Dropping into the chair, I forced myself to flip open the book, found a blank page, and stared at it.
Until an idea formed in my head.
Chapter Seven
Jake
Eight minutes after I stepped off the elevator, thirty seconds faster than the last time—because, you know, my life had become so fucking routine that I’d started timing that shit—after enduring the record-breaking, twenty-seven-degree low—hey, this was Texas—I stepped into the coffee shop around the corner from my condominium building, inhaling the scent of homemade blueberry scones and freshly brewed coffee.
“Mornin’, Jake,” the young woman behind the counter greeted as I approached, her smile friendly, her gaze inquisitive.
“Morning, Kim.”
“The usual?” she asked, looking up at me, one hand cocked on her hip.
Staring into the glass display case, I perused the items momentarily as though I might actually choose something different than the usual. For the past six months, I’d been coming to the coffee shop at least once every two or three days, ordering a blueberry scone and a strong, black coffee—not exactly the thing that would help my bad boy image. Then again, I was kind of a simple guy. Perhaps I kept my order uncomplicated because the rest of my life was chaotic enough. Whatever the reason, I didn’t see change in my near future.
Looking back at Kim, I smiled. “Yeah. The usual.”
As Kim rang me up, her dark eyes darted down to the notebook in my hand. “That’s new. What happened to the laptop?”
I followed her gaze down to the leather-bound book. “Thought I’d try something different today.”
Kim laughed. “But you still ordered a blueberry scone and black coffee.” It wasn’t a question. She cocked her head. “Sounds about right.”
Passing her my credit card, I shrugged. “Can’t step too far outta the box. Wouldn’t wanna get hurt.”
Kim gifted me with another laugh, handed back my card, and went to work on getting my order ready. While I waited, I glanced around, looking for an empty table. There was only one left—in the far corner near the window, which would be perfect provided I could get to it before anyone else did.
“Here you go,” Kim called out. “Go wild.”
Everyone loved to do the play on my last name. Rarely did I ever hear anyone come up with something unique, but I’d learned to play along. “Funny.”
“I try.” Kim waved me off with her fingers. “Now go write something. We’re all waiting for the next masterpiece.”
Yeah, so was I.
I secured the notebook under my arm, grabbed the scone, a napkin, and my coffee, then weaved my way through the people scattered about. Careful not to run into anyone, I was about to give myself a mental pat on the back for making it all the way through without any mishaps, right up until…
Shit. “Sorry,” I muttered when I bumped the arm of a woman who’d been hunched over one of the round tables. At least I thought it was a woman. Too small to be a man, but thanks to the hood covering their head, I couldn’t be sure.
Turning, I slid into the chair at the table in the corner, dropping my load before lifting my gaze to see who I’d bumped and if they were ready to burn me alive with a scathing glare.
Definitely a woman. But she wasn’t scowling back at me. In fact, she wasn’t looking at me at all. Instead…
My eyes dropped to the notebook in front of her. “Are you … playing tic-tac-toe?” I found myself blurting before I could think better of it.
The woman’s gaze lifted, and I was then staring into eyes the color of storm clouds, such a mesmerizing shade that I was momentarily stunned, my hangover all but forgotten.
Damn, she was pretty.
And I’d never been more grateful that I’d stopped to take a shower than I was right then.
A lock of hair peeked out from beneath the thin white hoodie she wore, and my attention drifted down to her shoulder as I tried to decipher the color. Pink? Orange? I know, being an author, I should’ve said something along the lines of magenta or salmon, but seriously. Being a guy, I didn’t give colors fancy names. Regardless, I wasn’t quite sure what the color was, but I was fairly certain that it wasn’t natural.
“Yeah,” she said softly, the labret piercing beneath her lip twinkling briefly before she returned her attention to her game.
“Who usually wins?” I asked, dropping my eyes back to the paper, then up again as I pushed the hood off my head, secretly hoping she’d do the same.
She didn’t.
