by DD Prince
“Lots of vegetables. Lots of meat. Lots of cheese. Everything.” I say.
He smiles. “Load it up with the works. Triple cheese. Yeah.”
“No hot peppers,” I add.
He smiles a big and beautiful smile. I crack one, too.
The phone starts to ring again. I glare at it.
He finishes up with whatever pizza place he’s called and looks at the ringing house phone.
“What’s that all about?” He’s obviously picked up on my anxiety, on the way I hung up. Not like he could’ve missed all that, standing right beside me.
I shake my head. “Ignore it.” It keeps ringing a fifth and sixth time so evidently there’s no voicemail. I unplug it half way through the seventh ring.
He makes a face of interest.
“Jon?” he asks.
I shake my head, hoping he’ll get the message that I don’t wanna discuss it.
He moves to the bar and lifts the paper. “What’s this?”
“It’s a list of all the stuff of mine you’ve used. Tomorrow, please purchase all of those things and put them on my shelf in the fridge. And then, consider filling your shelf with your own groceries.”
He looks at me like I’m an alien lifeform and drops the paper on the counter.
“You wrote that in your room just now?”
I stare at him, waiting for his point.
“Which means you memorized every single thing? It was naggin’ at you that much that you’ve been stewing on every egg, every banana?”
I say nothing, arms folded over my chest.
“I didn’t put down the ¾ of a lasagna you ate or the food for tonight. Though I should’ve.”
He looks at me for a beat like I’m beneath his feet, and that has the effect of making me angrier.
He heads to his room and comes back with three one hundred dollar bills and drops them on the counter. “There. Fill the place with groceries for both of us. We’ll share.”
I shake my head. “Nnoooo. You’ve used about forty dollars of my groceries. You can simply buy those things on that list.” I point to the list.
“I’ll buy all the groceries. Don’t give a fuck.”
“You’re not hearing me.”
“What’s your problem?” He stalks toward me and my back hits wall. I realize that I’m letting him intimidate me, letting him dominate this situation.
“I have no problem if you stop using my stuff. You’ve been a terrible roommate. If we’re stuck here with one another, establishing some ground rules is necessary. I don’t like to live in a pigsty. It’s not fair of you to expect me to either live with your mess or to clean it up. If I have four bananas and a dozen eggs, I expect to find four bananas and a dozen eggs. Not eleven eggs, certainly not five eggs! If you run out of food and want to use something of mine, ask me.”
“You’re serious?”
“Duh!” I throw my hand up in the air.
He folds his arms across his chest.
“That’s pretty fuckin’ petty.”
How dare he!
“How dare you? Your behavior led to this. I’m a caring, generous person, usually. But, when someone takes advantage of me, I don’t stand for it. I’m not a doormat.”
I’m lying through my teeth. I’ve always just dealt with it. But, not anymore.
I continue. “We’re sharing this apartment, but we’re also colleagues so that also means that you need to respect my personal space, stop making a mess, stop stealing my food, and refrain from calling me baby or peaches or Curly Sue or any other demeaning names.”
“We’re not colleagues. I’m your boss.” His arms are folded across his chest again.
“Oh. Right,” I say snarkily, looking him directly in the eye. ” My mistake.”
“Which means I get to boss you around.” He moves in closer and puts both hands on the wall on either side of my face. He gazes into my eyes. Deep. He moistens those lips and my eyes move to them.
“I’m the boss of you, Carly…”
I look up at him and my mouth goes dry as he skims his bottom lip with those teeth again.
Wait. Hold the fuck up.
“Outside the office? Wrong. Back off.”
He’s so close, I feel the heat of his breath on me.
“Back off. I’m warning you this one last time.”
Mr. Charming melts away and now he’s glaring, with challenge in his eyes. He backs off.
“I’ll buy groceries, peaches. I’m not stingy.” He then mutters barely under his breath, “Not like some…”
My face goes redder.
