She put her hands on the seat and shifted like she couldn’t get comfortable. “Nothing,” she said, pointing down to the file again. “What is all this?”
“I’m going to need your talents if I’m going to make any of this work.”
“Talents?” she asked, looking confused. “Did Mirna tell you I had some sort of talent? Because I think you might of caught her during one of her bad times. The only talent I have is sabotaging my own life.” She tapped her index finger a few times against the seam of her lips. “Oh!” she exclaimed with a snap of her fingers. Leaning closer, she placed a hand on the side of her lips as if she were warding off lip readers. “When I was in kindergarten I ALWAYS colored inside the lines. Although, I’m sad to say I never pursued it professionally.” She sighed deeply. “One of my many many regrets in life.”
I found myself smiling back at Dre, and it sure as shit wasn’t as a result of her joke, because it wasn’t nearly as funny as she seemed to think it was. But if smiles were infectious then Dre’s was the plague of smiles.
Extremely contagious.
“Listen, Doc, I have no doubt that you were a coloring badass at one time. A Crayola savant, if you will. Unfortunately, that skill isn’t really going to work in this particular situation,” I said, nodding to the papers on her lap. “I need to create a paper trail so I look like an exceptional citizen in every way.” I leaned back against the door. “Like Martha Stewart.”
Dre lifted her head and scrunched up her nose. “Martha Stewart did time for insider trading.”
I sat back up. “Then John Stewart, or Tony Stewart, or whichever Stewart looks like someone the state would want to give a kid to. Fuck, even Kristen Stewart would do,” I said. “Although, I hear she’s a lesbian now, which is awesome by the way, but if she lived here they might not give her a kid ’cause Florida’s southern and very conservative,” I said, repeating Grace’s words.
“Well, we are in Florida, it doesn’t get much southern then that,” Dre said.
“Yeah,” I agreed. “We’re so southern that we’re below the bible belt. We’re like…the cock of the south.” Dre laughed.
“Did you know that gay marriage isn’t a thing here yet?” I asked.
“I actually did know that,” Dre said, tilting her head to the side while she went over the papers. “Well, I knew that. I can’t exactly say I’m up to date on current events just yet.”
Normally, when I went off on a tangent, especially to someone who didn’t know me very well, most people liked to call me out when I’ve veered off track and would try to and rein me back in. I was beginning to notice that Dre didn’t do that. In fact, every time my brain steered me off course, she’d let me go with it until I found my way back around on my own.
It was…different.
“Long story short is that I need to be a model citizen, and the list in that file tells us what we are going to need to make that happen. Since I can’t exactly prove a lot of that shit the legit way, I need your skills to create them.” I got out of the car and she followed, file in hand. I leaned against the hood and lit a joint, inhaling the smoke along with the salty air. Dre’s head was still in the papers as I continued, her bottom lip between her teeth. “At first, before Mirna told me what a diabolical genius you were with the forgery, I was going to get you a job at the clerks office and see what you could do to move things along. You know emails, files, signature stamps. Whatever might help,” I explained. “But when she told me you created the check itself, watermark and all…I figured we could use that talent to make a big dent in that list a lot faster.”
She didn’t answer, instead her face twisted like she was in pain. She shifted sideways pulling up one of her knees and unknowingly exposing a strip of white panties between her legs before rearranging her dress. The memory of her smell, the taste of her on my tongue, flooded my senses and had me momentarily forgetting why I was there, because Dre’s stunning-as-fuck pussy had shoved aside the red velvet rope and stolen the first spot in line at a club I desperately wanted to shove my cock inside.
If it was beautiful when it was battered, I couldn’t imagine how perfect it looked pink, puffy, and wet with excitement.
“Okay, but how the hell does it fix this shit with Mirna?” she asked. I offered her the joint and she rolled her eyes.
“Tell me, Doc. What are your plans when the assisted living place has an opening and Mirna moves to Sarasota?” I asked, blowing smoke rings out into the night.
She shrugged. “I hadn’t thought too much about it. I can’t go back to my dad.”
Actually, you could.
“Okay, let me be more direct. Where do you plan on living? Mirna’s?”
“Maybe. If it’s okay with her. I wouldn’t make any assumptions, though. I’d have to ask her.”
“See, that’s where you’re wrong. You can’t stay at Mirna’s when she moves.”
She pushed off the hood and stood in front of me. Any closer and I could pull her between my legs. “I think we should leave that up to Mirna to decide.”
“But it’s not up to her.”
She threw up her hands in frustration. “Then who is it up to?”
I grabbed the file and pulled out the warranty deed Mirna had given me earlier. “The big-dicked, well dressed motherfucker who owns the house, of course.”
* * *
DRE
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” I said, not believing what I was holding in my hand.
“Doc, I’m hurt. You know how very serious of a person I am,” Preppy said with his hands over his heart.
“So you’re saying if I do this, forge the documents you need, then what, you’ll let me stay there when Mirna goes to Sarasota? That’s blackmail.”
“I know you’re upset but there’s no need to be racist.”