Those gray eyes raised to meet mine once more, and this time one of her eyebrows lifted, and if I wasn’t mistaken, the corner of her lip curled slightly. Interesting. Her lips… I tried not to stare, but it wasn’t easy. Not only did she have a piercing beneath her lip, she had a ring that circled her plump bottom lip twice (or appeared to) on the right side, as well as a diamond stud in her nose and a barbell in her left eyebrow. Even with those distracting me, I couldn’t help but notice her glossy mouth matched the color of her hair.
As did her eyebrows. Did women actually do that now? Color their eyebrows?
“I normally do,” she said, and I assumed she was referring to winning the games, not coloring her eyebrows. Unless of course she was a mind reader, then … well, if that were the case, then I probably needed to censor my thoughts, because yes, more than once since my ass had hit the chair, I’d pictured her naked.
Small, curvy … fucking naked.
Another smile flirted with the corner of her coral-pink lips. (Yep, I went there—coral. My new favorite color.)
“Well, congrats,” I offered, forcing my eyes to meet hers. “I’ll leave you to it then.”
Opening the notebook, I stared down at the blank page while I tore off a piece of my blueberry scone. I looked from the pen to the paper, back again. Then I got distracted, looking at my phone, the clock on the wall, the woman next to me, the old guy in the corner. Back to the pen and paper. I must’ve done it a hundred times, because the next thing I knew, the blueberry scone had disappeared, as had half of my large coffee.
“Shit,” I muttered, wiping my hands on a napkin.
“Try playing tic-tac-toe with yourself. It’s good for your ego,” the coral-haired woman beside me said, her husky voice drawing my attention her way once more.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. At least it works for me. Usually.”
I really liked the sound of her voice. And the sweetness of her face. And the color of her eyes, accentuated by the dark liner circling them. The perfect curves of her mouth. The slight dimple in her chin. And … I let my eyes drift lower.
Again, I tried not to stare, but I couldn’t help but notice her hands. She had slender, elegant fingers but no fancy fingernails glued to the end like most of the women I knew. Then again, her fingernails weren’t what caught my attention. No, the credit for that went to the intricately detailed tattoos that covered each of her hands.
On the right one, she had a light pink and white rose with delicate petals wrapped in what appeared to be barbed wire that snaked down her index finger. The design was done so well that the flower looked almost real, the shading causing the petals to practically stand up. On her other hand was a vibrant turquoise candy skull with dark blue eyes in the shape of hearts, a matching upside-down heart for a nose, and pink teeth that tied in with the random designs throughout.
I forced my eyes away, concerned she’d caught me staring—which honestly wasn’t something I tended to worry about—but when I looked up, she seemed more interested in the x and o she was jotting down on the most recent tic-tac-toe board she’d drawn. My attention was snagged by a napkin tucked beneath the sketch pad, part of which I could see had a colorful design on it, but I couldn’t tell what it was.
When she turned her head, peeking out from beneath the white hood, I quickly turned back to my notebook, pretending to be…
Shit, I couldn’t even pretend. I had no idea what the fuck I was supposed to write.
So I started with … Chapter One.
Kind of pathetic, but it was a start.
Chapter Eight
Presley
Was it me, or did this guy look really familiar?
I was pretty sure I recognized the attractive man who had settled at the table beside me, but I had no idea from where. Being that I lived and worked in the area, it was possible I’d seen him at the grocery store, or perhaps he’d been a customer at the tattoo shop, which would’ve been the most logical place to have seen him.
Then again, he didn’t look much like the tattoo type. He was too clean cut for that, in a very male model kind of way.
Damn it. Yes, I was stereotyping—something I’d been trying to work on for some time now. I’d learned long ago not to do that. In my line of work, I’d realized that people of all walks got tattoos. College kids, kindergarten teachers, fathers of three, Girl Scout leaders… They all got ink. These days, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a nun stroll into my shop.
But this guy… I don’t think I’d seen him at the shop.
