What He's Been Missing Read Online Free PDF

another reason to disagree.
    On the other side of the suite was a king-sized bedroom Ian had decorated with rose petals all over the floor and bed, and white taper candles on the nightstand. It was clichéd, but much more than I’d ever expect from Ian.
    â€œWhat’s up with you?” I asked, standing alone in the room with Ian after he’d closed the door behind us. “And why in the world did you lie and tell Scarlet I had a boyfriend?”
    â€œI can’t do this, Rach! I can’t!” He threw the book onto the bed.
    â€œCan’t what?” I knew what I was thinking he was saying, but I needed to confirm that he was saying what I was thinking.
    â€œI can’t!”
    â€œCan’t what?”
    â€œYou know I didn’t even tell my parents? Who gets engaged without telling their parents? I can’t. They’re gonna hate this. They’re gonna hate her. My mother hasn’t even met Scarlet. Oh shit!”
    â€œCan’t what?”
    â€œAnd you know why I haven’t told them about her? I didn’t because I was afraid—I was afraid they’d try to talk me out of it.”
    â€œOut of what?”
    â€œAsking Scarlet to marry me, Rach,” Ian said, falling onto the bed. “I can’t ask her to marry me.”
    â€œYou can’t?” (Hiding my excitement here was quite difficult. But considering the distraught look on Ian’s face, with him laid out on the bed like a man about to undergo open heart surgery, I couldn’t break out the streamers and balloons just yet.)
    â€œIt’s just not right. There’s something that’s not right!”
    I stood in front of Ian on the bed with my arms crossed.
    â€œWhat’s not right? This morning you called me all excited about the ring from Namibia. What happened?”
    â€œDon’t play with me, Rachel. You know she’s not right for me. Maybe now isn’t the time.” Ian shot up and stood beside me. “There’s something missing. Something just missing from us.”
    â€œSomething like what?”
    A rap sounded at the door and one of Scarlet’s happy friends poked her head into the room.
    â€œWe’re almost ready for the surprise!” she whispered. “About to cut the cake, too!”
    Ian was frozen.
    â€œWe’ll be out in a minute,” I said.
    She closed the door slowly and reluctantly.
    I looked back at Ian. We’d been in these kinds of standoffs together in the past: sophomore year when he caught his girlfriend cheating on him with some muscly Omega in a bar in Tallahassee and I had to stop him from going off and losing his first fight; senior year when I was cheating on my boyfriend with a muscly Omega in a motel room in Tallahassee and called Ian from the bathroom for help when my boyfriend knocked on the door (ten minutes later, Ian pulled up in back of the motel and I climbed out the bathroom window).
    â€œWhat are you going to do?” I asked.
    â€œI can’t do it, Rachel.” Ian looked into my eyes.
    â€œI’ll get you out of here if you want me to. We’ll walk right out the door. But I need you to be clear about what you’re doing,” I said. “That girl in there—all those people in there are expecting you to get down on one knee and propose.”
    â€œI know.”
    We looked to the balcony outside the glass doors beside the bed.
    â€œIt’s the tenth floor,” he said mordantly and we laughed.
    â€œAnd we’re a little too old to be escaping from hotel rooms.” Ian walked to the doors and looked outside.
    â€œI can’t do this to Scarlet,” he said. “I know you hate her, but it’ll really hurt her. She’s worth more to me than that.”
    â€œI don’t hate—”
    â€œShe’ll be devastated. I don’t want to be that guy in her past. The one who—made her jaded like most of the other women I know.”
    And