“Seriously!” I said. “What, you want me to rent it from you?” I asked, shocked by what I was holding. I didn’t give a damn about Mirna’s possessions or her house, and I could understand why I wouldn’t be the best choice to handle her affairs, but that didn’t mean it still didn’t sting.
“No, not like rent it from me.” Preppy shook his head. “If this works and we get Max back, then the house is yours, free and clear. I’ll sign it over to you and you’ll never have to worry about not having anywhere to stay ever again. And before you jump to any conclusions, I didn’t weasel the house from Mirna in some scam where I forced her to marry me or anything. I didn’t even know she was transferring the title. She just sprung this on me today.”
I was quiet for a moment. Glancing down at the paper, then out at the water again and again, without a single clear thought about what had just happened registering.
“If it helps any, your forgery skills are top notch. Where did you learn all that shit?”
“Wowed?” I asked at his strange compliment.
“Yeah and I’ve never really been WOWED before. Okay, maybe once, but it was during American Ninja Warrior, and that guy who won was an amputee and god damned war hero. You’d have to be made of fucking stone to speak during the commentators touching tribute while the camera zoomed in on his prosthetic leg and the star spangled banner played in the background.”
Her face contorted like she was about to be sick. “It’s not a wow at all. It’s not something I’m proud of, one of many things.”
I scoffed. “We’ve all done shit we’re not proud of, but for most people that involves getting drunk and doing something fun that someone else disapproves of. Most people’s ‘shit their not proud of file’ doesn’t involve forging complicated documents, though. I mean, is forgery the new thing all the kids are doing? Maybe not, because if it were a new thing then there would for sure be a porn parody about it already and since I haven’t come across anything titled Teenaged Asian Forgers Take it Real Deep, I don’t think the forgery trend is going to be all the rage anytime soon.”
“It was mostly Conner. He was always trying to literally print money. I just picked u
p a few things along the way,” I admitted. “I’m going to pay her back every last cent, plus interest, you know,” I said. “I know that’s THE lie a lot of users tell themselves and others in order to follow through with whatever bad idea they had in mind, but I really am going to pay her back.”
Preppy pushed off the hood. “I believe you,” he said, with actual sincerity in his voice. “Think of how much faster you’ll be able to do that when you don’t gotta worry about a roof over your head.” He held out his hand. “Deal?”
Preppy was right, as much as I hated to admit it. I took his hand. “Deal.” When I tried to let go, he pulled me between his legs and wrapped his hands around my waist. “A handshake is so informal. We should seal this deal with a fuck. That sounds much more official don’t you agree?”
I shook my head.
I pushed off his shoulders. “You know, sometimes I’m not sure when you’re serious.”
“Oh, well that’s easy to figure out. I’m always sometimes joking in a way that’s honest.”
“Totally cleared that up.”
“Glad I could help,” Preppy said as we both got back in the car. He started the engine.
“I could go to prison for this you know,” I stated, and although I intended for it to be an argument, I found myself smiling.
Preppy blew out a breath. “Minimum security, doesn’t even count.”
“I can’t believe I just agreed to forge documents when I told myself I’d never do it again,” I lamented.
Preppy put the car in reverse. “Don’t think of it that way then.”
“How would you have me think of it then?”
He wagged his eyebrows. “Think of it as coloring outside the lines.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
DRE
“Where are the shoes? I thought we’d agreed that you’d wear the FUCK-ME heels?” he asked, when he saw me sitting on the rocker on the front porch in a pair of 50’s style, denim, high-waisted cut off’s with buttons on the front and a white ‘wife-beater’ style tank top that showed a small sliver of skin on my midsection. I’d opted for plain white Keds instead of my precious heels, which I seriously considered bubble wrapping for safe keeping.
“We didn’t agree to anything of the sort.” I stood up, and Preppy’s eyes dropped to where my shorts stopped high on my thigh and instantly, I regretted wearing them. “Besides, they didn’t really go with the outfit.”
“In my head you agreed to wear them. Actually, you agreed to a lot of things in my head. You want me to tell you about it?”
“Nope.”
“You really are a fun-sucker, Doc.”
Ten minutes later, he was dragging me through the woods in the back of Mirna’s house. The same woods I’d ran through when I ran from him weeks ago. “And you wanted me to wear heels?” I asked, stepping over a fallen tree branch. “Where are you taking me, anyway?”
“NOW you ask?” Preppy asked, turning around with a look of surprise on his face. “There is a man dragging you through the woods, with god-knows-what on my twisted mind, and now you think to ask where we’re going? I hate to say it again, Doc, but you’re kind of shit at this life thing.”
“Working on it,” I muttered.
“I’ll help you,” he said, ducking under a low growing bush. “First lesson, don’t go into the woods with men you don’t know because more than likely they have plans that end with your parts being scattered across several counties.”
“No following strangers into the woods,” I said, summarizing his lesson. “Check.”
“Number two, no candy from strangers.”
“What if they’re in a really cool van and parked by my playground?” I asked, with mock stupidity. “And they have Reese’s?”
“Well, then that all depends.”
“Depends on what?” I asked, as we finally found our way clear of the jungle of foliage.
Preppy stepped out into the clearing, turning his face up to the sun. “If the creepy guy in the van is me or not.”
