Losing Pieces of Me by Rose Briner Read Free Book Online

care if I had two heads, as long as it came with money, they’d take it.”
       I didn’t see that one coming and now I feel bad for suggesting he went home with Colleen, he looks like women who act that way really hurt him.  He’s so different from the impression I got off of his brother.  Hayden would’ve been throwing money at them, but not Jayden.
    Keep your eye on the prize Mireya, this man is the enemy .
        I can see I’m in danger of becoming friends with this man, so I’ll have to watch every move I make to make sure he doesn’t get too close to me.
       We sit for hours in a small café talking about simple things like books and movies we enjoy, all the while avoiding subjects such as his ex-girlfriend and his brother.  It’s a nice break from all the worries I have in my life right now. But too soon we are done eating and he’s dropping me back off at my car.  Or at least where my car used to be.
       “Shit,” I say to myself as I look around for my car.  Jayden let me out of the car with a good night and I never thought to make sure my car was still going to be here when I came back.
       “What’s wrong?” Jayden asks coming up behind me and scaring the crap out of me.
       I give him a defeated look, “My car is gone.  I got a parking ticket earlier, they must have towed it.”
       “That’s strange.  Usually they don’t tow a car unless it has multiple unpaid parking tickets,” he says, pulling out his phone and looking down at it.  “It’s late, I’ll have your car taken out of impound on Monday morning and returned to you.”
       My eyes widen as I think about what that means.  If he asks about where my tickets were issued he’s going to find out that I’ve been hanging out around his office for weeks now and that’s going to make me look desperate in his eyes.
       “Come on, let me take you home,” he says, taking off his jacket and wrapping it around my shoulders.  I didn’t even realize how hard I’m shaking until now.  More than the fact that I’m cold, I’m scared that I’m watching my life fall apart around me.  First my sister, then the rent, and now my car is gone too.  Tears spring to my eyes and I have to swallow the large lump that’s formed in my throat so I can hold my tears at bay until I get home.
       He drops me off that night outside of my apartment with a promise to return my car on Monday.
       “I won’t be back for a week or two, I’d like to see you again when I get back,” he suddenly announces as he’s getting back into the car.  He turns to face me and I can see the hope in his eyes.  I have to say yes, even though normally I would say no, he’s my one chance to find my sister and I’d be stupid to say no.
       “Sure, sounds great,” I tell him turning back towards the door to my apartment.
       “Take care, Mireya,” he says, giving me one last look as he gets into the car and shuts the door.
       I watch him drive off before I turn back to my apartment and head inside.  When I get inside and turn the light on, it’s then that I realize that I have his jacket and no way to contact him to give it back.  Not that I really want to.  His jacket is warm and smells just like him.  I might as well keep it as a souvenir because the closest I am ever going to get to the man is smelling his jacket.
       I spend the entire weekend thinking about him.  As much as I don’t want to think about him, being near him gives me hope that someday I can find my sister.  He’s my one ticket to his brother, and as much as I want to stay away and forget I ever met Hayden, I can’t do that.
       I don’t want to use Jayden to get to his brother.  He really seems like a genuinely nice person and I feel kind of bad using him to my advantage.  But as I look around the small apartment that I’m slowly starting to empty out, I realize that this is the last strand of hope I have left to hang on to.  My sister is gone