Mister McHottie

by Pippa Grant

  Tonight, he’s hanging by the wall in the basement of a library not far from the office, bopping his head along to the music while the girls and I rock out at a retirement party. I’m ignoring his speed it up so we can sneak into the stacks upstairs bedroom eyes, and only partly because I’m a musical professional.

  Mostly, though, because I love the way he growls and attacks me—in the good way, of course—when I’ve made him wait.

  I wink at him and turn my attention back to our audience. These ladies know how to let their hair down and party. So does that tall piece of eye candy in the middle of the room, whom I’m pretty sure Parker knows, and no, I don’t know how, but you can bet I’m going to find out.

  I wonder if it has anything to do with that bachelor auction that she tried to keep a secret from us?

  We’re almost done with our last set, and as we go into “I Do (Cherish You)” by 98 Degrees, Chase shoots me one of his You’re going to owe me looks. But I know he doesn’t actually mind dancing with the retiree-of-honor’s mother, especially since her walker leaves plenty of room between them for the holy ghost.

  He’s actually quite charming with people when he’s not trying to put worms in their peanut butter sandwiches.

  Who knew?

  We finish up the song to a round of applause, Willow thanks everyone for being such a great audience, and I make quick work of packing up my keyboard.

  “Seriously, Sia?” Parker says. She’s still sporting a blush that hasn’t gone away since the sexy guest entered the building, but that doesn’t stop her from telegraphing that she knows exactly what’s on my mind. “In a library?”

  “Speed it up, Bro.” Chase steps up behind me and settles his hand on my lower back, and I get tingles all over my skin and a surge of primal lust settles hard and heavy in my core. “I want to check out the comic books before we go.”

  “Go on, you two.” Willow shoos us. “Be quick and don’t get caught.”

  “Willow!” Parker hisses.

  “What? They’re gonna do it anyway, might as well get it over with before anyone else catches on.”

  I don’t hear Parker’s counter-argument, because Chase is tugging me to the stairwell. “Your band doesn’t suck,” he tells me.

  I swat him on the ass. “Watching you watch us doesn’t suck either.”

  He grins back at me and bypasses the first floor. Then the second. And the third. We finally emerge on the roof of the library, where there’s a small table set with champagne and chocolate covered strawberries, the soft sounds of OneRepublic blending in with the summer city night, and fairy lights strung around the half-wall.

  It’s beautiful and romantic and my heart is utterly melting.

  “Who are you, and what have you done with my boyfriend?” I ask Chase as I wrap my arms around his neck.

  “What? This? It’s for my other girlfriend.”

  I laugh as I pepper his jaw with kisses. “Is she hotter than me?”

  “Way hotter.” His hands are trailing up my back under my shirt. They stop mid-way, and I know he’s suddenly realized I’m not wearing a bra.

  “Does she sing better?” I ask.

  “Yes. And no man has ever had to break her piano to save anyone’s ears.”

  I’m laughing again, but his hands slide around my front to cradle my breasts, and my breath catches.

  “I love touching you.” He grazes my earlobe with his teeth, pokes me in the belly with his rock-hard cock, and once again, this man has turned me into a giant mass of raging pheromones and lust. “And seeing you smile. And watching you play. And making you come.”

  And now I’m all warm and glowy in my heart, which makes being turned on even hotter. “I love loving you,” I whisper.

  He captures my mouth with his while I make quick work of undoing his button. He takes me hot and hard and fast against a brick wall on the roof, touching me in all my favorite places while I scrape my nails over all his favorite places, his mouth on mine, his tongue feasting on mine, his solid cock sliding in and out of my pussy, filling me and teasing me and completing me, until I shatter into a million happy stars and take him over the edge with me.

  His fingers twirl in my hair as we both catch our breath. “I love you, Ambrosia May Berger,” he tells my shoulder.

  I stroke the back of his neck and pull him closer.

  We might not have a normal love story, but it’s ours.

  Because Chase Jett—this man who comes to hear my band play, who dances with little old ladies, and who makes love to me on impromptu rooftop dates—is worth every challenge we’ve been through.

  And I wouldn’t change any of it for the world.

  Thanks for reading! Want some bonus epilogues, including a huge surprise Chase has for Bro on their anniversary and another surprise involving the Bratwurst Wagon? Click here to register for the Pipster Report, and I’ll send you three!

