by K. Bromberg
“Always.” I look at the cute cottage-style house. “You lived here long?”
We stare at each other in silence, and it’s almost as if she remembers she isn’t supposed to like me. Her expression and posture suddenly stiffen...probably because she realized she was smiling at me.
And fuck if I know why it turns me on.
“It’s none of your business.”
So that’s how she wants to play it? Fine.
“Then it’s also none of my business that Pussy ran into the house about two minutes ago.” She narrows her eyes and sneers at me again. “It’s your loss, Desi.”
“What is?”
“That you don’t trust me to show you just how good I am with something wet and groomed.” And with that parting comment, I flash her a lightning-quick grin before heading to my side of the fence, while she grumbles and curses me out under her breath.
I hear her door slam.
I hear her call for Pussy again.
And all I can think about is how damn unexpected she is—and at the same time such a very welcome distraction.
I think I’m going to like my time in Sunnyville.
Chapter Six
Desi
The room is dark when I wake up.
My heart is racing and the whoosh of my pulse pounds in my ears.
I jump at the shadows in the room. At the sound of one of the dogs I’m watching scratch at something in his crate in the other room. At the sheets pulling off me when I move my feet.
Because all I can see is the sinister shadow over me when I woke up three weeks ago.
All I can feel is that unending panic of being alone and vulnerable.
All I can remember is that all-consuming fear that robbed me of my thoughts and paralyzed me from action as I sat there fully aware of everything around me—his scent, the harsh rasp of his breath, the complete control he had over me without saying a single word.
I know he’s not here now.
Physically anyway.
But that’s almost worse...isn’t it?
Not hearing from him, not knowing where he is, who he is, is even scarier.
I stare at the ceiling for the longest time and try to make sense of the shadows, but just like every other night this week, sleep won’t come. I know it’s hopeless.
The dogs whine when my feet creak over the raised wooden floors of my house. I open their kennels and get lost in their kisses and attention as I try to figure out what activity I’ll do tonight to occupy the hours when I should be sleeping.
I’ve already cleaned and scrubbed and reorganized every corner of my house and fear I’ve run out of things to do. It’s the wee hours of the morning when you realize you’re the loneliest—kind of like I feel right now.
“Do you guys have to go potty?” Tails wag and butts wiggle on the three dogs in response. “Okay. Let’s go.”
And then my steps falter a few feet before the back door as my mind runs through who could be out there. Whether he’s waiting for me.
“Get a grip, Des,” I mutter to myself. “Whoever it was got what he wanted and left.” I stare at the doorknob and then at the shadows outside to see if any of them move. “Either that or you weren’t hot enough for him to want.”
I say the words but shudder.
Humor.
It’s how I cope.
It’s how I tell myself that it was nothing more than a man trying to break into my house, and when I woke up in the middle of his attempt it scared him off.
It’s how I open the door to let the three dogs out, eager to relieve themselves.
And when I look to the right to where Reznor lives and see the lights burning bright in his house, I can’t help but wonder what keeps him up at night.
Chapter Seven
Desi
Bang. Bang. Bang.
What the hell?
I must jump a foot off the ground. Thank God I’m not grooming a dog or else I’m sure there would be a very random strip of hair missing down its back. Or worse. A cut ear…
And then I slink behind the wall so I’m not in the line of sight of any of the windows.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
“Desi, it’s Rez. Open up.”
The sound of his voice has my panic morphing immediately from sheer terror to anger. I welcome the feel of my temper as it wipes out the exhaustion and panic, and I let it ignite as I stalk the few feet to the back door.
When I fling it open, Reznor is standing there with his arms folded over his chest, a baseball hat low on his forehead, and an irritated look on his face. The sun is fading behind the hills at his back, bathing the valley of Sunnyville in a soft glow, and I hate—absolutely hate—that my stomach flutters at the sight of him.
I’m not a flutter girl. I’m a quick bang of lust between the thighs, it’s time to go to the bedroom type.
Flutters don’t happen.
But I fluttered.
Crap.
“What?” I snap at him, trying to combat my unwanted attraction to him, when every part of my body reacts to him. To the rough cut of his jaw. The deep brown of his eyes. The slight curve of his smile.
“Good evening to you too.” He chuckles.
“Ever heard of a front door?”
He looks at me for a beat before shaking his head. “Sorry. I thought that was the business entrance and this was the personal. I didn’t mean to—”
“Scare me? Yeah. You did.”
