Read Breathe Me (A 'Me' Novel) for Free Online Page B

had my story.
    Not one of those books had someone in them who had no one.
    No one, I had no one.
    And when you had no one, you were no one and no one would miss you.
    If I hid money and worked more, I could replace the books in two or three months and maybe keep them at work or hide them somewhere in the house. I had to have them; they were the only things in my life that were constant. Books, words, they never changed. I didn’t need to pretend for them; they just were.
    As I pulled open the door to ’wormz, I nodded to the few other employees I knew and made my way to the back of the store, where there was a small reading area next to the café. I needed to escape into a world where mothers loved their daughters and fear ruled no one. A world where the bogeyman and the person who is supposed to chase him away aren’t one and the same.
    “Harley.” A voice interrupted my ramped thoughts.
    Well shit, is he stalking me? I thought frantically as I stopped short and took in Mr. Dystopian Biker sitting on the small two-seater couch. He had his jacket off and thrown next to him with one leg crossed ankle-over-knee, making his dark jeans bunch up and show off his black biker boots. His shirt was the tight kind, showing off his muscular arms and the start of a tattoo peeking out from the left sleeve. It was like his muscles were suffocating in the shirt with the way they were trying to escape the sleeve.
    “Are you following me?” I asked, trying to hide my obvious perusal of his body.
    “You found me. I should be saying the same thing to you.” His voice was smooth and velvety, marked with a hint of amusement. He could’ve said the world was ending and I would have been his, hypnotized, done for.
    “I didn’t find you. I work here,” I pointed out.
    He took in my yoga pants and tank top and smirked. “True, but you don’t look like you’re working right now.”
    Up until earlier this morning, I had never had someone look at me so openly and raw. It did things to me, both frightened me and warmed me—two feelings that I had never experienced together but instantly loved. It felt right. Fear, I knew; I lived it every day. But this, this was new, and new scared the shit out of me. Trying not to let him know how much he affected me, I walked over and took a seat next to him. He followed my movement, his eyes never leaving my face. The intensity of his stare caused me to blush a little. He let out a small chuckle, and I was sure he noticed my flushed cheeks.
    “I came to read,” I said, trying and failing not to gawk at his face. I mean, I’d read about perfection and seen the guys in magazines, and they still had nothing on this man, who in one day had me feeling things that I thought I would never get the chance to feel.
    “You came to work when you’re off to read?” he asked skeptically. “Why can’t you read at home?”
    His question slapped me back to reality so fast it almost gave me whiplash. What would a person like him think if he knew the real me, the real reason I came here tonight? I’d read enough books to know that guys like him, who looked like him, never fell for the wrecked girl who didn’t love herself enough to be herself. No, guys like him fell for the slightly overachiever type A personality girls, someone who I was really good at pretending to be, except around him.
    “I don’t have many books at home,” I answered truthfully, swallowing back the pain of the memory from not even an hour ago. My books.
    “Really?” he asked, his thumb grazing the most perfect set of lips I had ever seen. “I would have thought you’d have books all over your place, next to your bed, in your living room, stacks just waiting to be read or reread again.”
    How the hell would he know that if I had my own home, that was exactly what it would be like? Shelves of my favorite books worn from use. My friends.
    “Yeah, well, why are you here? Can’t you read at home?” I challenged.
    “I get such a great