Maybe it was the bad boy thing he was rocking that seemed familiar. Scruffy jaw, tousled black hair, faded jeans, black hoodie covering what looked to be a rather impressive upper body—he could’ve easily been one of the many I’d seen over the years traipsing around downtown Austin, attempting to make a name for themselves in the music world.
Along with all that, even with the scruffy, rough edge I saw, there was something beautiful about him. I honestly had no idea what it was about him specifically, though.
Still, I had no idea where I might’ve seen him. Since this was only the third time I’d come in to this particular coffee shop, I doubted I’d seen him here, but again, it was possible.
While I’d been scribbling x’s and o’s between the lines, I’d noticed him looking at my hands and thought for a minute that he was going to ask about my tattoos—something a lot of people did—but when I subtly let him see that I’d caught him, he’d snapped his attention back to his journal, looking as though he was waiting for the words to write themselves.
He held his pen at the ready—in his left hand, because that was one of those oddities that I typically noticed—but he wasn’t writing anything. After he’d scrawled a couple of words, which I couldn’t read from where I sat, he spent the rest of the time staring at it.
I wondered what he was working on.
Was he a teacher prepping his lesson plan? Nah. He didn’t give off the teacher vibe.
An executive planning to write his resignation? Hmm. Maybe.
A son looking to write a letter to his dad? That was possible.
A scorned ex-boyfriend planning to write a death threat to the woman who’d broken his heart? Feasible. But I doubted it. He had more of a player vibe going on.
My mind went all kinds of crazy thinking of what he intended to write. And I felt a pang of sympathy when he continued to scowl at the paper, apparently at a loss as to what he needed to pen on it.
I knew how he felt. For the past twenty minutes, I’d been playing tic-tac-toe. With myself. Because, of course, that wasn’t weird.
Granted, as I’d told my mysterious table-neighbor, it really was good for my ego because I won every time, but it wasn’t much of a challenge. Still, it was the only thing I could seem to do other than doodle random crap all over a blank page.
What I’d been hoping for when I walked into the coffee shop this morning was to have some sort of divine intervention and get my muse back—which, at this point, had been missing for more months than I was willing to admit. Instead, I got a bunch of straight lines and some circles. It’d been a long damn time since I’d drawn anything worth a shit.
So much for inspiration.
The front door to the coffee shop opened, and the brisk January breeze whipped inside, fluttering my papers and sending the napkin I’d brought with me to the floor. As I reached down to get it, I knocked heads with the handsome pen-wielding man.
“Ow, shit.” With a wince, I pulled back quickly, hand on my head.
“Fuck. Sorry,” he said, rubbing his head as he held the napkin out for me.
I massaged the sore spot while I watched him.
“Are you okay?” he asked, a wealth of concern in those few words. “I swear I’m not generally this abusive to strangers.”
I couldn’t help but smile at that. Well, that and the deep cadence of his voice. It was sexy. Rough. Like he’d just rolled out of bed.
“I’m sure it won’t leave a bruise for too long.”
“What is it?” He nodded toward the napkin he was still holding.
I looked down at the frayed piece of paper, frowning. “Nothing.”
And really, it wasn’t. It was only the last thing I’d drawn that I actually liked. It was a puzzle of sorts, I guess. An elephant broken into pieces, something I was considering for my next tattoo. When I’d first started it, I’d been focusing on depth and shading more than anything. Unfortunately, I was only carrying it around to remind myself that I’d lost whatever mojo I’d had before.
When he leaned closer, I retrieved the napkin, trying not to notice how freaking good he smelled as I made direct eye contact with the man, allowing myself to notice the intriguing color for the first time. They weren’t blue and they weren’t green, sort of an interesting combination of the two. Teal. A rare color that had me staring for a heartbeat too long.
Jerking my attention back to my paper, I placed another x, then another o, pretending I hadn’t been watching him, all while I fought the urge to look at him again.
Between the mussed, jet-black hair that was a little long, those mesmerizing eyes, dark eyebrows, and the weeks’ worth (at least) of beard stubble lining his jaw—a little more than what was fashionable these days—the guy had my pulse ratcheting up a notch.
