart, not ear. Like you always do.”
    “ Well what the
hell do you want me to say? If I say I think about a future with
him, you’ll get mad, and if I say I don’t, you’ll call me a
liar.”
    His eyes softened and reached
out for my hand across the table. “Bella, please. I’m not mad. I
just want to pull you out of it for just a moment, just so you can
look at it from a different angle. There are so many things in life
that make us happy in the short term. These cookies, for example,”
he said, picking up the tray. “But in the long term, they can hurt
you.”
    “ Maybe I’m
tired of everyone always worrying about me getting