  If you’re the awesome type of person who likes to leave reviews, here are quick linkies for you to Amazon and Goodreads. And keep reading for a sneak peek at Stud in the Stacks. Hugs and cookie kisses!!

  Pippa

  More Books by Pippa Grant

  Stud in the Stacks (Parker & Knox)

  The Pilot and the Puck-Up (Zeus and his new nemesis)

  Ares’ Epic Romance (not the real title, sadly, but yes, Ares is getting his own book!)

  Keep in touch with Pippa Grant!

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  Get the Pipster Report

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  If you love sexy studs who aren’t afraid to read romance novels, socially awkward heroines, and jungle beefcake bachelor auctions, read on for an excerpt of Stud in the Stacks!

  Knox (aka Mr. Romance, aka Tarzan, but only for tonight)

  Even though it’s been six years since I stripped for a roomful of women, I’m pleased to report my loincloth still fits in all the right places. Tad more snug in front than I remember, but if I had to grow, might as well be in the junk.

  I give the elastic one last test as the producer signals that I’m up. Spider-Man gives me a fist bump. Thor smacks my ass. They’re the last two bachelors going up on the block after me in tonight’s superhero-themed auction.

  There are some who might say Tarzan isn’t a superhero, but Jane would beg to differ.

  And I fucking own this costume.

  Plus, if no one else bids on me, my Nana’s right up front, ready to throw down the hundred bucks I slipped her before the show.

  I’m hoping for a little higher than that though. Batman just went for a cool five grand.

  Batman was a dick, which I assume my Nana didn’t know when she started the bidding on him. A grade-A, condescending asshat who thought just because he had a few million bucks in the bank, he could call people gay like that’s an insult and take a metaphorical shit on my favorite books.

  I fucking want to beat Batman.

  “Ladies,” local anchorwoman Nancy Houlihan says into the microphone onstage just beyond the door where I’m waiting, “next up is…”

  She pauses, the spotlight criss-crosses the stage, and a drum rolls. All goes silent, the light stops on the doorway, and Nancy crows, “Tarzan!”

  My music starts—does anything say jungle man quite like “The Lion Sleeps tonight”? Not if you have half a sense of humor, it doesn’t—and I put all my swagger into walking out that door to the whoops and hollers of the fancy crowd. Nancy’s on the far side of the stage, waiting at the microphone while I make my way to center stage, grinding and gyrating and showing off my old moves for the ladies.

  At the front table, Nana’s covering her eyes, and despite my irritation with Batman, it’s all I can do to keep from cracking up.

  Am I a sexy beast? Sure.

  Do I know how to give the ladies what they want? Damn straight.

  But a bachelor auction? I’m a little more than just my meat, thank you
very much. Also, I’ve read over eighty bachelor auction romances. I know how this story usually ends, which is why I almost said no.

  However, Nancy reached out to me through my blog and said the magic words—“All proceeds are going toward literacy”—so here I am, and I’m damn well going to get as much money for my sexy ass as I can. I shake my booty, I point at the ladies, I wink, I smile, and I get my groove on, squatting to the floor and thrusting to some “a-weema-weh.”

  Nancy and my Nana might be the only two women in the room unaffected.

  Just because I don’t take myself too seriously doesn’t mean I can’t give a good show.

  The music keeps playing, but it lightens as Nancy steps to the mic. “Ladies, meet Tarzan. He’s six-two, one hundred eighty pounds, and when he’s not swinging vine to vine to save Jane in the jungle, he likes to—”

  “One thousand dollars!” A brunette in a killer red dress leaps out of her seat at a table midway back in the banquet hall and waves her paddle.

  Holy shit.

  Bidding hasn’t even started, and we’ve already surpassed Nana’s budget. I cock a finger at the brunette, wink and fire, and a Marilyn Monroe lookalike in the corner flings her paddle in the air.

  “Fifteen hundred!”

  “Two grand!” I make eye contact with the strawberry blonde at table seventeen, and hello.

  There’s something fierce about her. She’s not leaping out of her seat like the brunette, Marilyn Monroe, or the little old grandma in the back who just stole a mic to offer up seven grand and her pet poodle.

  Seven grand? And what’s a literacy foundation going to do with a poodle?

  “You keep your hands off my grandson, Mabel!” Nana yells.