It did not go unnoticed that this was the first time I’d had any sort of physical attraction to a guy in … too damn long. Needless to say, the mystery man had definitely caught my attention.
Oh, did I mention his lips? He had full lips, the kind a woman wanted to feel leaving a blazing trail of heat all over her body.
Christ. I really needed to get it together.
He looked familiar, but for the life of me I had no idea where I might’ve seen him.
Before I could spend too much time thinking about that, my cell phone rang. Glancing down at the screen, I saw that it was Gavin.
“Hey,” I greeted, keeping my voice down as I pressed the phone to my ear.
Gavin yawned loudly into the phone. “Where’re you at? I thought for sure you’d be sleeping.”
“Ran out to get coffee.” I didn’t bother to tell him that I couldn’t sleep and that I’d been awake for hours, and at this point, my day was almost over. He had probably realized that by now, since this wasn’t the first time in the last couple of weeks that I’d disappeared—and not to the shop—before he ever saw the light of day.
“You gonna bring me a cup?”
I could hear the sound of the shower in the background and I wondered if he still had company or if he really had sent them home like Gil said. “You can get your own coffee.”
Gavin chuckled softly.
“Oh,” I added, “make sure you pick your clothes up off the bathroom floor. And do not let me find your underwear in the hallway again.”
Gavin laughed, evidently amused by that. “I’ll think about it. You comin’ home soon?”
“Yeah.” Not because I wanted to but because sitting in the coffee shop hadn’t helped one bit and the last thing I needed was more caffeine. “Ten minutes or so.”
“Cool. See you then.”
I disconnected the call and tucked my phone into the pocket of my hoodie while I stared down at the page now full of tic-tac-toe boards. With a sigh, I closed the sketchbook and got to my feet.
Curiosity had me glancing down at the man’s notebook to see if he’d written anything more. I smiled when I was close enough to identify
the two words he’d jotted on the page earlier: Chapter One.
A writer. Definitely not what I would’ve guessed.
“That’s a start,” I told him, grinning when he looked up at me. “If you’re at a loss, you could always go with once upon a time.”
He flashed me a brilliant smile, and the lopsided grin transformed him from ruggedly handsome to smoking hot.
“I’ll take that into consideration.”
Before my vivid imagination could undress him where he sat, I shook off the thought and smiled. “Have a good day.”
The man nodded, his eyes intently focused on me briefly before I turned and walked toward the door, tossing my paper cup into the trash receptacle on my way out.
With my sketch pad beneath my arm, I thrust my hands into my pockets in an effort to keep warm. I should’ve dug out my heavy jacket that morning, but I hadn’t had the energy nor the desire to hunt through the unpacked boxes I’d stuffed into my closet to find it.
Now, I wished I had.
Chapter Nine
Jake
Saturday night
This might not have been my best idea yet, but here I was, and I hadn’t yet come up with a way to get out of it. Then again, I hadn’t really tried all that hard.
Forget the fact that it had been my not-so-brilliant idea in the first place. However, as I downed my wine in one gulp, listening to the incessant chatter coming out of this woman’s mouth, I was beginning to rethink the idea. Especially as she continued to talk.
“I’m serious,” she giggled, grinning back at me as though I was the most interesting person in the world. “I read Forbidden on, like, the day it came out, and… Oh. My. God. I had to change the batteries in my vibrator twice.”
Maybe she should use better batteries, I thought, although I knew that wasn’t the point.
Or maybe it was.
Helena was a nice girl, even if the only thing she talked about was me. In fact, she was so enthralled by me, I knew very little about her, other than she was in her late twenties and lived in Austin. I’d met her at a bar downtown one night a few weeks back and we’d hit it off. And by hit it off, I meant we’d come back to my condo and fucked like rabbits on my couch. I won’t lie and say that I’d been all that interested in talking that night. Tonight, not much different.
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