The Boy Next Door

by Staci Parker

  Chapter Two

  The next morning, he made some sort of excuse to her about having to get to work. She looked disappointed when he handed her a fifty dollar bill and called the cab company, but the no-nonsense set to his jawline made her reconsider putting up an argument. He waited until the taxi took off, then he took off in the Charger. He did not feel the need to head straight to the office. Instead, he pointed the Charger to his real home and settled in his seat for the drive.

  The little apartment was convenient for so many things. It was handy for one-night encounters and also served as a meeting place for any of the friends that did not know about his day job. He did his best to keep it up as though it were really a place to live, but truthfully he could not imagine actually living in a studio apartment where the kitchen overlooked the main area, where the living room and the bedroom were one giant shared space, and where the only door in the place led to the tiny bathroom.

  He pulled up to the gate of his estate and punched in the codes to let it slide open. He pulled the Charger into its designated spot of the multi-car garage and headed inside.

  The apartment he just left could have fit four times over into the garage alone, and that did not count the other structures on the property. The main house sat back from the street, with the guest house and the small pool house behind it to flank the tennis court and the swimming pool.

  His butler met him at the garage door, and handed him a cup a coffee. Greyson grinned and took a cautious sip from the steaming mug.

  “Long night,” he admitted with a grin to Mister Anders.

  “I can see that, Sir,” he replied noncommittally.

  Mister Anders was not a fan of Greyson’s newest hobby but did not feel it was his place to say anything about it. Mister Anders had worked for the family for several decades and had known Greyson’s father more like a brother than an employer. Now that Greyson was head of the family, of the business, and of the estate, things were changing faster than Mister Anders was accustomed to.

  Greyson headed up to his master suite to get ready for work. As the heir of the global corporation, he had massive responsibilities but he also had a certain amount of freedom. His recent street racing was just a way to blow off steam and to have a little fun with girls who did not know who he was. Most of the time, he was completely bored with the society girls that his father’s associates and friends pressed upon him. These girls from the races were not really that much brighter, they will just fun without all of the strings.

  There were magazine articles listing him as one of the country’s most eligible and desirable bachelors, but he hated those articles. His private life was no one else’s business, especially since he did not purport himself to be any kind of celebrity. He did realize that with his financial status, he was a default celebrity of sorts especially given his piercing eyes and washboard stomach, but he was not the type to seek it out.

  After a long hot shower, he slipped into one of his custom tailored grey suits and headed back downstairs. This time, his driver would be in charge of the accelerator and would drop him off at the high rise office building downtown. Part of him wished he could just hand the reins to someone else, but he knew his father built this company so that his son could run it someday.

  He stopped by the granite and steel kitchen for more coffee and something more substantial. The kind older lady who worked as his chef ushered him to the table and laid out a nice breakfast for him. He really should not have taken the time, but the lox platter looked irresistible. The bagel was perfectly toasted, the vegetable cream cheese was soft and spreadable, and the translucent slips of smoked salmon glistened. He topped off the entire creation with shaved red onion and capers and wolfed the entire meal down along with another cup of coffee.

  Greyson gathered his briefcase and sighed deeply as he slid into the town car. Despite everything that his father had left him and being a man of nearly unlimited resources, he was bored with his life and ready for something to change.

  Chapter Three

  The next racing night could not arrive soon enough, and Greyson went through the motions of his business dealings with anticipation of feeling that rumble underneath him. There was no rumble in the board room that could come close to matching the excitement of his beloved Charger roaring off the starting line.

  It really had less to do with the girls and more to do with the racing itself. The girls he took back to the apartment were just the chocolate cake after the filet mignon. He got more of a thrill out of the fifty-second street race than he did when he closed a fifty million dollar deal at the office.

  By Friday afternoon, he was tapping his toes impatiently in the board room and watching the clock tick off one second per hour. When the meeting concluded, he nearly ran out of the room much to the irritation of the other board members. They, like Mister Anders, were still getting used to the changes.

  Greyson reached the building’s parking garage in record time, and waved his driver over insistently.

  “I gotta get outta here,” he told the man as he slid into the back seat.

  The driver nodded. “Where to, Sir?”

  “Home. I need to just get home.”

  The town car pulled smoothly out of the garage, and Greyson sunk back into his seat and yanked his tie off with a strangled groan. He was ready to slip into those torn jeans and beat up tee shirt, and take the Charger out for a spin. He had been a reckless teenager and sometimes longed for those days when he could slip out and do whatever he wanted while someone else was left to clean up the mess he left in his wake.

  He finally arrived home to don his street uniform, and he headed out in the Charger to the other side of town. Mister Anders tried in vain to stop him, and just stood in the open door shaking his head as the Charger pealed out of the driveway.

  On his way to the racing site, he pulled into a fast food drive-through window and ordered himself a meal that would have made his chef quit her job. She tried to provide him with healthy balanced meals for his overall health, and he just grinned at the thought of her reaction to his double bacon cheeseburger and extra-large order of French fries. The bucket-sized soda washed everything down nicely.