  “Suck it, you old hag,” Mabel yells back.

  I point Nana to sit down, then do a slow turn, pausing to show the audience my ass while I flex my arms and shoulders. Am I whoring out my body?

  Yes.

  Do I care?

  Fuck, no. It’s for a good cause.

  Bonus if we click, but if we don’t, she’ll still have a night to remember. With all our clothes on. I might be nothing more than a librarian in a loincloth, but I do have some standards.

  “Ten grand.”

  The strawberry blonde at table seventeen again. She’s got a death grip on her paddle and her voice is firm, but there’s something in her expression that says this isn’t where she wants to be.

  Like she’s out of her element, but she has a goal, and she’s going to get it, even if it’s uncomfortable.

  And she just doubled Batman’s final price. I could kiss her for that alone.

  I’m distracted by a high-pitched whistle and a “Shake it, baby!”

  The music switches to an old song from my grad school stripping days. I tip my head back and laugh. Nancy cocks her own finger gun at me—the lady did her research well—and goes back to fielding bids. I dip into another grind, rub my hands down my chest and play with the band on my loincloth.

  “Fifteen grand!” That from the brunette who jumped the gun on the bidding.

  “Twenty!” Holy shit, Marilyn Monroe’s serious.

  The strawberry blonde at table seventeen surges to her feet. “Fifty thousand dollars!”

  Fifty what?

  Holy fuck.

  The music screeches to a stop. I stop. Nancy stops.

  She bats her fake eyelashes at the strawberry blonde. Not coy, like she’s hitting on the highest bidder. But like she just forgot how to talk and she’s stalling for time.

  She visibly swallows, which is more than I’m currently capable of doing. “Fifty thousand dollars?” she repeats.

  “Fifty thousand,” the strawberry blonde confirms with a waver in her voice.

  Fuck me.

  This isn’t bachelor auction money. This is gigolo money. Or… worse.

  I know that book too. And at least a dozen variations.

  Nana looks at me as though she, too, suspects this is bang her and knock her up money. Or I want to be your sugar mama money. Or possibly I need to take you into a secret room for a government experiment money.

  I read a lot. Don’t judge.

  “Fifty thousand dollars,” Nancy says. “Going once…”

  I stare at the strawberry blonde.

  She stares back, not blinking, but not nearly as confident as she was when the bidding was still in the four figures. There’s something about that determination in her gaze—there’s a story there.

  An intriguing story. One I’m surprisingly interested in hearing. Fifty grand? For me? I’m a catch, but dude. That’s almost as much as I make in a year.

  “Going twice…”

  “One hundred thousand dollars!”

  A new voice rings out from the back doorway. Gasps and whispers of “Who is that?” echo under the sparkling chandeliers.

  I crane my neck, but she’s backlit, and all I can see is a shapely figure and a curly head of hair.

  The strawberry blonde at table seventeen drops her paddle, eyes flared, lips parted like someone just stole her baby unicorn.

  I might be wearing a similar expression.

  Because what the fuck is expected of a guy who goes for a hundred grand?

  Nana’s gaping at me.

  Apparently she doesn’t know either, but then she starts grinning like she’s already counting new great-grandbabies.

  “One hundred thousand dollars,” Nancy repeats faintly. “Do I hear one-fifty?”

  Silence.

  “One hundred thousand. Going once…” Nancy calls.

  The strawberry blonde quietly sinks into her seat.

  “Going twice…”

  A hundred grand.

  Holy fuck. Batman can blow me.

  “Sold! To… the lady in the doorway for one hundred thousand dollars!”

  I put on a smile and move to the side of the stage as my purchaser swings her hips through the tables. The strawberry blonde at table seventeen is staring down at her program, and I get the oddest feeling in my chest.

  Like something bigger than a hundred grand could’ve happened.

  Click Here to get Stud in the Stacks today!

  About the Author

  Pippa Grant is a stay-at-home mom and housewife who loves to escape into sexy, funny stories way more than she likes perpetually cleaning toothpaste out of sinks and off toilet handles. When she’s not reading, writing, sleeping, or trying to prepare her adorable demon spawn to be productive members of society, she’s fantasizing about chocolate chip cookies.

  Find Pippa at…

  www.pippagrant.com

  pippa@pippagrant.com

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2017

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Cover design by Lori Jackson Designs.

  Edited by Jessica Snyder