Psycho Ex Boyfriend (Standalone New Adult Romance) (The Alpha Brotherhood Book 2) Read Online Free Page A

has a colorful paisley pattern. And I’m in a skirt. Close enough.
    She sees me as I approach and flashes me her perfect movie star smile that always makes me momentarily consider getting veneers. I used to think it was a fake ass smile, but she appears to be legitimately jubilant and optimistic about… well, seemingly everything. I don’t really find it annoying anymore, it’s rather refreshing.
    Except for the hugging thing. Demi rises from the table with open arms and I exert conscious effort to keep my muscles from tensing up like they always do. Except with Adam. He’s just… not what I am supposed to be thinking about right now!
    “I am super excited about the New Year,” Demi declares.
    You are super excited about everything. “Definitely,” I reply. “I think we’re on track to perform very well. Holiday sales were far above expectations.” I sound like a damn robot. “And the new flower illustrations from Vicky are so cute!” I add in an effort to appear remotely normal.
    “ Yours are beyond gorgeous, Sabrina. We didn’t need another illustrator to complete the spring release.”
    “I like her eclectic style. It’s playful. And she is an actual artist. We’re both essentially professional doodlers.”
    “True,” Demi says, taking a sip of her latte. I don’t think she’s even wearing makeup. “But some of the white spaces in her drawings are too small. I thinks she forgets that she’s working on a coloring book sometimes.”
    I like the tight spacing of her intricate patterns, but I hesitate to say it. It’s a challenge to color within the lines, but looks fantastic once you’re done. “I’ll speak with her about that.”
    “I already have. Didn’t you notice the revisions in the first draft we sent to the printer?”
    “Um… No. It slipped past me.” That is so unlike me, I can’t believe I didn’t notice. Were they even marked? “I’ll make sure to look closer next time, sorry.”
    “Sabrina, don’t apologize. You own this company.”
    “Co-own.”
    “Yeah, with me,” she laughs, pushing a plate with the other half of her brownie toward me. “You seem stretched a bit thin lately, even for you. Is everything alright?”
    “Yes,” I answer automatically. But it’s not. This is another one of those pivotal moments that can take a relationship out of the acquaintance zone and turn it into an actual friendship and I keep messing it up. Demi is always reaching out, always noticing the little things, always shifting the conversation from business to personal. And I keep shutting down. “Okay, not really,” I exhale as my heartrate increases.
    “Let me guess. That booty call from college still driving you insane?”
    “In a sense.”
    “Girl, you need to cut him loose,” she says with an eye roll.
    I bristle, sitting upwards and crossing my arms. An ancient memory comes to the front of my mind. I’m standing in kitchen at my mother’s house, listening to one of my aunts say that exact phrase about one of their no good boyfriends. It’s a strange recollection. I remember the room so well. The smoke stained sheer curtains on the window by the sink, the brightly painted rooster head draped with a worn dish towel, the splatter of rust across the white surface of the constantly buzzing refrigerator. But I can’t remember any of their faces. Even my mom’s.
    Girl . Women always say that to me. Black women seem to expect me to relax and speak differently than I normally do, like I’m hiding who I really am. It’s an invitation to bond, but all they discover is that I am, in fact, actually wound this tight. And I know it’s essentially common vernacular for everyone at this point, but it still sounds weird coming from white people, especially if they drag out the rrrr . Demi doesn’t do that, thankfully, and she is just trying to be helpful, plus I’m being too neurotic. I grab a chunk of the brownie and shrug it off.
    “Sabrina?”
    “Adam isn’t just a booty call