  He was not overly concerned about the impact of one meal on his health. He worked out like a fiend and ninety-five percent of the food he ate was of the healthy variety. He just liked to indulge in the burgers once a week before the race.

  After he finished his meal in the car in an empty law firm parking lot, he decided to swing by the apartment and make sure everything was looking good. He never wanted it to look like it was abandoned; those apartments always got robbed.

  After checking, he headed over to the normal gathering spot. The onlookers and drivers had already started to assemble, and the group parted as he pulled up. A couple of new visitors ooh-ed and ahh-ed over his car and he basked in the attention she earned for him.

  He stepped out of the car and nearly lost his balance when his eyes fell on her. These racecars were usually driven by young guys with something to prove, and the girls were giggly airheads who barely knew how to put gas in their own cars. But she was different.

  She stood slightly apart from the crowd, but not so far away that she looked like a loner. She hung around the fringes and looked a little bored. It was not that affected boredom look; it was a look of profound otherness, as though she belonged to a different time or a different place. Her face was devoid of any actual emotion as the young man beside her bounced and jabbered away about something. She smiled politely, but her eyes never crinkled with humor or enjoyment. Greyson estimated that her jeans were oversized by at least one dress size, and her tee shirt was the same. Her chestnut hair was drawn back into a simple bun at the nape of her neck and her creamy skin shown softly in the rising moonlight. From a distance he could not give an educated guess as to her age or her eye color. But from the instant that he saw her, he had to know more. He had to learn everything.

  Chapter Four

 
Greyson approached the woman and the young man with the same casual swagger that he approached life.

  The young man, who had been bouncing around, started jumping more.

  “Dude! You’re the Charger! Love that car dude! Did you do the work yourself?” The poor kid was nearly hyperventilating.

  Greyson clapped him on the shoulder. “Thanks, man. I have a great mechanic. I’d be happy to recommend him if you like.”

  He knew that no one else in the entire racing group could afford his mechanic, so he felt safe making the offer.

  The woman regarded him coolly with her emerald eyes.

  “Folks around here just call me Charger,” he offered as he flashed his winningest smile.

  “They don’t call me anything,” she retorted and turned away.

  Greyson was not used to any sort of rebuff, professional or personal.

  “Oh? They just say, ‘hey you there’?” he tried to joke around with her.

  “They don’t speak to me at all. I’ve never been here before.”

  “Ah, I see. And why tonight?”

  “My little brother wanted me to watch him race.” She gestured casually to the bouncy young man.

  He sidled up to her and tried to be casual about draping his arm behind her on the roof of the young man’s car. She smoothly side-stepped away from him and turned to face him with her arms crossed on her chest.

  She was driving him insane with her disregard. And he was becoming more and more curious about what lay hidden underneath those oversized clothes.

  “Look, I was just coming over to say hello. I didn’t think I recognized either of you, or his car, so I thought I would say hi.”

  He offered his hand genteelly. “So hello.”

  She shook his hand politely, and her soft skin felt like cream in his hand.

  He turned and disappeared back into the crowd, moving too quickly to notice her long and pronounced exhalation of breath. Greyson was beyond distracted just from one look into her green eyes and knew that it was going to affect his racing that night.

  He completed two rounds of racing and won by his slimmest margin ever, but it still counted. He was not going to lose his reputation based off one cold encounter with one hot woman.

  He approached the pair one more time before the night was over.

  “Can I give you a ride? You might like a little rumble,” he grinned down at the petite woman.

  She narrowed her gaze at him and tried to ignore her brother’s fist popping against her arm.

  “C’mon, go ahead,” he whispered loudly. “You gotta try out that car.”

  She sighed dramatically and gave in. “Fine, one little spin.”

  Greyson walked her over to the Charger and closed the passenger door behind her. He took a deep breath as he walked around the back and tried to get a grip on his raging hormones.

  “How fast did you have in mind?” he whispered as he shut the car door, quirking one eyebrow up in a question mark.

  She looked up at him through thick dark lashes. “You tell me.”

  He felt his cock twitch underneath the fly of his jeans and he dug his nails into his palm to stop his hand from adjusting himself. He started it up and watched as her hands gripped the sides of the seat when she felt the rumble under her. He revved the engine and smirked to himself as he heard a faint gasp from her side of the car.

  He eased out of the crowd and as soon as they were clear, he looked over at her sideways out of the corner of his eye, and slammed the gas down.

  “Fuck,” she whispered, pressing her head backwards into the headrest.

  He laughed at the expletive that fell from her soft pink lips.

  “You okay over there?”

  “Y-Y-Yeah,” she stuttered as she tried to regain her composure. “R-R-Racing’s my brother’s thing, not mine.”

  “You’re more of a slow lane driver?”

  “More like a driver who wants to stay alive,” she retorted.

  Dammit, he thought, and she’s quick with the comebacks.

  “I seem to be perfectly alive,” he bantered.

  “For how long? Until you plow this thing into a wall some night?”

  “Nope, no wall plowing here.”

  He whipped the car in a tight U-turn and she pitched sideways, knocking her head against his shoulder.