“I’m actually a very sharing person. When I like people. When people treat me like a human being!”
He snickers.
“And I am eating some of your pizza, because you owe me dinner after ruining the rest of my food tonight.”
He cocks an eyebrow at me. “I owe you dinner? Fine, this weekend, I’ll take you to dinner.”
“No. I meant the pizza. The pizza will suffice. I’m going to take half of it and eat it in my room, so I don’t have to look at you and your…” I gesture to his dick print.
He looks down and then that brow shoots up again.
“Wearing underpants is a good idea,” I remark.
“Thought you didn’t like when I walked around here in my underpants… thought I was bein’ a better roommate…”
“No…not what I…”
He’s fighting off laughter. He totally knows what I mean.
“Grrr!” I’m doing a terrible job of hiding my frustration. I storm to the bar, grab the two plates and scrape them into the trash and begin cleaning up the mess.
“You wearin’ underwear? If you want me in them, all right, but you don’t have to follow the same rule,” he says this directly into my ear, and his mouth actually connects, though briefly, and then he moves to the fridge with the hot sauce and the bottle of teriyaki sauce.
I’m ready to tell him to fuck right off.
I stop myself. No. I need to keep this professional. Or, try to get it back to professional somehow.
“How about this? We go back to professional. Professional colleagues who have to share an apartment. We’re both fully dressed outside our bedrooms, we both buy our own food, clean our own mess, and treat one another respectfully. How’s that?”
He smiles. There’s deviousness there.
“What?” I demand.
“Nothin’. You want this to be purely professional, you got it, peaches. I’ll remember to boss you around extra at the office.”
What a jerk.
How much would it cost me to get my own apartment? I get paid next week. Could I swing it?
“Let me know when my half of that pizza is here.”
I storm to my room and slam the door.
***
No more than a half hour goes by when I hear knocking. Loud knocking.
I’ve been Googling apartment rental prices. I can’t afford my own apartment right now. Not with deposits and all that jazz. There’s always a roommate but I haven’t had the best luck with roommates. Neither at home nor here.
I open my door. It’s the front door. Is it the pizza?
More knocking.
“Aiden?” I call out. No answer.
I head to the door and look out the peephole. Pizza.
I open the door.
Pizza guy smiles and looks down at the receipt taped to the box. “$42.50, please.”
“Uh, one sec,” I say and call out, “Aiden?”
No answer.
“One sec,” I repeat and run through the apartment calling him. He doesn’t answer.
I rap on his door. Nothing.
I open it. He’s not here. I look out the window to the terrace. Nobody.
“$42.50,” the pizza guy calls out. “I gotta go, miss.”
I glance at the counter to see if those three hundred-dollar bills are still, by some chance, sitting there.
The counter top is empty.
Of cours
e. FML. That jerk bloody well stuck me with the pizza bill!
I rush to my room and zip back out with my bag. I pull out three twenties, tip him five dollars and fifty cents, and then after I close the door, I seethe.
Sonofabitch!
I’m pretty-well broke now. Forty-three bucks and a maxed-out credit card to my name. Well, I’ve got forty-three bucks, an extra-large pizza, five eggs, some granola and apples and two boxes of crackers to last me a week and a half.
Sonofabitch.
I need friends. I need to rant. I need to stuff my face. And get drunk. And dance. And rant.
And maybe all of the above.
I grab my phone and text Ally.
“Had dinner yet?”
She replies immediately.
“What’cha got?”
“Pizza.”
“I can do second dinner.”
“Be right down.”
I slip on my flipflops and tuck my phone and keys into the pocket of my sweatshirt dress and then head out to the hallway with the pizza and take the stairs.
12
AIDEN
I’ve gotta fuckin’ tap that. And soon.
That morning, I had visions of that curly hair, those full lips when I fucked my pocket pussy in the shower. I tried to shake the image of her off before busting a nut, but it was her tits I imagined blowin’ my load on, instead of my shower wall.