Where most of Logan’s Beach is flat, the clearing was rocky on all sides with a large pond in the middle. Jagged rocks and piles of hard shell created a slope to a rocky perch ten feet or so above my head and twenty feet above the water below.
Preppy took off running up the slope but I stayed put, wondering what on earth he was up to.
I thought our funny banter about life lessons was a good step toward having a good time. I was ALMOST looking forward to the rest of the day, but the second Preppy pulled off his shirt I knew it was all a big fucking mistake. Even with only his naked back in view while he set his shirt neatly on a nearby rock, I knew I was screwed. But when he turned around and I was given a full view of his upper body, I considered heading back to the tower for another dose of a life reality check.
Because he COULDN’T be real.
He was complete and utter…perfection.
PAINFULLY so.
Colorful tattoos were inked over most of his skin. His defined abs flexed when he stretched his arms over his head. His biceps and forearms were lined with veins. He even had one of those V things that ran into his jeans and had me licking my lips like he was a steak and I was a hungry lion.
Which I wasn’t. I was the weak hurt lamb, wasn’t I? How the fuck did that movie go again?
You’ve got to be fucking kidding me? I thought, unable to tear my eyes away from the man, who with the removal of one item of clothing, had turned from looking like a hipster-professor type…into walking sex.
“Why am I kidding you?” he asked. That’s when I realized I’d not exactly kept that thought to myself.
There was no way to hide my staring, and since I couldn’t rip my eyes away from his body I decided to go with the truth, no matter how painful it was. “Seriously, THAT’S what you’ve been hiding under your LEAVE IT TO BEAVER clothes?” I asked, as he stood on the very edge of the ledge where the sunlight highlighted every bit of his perfection. He looked like one of those tattoo models on the cover of INKED magazine. Was it too much to ask that he have lopsided nipples or a beer belly?
“Like what you see, Doc?” Preppy asked, rubbing his chest, slowly sliding hands down his abs, gyrating his hips like some sort of erotic dancer. A move I’d never found attractive…until right then. Shit, there wasn’t much I’d found attractive before Conner and I started on our road trip to hell, and the first stirring of any kind of desire in over a year comes courtesy of the devil in a bow tie.
Man, I really was fucked up.
“God, no” I said, finding my voice. “I mean, what kind of person would like that?” I asked, twisting my face in disgust. “What I meant was that you’re like seriously disgusting. You should just cover…” I waved to his bare chest, “all that up,” I said sarcastically, rolling my eyes. “If we were in public, there would be people puking everywhere at the sight of you. So gross.” By the time I was done with my rant, Preppy’s smile had grown so big it was blinding.
Without warning he shoved down the waistband of his pants. I quickly turned around so he wouldn’t see the redness creeping up my neck at the thought of him without his pants on, and I kept rambling, “Do a sit up for Christ’s sake, before you go flashing your flabs all over the place.”
Preppy’s chuckle echoed over the water. “What was that, Doc?” he called out, “You want to sit on my face?”
“I am so fucking screwed.” I muttered, keeping my voice low, but he heard me anyway.
“Not yet, anyway,” he said.
“What the fuck?” I asked, turning around. “Do you have fucking sonic hearing? Or maybe sonar, like a dolphin?” Preppy was perched at the edge of the ledge, dressed only in a pair of black boxers.
With one last wag of his eyebrows in my direction, he held his nose and jumped off the rock, hugging his knees tightly to his chest. “Cannnnnnnon Baaaaaaaalllll!” he yelled, until he connected with the water, sending a huge splash raining down over me. I guess I wasn’t staying dry after all.
I w
as wiping the water from my eyes and realized that was a huge mistake when my eyes began to sting. “Shit!” I said, stumbling around blindly.
I heard the water dripping onto the rocks and Preppy’s feet as he padded over to me. “Here, stop,” he said, taking my face in his hands and tilting my chin up so he could inspect my eyes. “The pond is salt water, it connects underground to some of the canals around here and salt water is a bitch on the eyes. Open your eyes and blink as much as you can and as fast as you can,” he ordered, and I listened. It stung at first, but after a minute the stinging sensation eased up as a mixture of salt water and tears dripped from my eyes.
“Thanks,” I said, focusing on the man above me, his hair and beard dripping with water, droplets beading on his chest.
He kept his hands on my face. “You’re next, Doc,” he said, in a low suggestive voice. “I want you to get nice and wet.”
“Do you ever say anything that’s NOT dripping with innuendo?” I asked, pulling away from him and turning around to pull my now wet hair into a high ponytail. I heard Preppy padding back up to where he’d hung his jeans, and then the sound of his buckle as he got dressed.
I made the very big mistake of whipping around too quickly, not realizing that Preppy was standing right behind me, and again I slammed right into his hard wet chest. Even worse, when I put my hands out to cushion the impact, they landed low. TOO LOW. And right on something very large and VERY hard in the front of his pants.
He shrugged. “Probably not, but I can’t say for sure, being as I don’t really keep track of that kind of shit,” he answered, following my gaze which was still locked on the crotch of his pants and the huge bulge pushing out the fabric.
“Ummm…” I said, diverting my eyes.
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