  “You okay?” he asked, trying not to chuckle.

  “Sure, great, love a good concussion.”

  “I’m not that much of a hard body,” he taunted.

  She righted herself and stared straightforward through the windshield. The best part of being a woman, she thought to herself, was no one can see what your body is thinking.

  He pulled back to the crowd and threw it into park. His hand drifted to her knee and she stiffened noticeably.

  “Didn’t mean to scare you,” he offered as an apology.

  “It’s okay, I’m just not used to it.”

  His hand moved an inch up her thigh. “You sure you’re good?”

  She caught her lower lip between her teeth and looked up at him.

  “Very good,” she whispered.

  He groaned softly and leaned towards her. The seat belt tightened against his chest as he neared her parted lips. He could feel her warm breath against his cheek; it smelled like peppermint candies. He ran his tongue lightly over her bottom lip and felt his cock stir again when she sighed quietly.

  “Want to get out of here?” he asked faintly.

  She opened her eyes and looked into his. “I can’t, I’m sorry.”

  He wrinkled his dark eyebrows together and pulled back from her. “Why can’t you?”

  “I have to get home,” she answered vaguely.

  Greyson huffed out his disappointment and sat back in his seat. He was not sure what to do with rejection. She popped open the door and disappeared to the other side of the tinting. As the car door shut, he slammed his fist into the steering wheel and swore loudly inside his own head.

  Who the fuck does she think she is?

  Chapter Five

  Greyson flung himself out of the Charger once he saw that she had left with her brother. He headed to the first bleach-headed, mini-skirted idiot that he saw and within minutes, was headed to the apartment with her. His frustration was beyond sexual but this would at least take care of the most urgent difficulty.

  He was in no mood for fun or playtime. Once they got to the apartment, he urged the girl down to her knees and held the sides of her face roughly as he plundered her bewildered mouth. She giggled when the evidence of his orgasm dripped from the corner of her mouth, and he shooed her out the front door hurriedly with cab fare and a dismissive wave.

  He flopped down on the bed and groaned loudly. Even with his cock satiated, he wanted the brunette from the race. He could still taste the peppermint on her lips and could smell the fruity floral fragrance of her skin. He would find her again.

  The next morning, Greyson dragged himself from the apartment back to the estate. Mister Anders gave him a grim nod but handed him the steaming coffee mug regardless.

  Greyson grinned and headed up to his master suite for a shower and some clean clothes. The hot water quickly steamed up the bathroom and he tossed his tee shirt, jeans, and boxer briefs onto the closet floor. The multiple jets of water shot out of the granite tiled wall and coursed over his tired body. He rested his forehead against one wall and let the pressure of the jets tattoo his lower back. Soaping himself up, his fingers lingered along his cock, still remembering her soft lips and haunting eyes. He stroked as he imagined those lips sucking him and her warm pink tongue tickling him. He grunted deep in his chest as he came, the spurts of his fluid splashing against the tile.

  After he finished his shower with a sigh, he stepped out and wrapped up in his thick cobalt bathrobe. He punched several buttons on the internal intercom system, and requested breakfast in his room. He was not ready to play nice with anyone he might encounter downstairs.

  One of the staff knocked softly
on the suite door, and he opened it with a flat smile and took the tray. It was another lox platter and he silently thanked the cook for one of his favorites.

  As he piled on the cream cheese, the smoked salmon, the chopped eggs, and the tomatoes, he clicked on the television and flopped onto his own bed. There was nothing good on television on Saturday mornings apparently, so he left it on some random movie and ate his brunch while staring out the window.

  Part of him was considering trying the race spot that night, just in the off-chance he would find her again. He had never been on a Saturday night so he was not sure what the crowd was like.

  Instead, he pulled over his laptop and punched through an email to his personal lawyer. With the retainer that Greyson paid him monthly, the man was willing to do almost anything that his staff could legally manage. Usually it involved some sort of due diligence project on a company he was acquiring or an executive he was trying to pin down. This time, Greyson launched an investigation into the brunette whose name he did not even know.

  The lawyer was on top of it for a Saturday afternoon and agreed to find out what he could. He knew better than to ask too much about the assignments he was given, and would only question them if it ran into a legal speed bump. He promised to deliver what he could as soon as he could.

  Greyson leaned back against the mound of pillows on his bed, and stared out the window into the backyard. He hoped for information about her, but knew in the back of his head he was crazy for even asking. But he could not walk away from the one that said no.

  He had never had a difficult life. There had been challenges -- growing up without a mother figure, being raised by servants and personal staff while his father made the family fortune larger, taking over the family empire before he was thirty, and personally speaking, being completely on his own. He had extended family somewhere, but he was not interested in relations that came crawling around with their hands out for money. But it was a “challenged” life most mortals only dream of.

  Chapter Six

  By Monday, the lawyer and his staff had not produced any details about the brunette woman. They had so little information to start with that finding something would have been damn near miraculous. Regardless, Greyson was furious that his highly paid, highly educated lawyer had found nothing on the girl.