She struts around that apartment and around my office, hatin’ on me, and like she’s got no idea how fuckin’ hard she’s makin’ every guy in the place. Those full lips. That ass. That rack. The way she flips her hair. The way she says my name with all that sass.
Usually, my morning fap session is enough to get me through the day, and I typically picture tits, ass, pussy, but never faces. Never hair. No one specific. I prefer it that way. Faceless. This chick is gettin’ my motor runnin’. Gotta tap it soon so I can get it outta my system.
Fuckin’ wanna grab her by those curls and force my cock down her throat when she’s sassy. Spank that perfect round ass while I do so I can feel her whimpering around my cock.
She tries to be cold as ice with me, but when she loses hold on her guard, like when we were laughin’ over hot cock sauce in the kitchen? Then tries to put on the tough chick act again?
Makes me wanna fuck the sass right outta her and watch all that attitude melt away. She’s either soft under all that attitude or she’s playin’ a good fuckin’ game. Either way, I’ll be the one that wins this thing.
But, fuck. When she bent over in front of me getting in the cab that morning? Fuckin’ had to fight to keep a lock on my self-control. Felt like a fifteen-year-old who had zero control over his dick.
Fuckin’ loved giving her goosebumps. I’ve done it twice so far. She’s affected by me and bad at hiding it. Or, good at pretending she’s trying to hide it.
And then tonight? Strutting in that sexy sweatshirt? Low cut in the front, high-cut on the sides, slits reaching toward her hips, no goddamn bra on. And those fuckin’ legs of hers. I wanted to heft her up onto the counter, throw the fuckin’ food to the side and pound her senseless.
Bossy little thing thinks she’s a Pitbull. A Pitbull puppy maybe, with a fuckin’ bow around its’ neck.
Don’t eat my food, Aiden.
You owe me seven eggs, Aiden!
The fuck is she all about? I’ll take all your eggs. You’ll be beggin’ to give me more eggs, wench.
My phone rang when she stormed off. My buddy Jude. Forgot I was supposed to meet him for drinks to talk about this latest bullshit with Bella.
Bitch sends me a link to a bunch of topless photos last night and it makes me wonder if she’s doing crack. I have pictures I’m using as insurance. Why the fuck would she send more as a peace offering?
Maybe I’ll get him to do some digging into Carly Adler, too. Figure out what I’m dealing with.
I thought for a minute there that she might be a mole, but I’ve run through all the scenarios where it’s a possibility and decided it’s highly unlikely my mother would have gotten Carly on radar. She’s been here just a couple days, came from a tiny office in Buffalo, a company we acquired quickly because I punted the lead my father’s way. She was an unknown before that. None of that was big enough to hit Audra Carmichael’s radar. But it wouldn’t be the first time my mother tried to get me in hand by having a woman throw herself at me. Does Audra think if she marries me off and gets me led around by the dick she can call the shots through whoever the chick is?
Still got no idea why my father put this chick in my apartment, though. Makes no fuckin’ sense. We have girls staying in the two-bedroom apartment, but there’s an empty three-bedroom condo of ours on the fifteenth floor where all three of them could go.
“Bella,” I greet. She’s at the bar I’m supposed to meet Jude at.
Is it a coincidence she’s here? The look of surprise on her face tells me it must be.
Bella is dressed in that same dress I fucked her in the other day. Same shoes, too.
Fuck, even cheaper than I thought. She sees me and chokes on the dregs of her drink and whispers something to the chick bartender who side-eyes me and then starts on a new drink.
I eye her from head to toe, but give nothing away as to whether I like what I see or am judging what I see.
“Aiden,” she greets belatedly, trying to look composed. Failing.
“What’s up, Bella?”
“I’ve had a bad day,” she shrugs. “Thanks to you.”
“Oh yeah?” I ask, casually.
“I found nothing in your briefcase. I know that’s what you’re up in arms about. There’s no reason for you to terrorize me like this.” She stares into the glass the bartender hands her.
I glare at her. “I told you already I’m not climbing back on your crazy train. Stop tryin’ to turn on the charm. Don’t fuck with me, Bella.”
She looks up at me and bats her eyelashes. “I won’t,” she assures. “I don’t want to be on your bad side, Aiden. I want to be on your good side. How do I get back there?”
She runs her index finger down my arm.
“Just stay outta my way,” I say. “I’ll let you know if I want you to feed specific info to Audra.”
She flinches.
“Yeah, I know she’s paying you.”
She swallows.
“I need her to keep paying me, Aiden. I’m in trouble. And if I don’t give her anything…”
“Not my problem,” I say.
She sighs. And then her look changes to absolutely panicked.
I head to the table to sit with Jude who’s slipped in quietly and had his eye on Bella and me. Now that she’s gone, I head there.
He already told me he spotted Audra and Bella together. Jude figures she told her to bed me and get all my secrets and report back to her on a regular basis while I’m in San Diego. But, Bella’s game was sloppy, caught her rifling around in my briefcase the while she thought I was crashed on the couch.
Bitch was acting sketchy all night, which was why I kept my “insurance” policy. Sad, but true --- not the first time I’ve videotaped girls during sex. On a plus note, never had to use the footage. Never even looked back at it.
He begins to fill me in, saying today, he found that Audra put another $2500 in her bank account. Small change for my mother. There must be another installment coming that Bella is seeking a payday for. And Bella must be desperate to go all out for that amount of money coming at her in dribs and drabs.
Yeah, I took the pussy on offer, and it was nowhere near as addictive as Bella believes it is. Audra knows I tapped Bella before I left for New York last time, thinking she’s a good weapon to use. But she wasn’t. And now I’ve got more ammo against my mother in case I need it.
“I want you to look into Carly Adler, man,” I say to Jude. “She just started work at my office. My father planted her in my apartment in the spare room for what feels like no good reason, so my gut is tellin’ me there’s a reason. I want to
know everything.”
“Tell me the basics,” he requests, starting to take notes.
“Cute as fuck. Lookin’ forward to bangin’ her. She worked for Chancellor & Associates in Buffalo, New York and my father recruited her after we acquired it.”
The bartender is wiping the table beside us. She swaps out our glasses, leaving a tray behind, and I notice she’s got eyes on Jude, who’s not paying her any mind.
“Don’t know how you can bang chicks you have no idea if they’re evil or not, man. This might be why you have to pay me so much money. Nevermind, actually. Keep on bangin’ away…”
I snicker. “It doesn’t matter. I ain’t looking for a relationship. If I catch a whiff of a ripe peach like that, better believe I’ll take a bite.”
“She gaggin’ for it?”
“Pretending she isn’t. Maybe because it’d blow her cover, or could be she’s playing a long game. Either way, guaranteed, I will bag her before the month is out. No, a week, two weeks max. Watch me. You want to wager?”
“Naw man, I’ve seen you in action. I don’t like to lose money.”
The bartender Bella was talkin’ to is wiping the table down on the other side of us now, giving Jude fuck me eyes.
Jude gives her a once over. She’s tatted and has a pierced nose, pierced lip. She’s got great small but perky tits. Definitely his type.
I leave the bar, leavin’ him there so he can chat her up, see if she’s worth his time.
13
CARLY
Ally answers the door in the same clothes she wore to work, but her hair is now up in a bun like mine.
“Oh wow. You look hot!” She eyes me head to toe.
I’m in my sweatshirt dress and flip flops.
“That sweatshirt dress is smokin’! And anyone who comes to my door with pizza is automatically a hottie, but even if you didn’t have pizza, you’d still be smokin’. Come in!”
I notice immediately that the apartment is a lot less impressive than the one upstairs. It’s more like a corporate apartment than mine and Aiden’s, which is like a home.
There’s black leather furniture, no photos on the walls, and it’s small. It has no personality.