“Fine. Next time I’ll knock so you know it’s me.”
“That’s not what I mean—”
“Something like this,” he says with zero regard for me telling him that there won’t be a next time. He raps his knuckles on the side of the doorjamb: knock-knock. Knock-knock-knock.
His grin widens as he takes in the frustration on my face.
Yes, I’m being a bitch.
No, he doesn’t deserve it.
But he made me flutter.
And he’s him—looking all hot and sexy—and I’m me—a woman who has sworn off men for a while—and hell if the sight of him isn’t getting things in me revved that I don’t want him to hold the keys to.
“What? You don’t like that pattern?” He angles his head to the side. “I can make a different one.” He lifts his fist to knock.
“No, it’s fine. It’s just…” I blow out a sigh and hate that the shy smile on his lips looking like a little boy’s, mixed with the tattoos decorating his arm are like kryptonite wearing down my defenses. “That pattern is fine.”
“Good,” he says as if he doesn’t hear the annoyance lacing every syllable I speak.
Silence falls as we stare at each other for a beat as I figure out what to say and he waits for it.
“You didn’t show up to class tonight.”
Just when I thought I was starting to like him...
“I wasn’t aware you were keeping tabs.”
His eyes narrow as he looks closer than I want him to look before crossing his arms over his chest and leaning a shoulder on the doorjamb, forcing me to take a step back into the house to gain some distance.
“Why does the class scare you so much?” he asks.
“No one said it did.”
“No one had to say it...your actions speak for themselves.”
Once again he's caught me flat-footed—first with the damn flutters and now with wanting to know why I didn’t show up to class. And I hate that I feel like I want to tell him when I don’t talk about this with anyone other than Grant and Emerson.
But I don’t. I recover quickly.
“I had to stay home. A plumber was coming to look at what I think is a broken pipe.” He just looks at me, which prompts me to ramble further. “He didn’t show up though.”
He twists his lips as he judges whether to believe me or not.
“Is your water off?” he finally asks.
I nod, holding our gaze steady so he believes me, all the while feeling slightly let down that he’s not pushing me more on this. “The sprinkler line is, yes
. The grass is still wet, so I don’t know...maybe it’s the mainline. Maybe it’s God knows what.”
“He didn’t show?”
“He’s coming. He’s running late. He’ll be here later.”
That’s the problem with lying to your neighbor—they can see people coming and going at your house and lies can easily be proven or disproven.
“Uh-huh.” He doesn’t believe me. Those brown eyes of his say it but he doesn’t speak the words. “Desi, what happened to you to—?”
“Why don’t you sleep at night?” The question is out of my mouth before I even think through explaining why I know that.
His subtle startle would probably go unnoticed by most, but I see it. I notice the slight hesitation that tells me there’s something there beneath the surface.
He smiles and shakes his head. “It seems like we both have something the other one wants to know about. How about that?” He lifts his brows in challenge and then takes a step back off the porch. “Later, Desi.”
And with that I watch him walk out of my yard.
In fact, I walk through the house to the front to watch him out the front window. He walks across his front yard over to his motorcycle in the driveway and fiddles with something on it.
I close my eyes briefly and fight the urge to walk outside and tell him about the man...
But why?
Is it because I see someone who possibly fights internal demons too? Or is it because last week, even though I’d felt like his crash dummy at class, I’d also felt extremely...safe?
Chapter Eight
Desi
“I promise you pickles and almond butter don’t go together, Em,” I say into my cell as I pull into the driveway.
“This baby has to be a boy. I swear. This pregnancy is different than my others. I craved nothing with Gwen and Taylor. No weird foods. No constant sex. No—”
“No wonder Grant’s walking around tired all the time.” I laugh. “Let the poor man get some sleep.”
“He’s not complaining by any means.”
“What man would?”
“Am I going to get to see you soon?” she asks, and the sound of her voice has me listening closely. Hormonal pregnant woman versus something is really wrong.
“You okay?”
“Yeah. I’m just worried about you—”
“I’m fine, Em.”
“But you’re avoiding me. Ever since the creeper in your house—you’re dodging coming over, because you don’t want me to look you in the eye and know you’re scared,” she says, and I don’t say a word in response. “I’ve known you too long, Des.”
“I’m fine,” I say in exasperation.
“Then tell me the last time you let loose. What wild party did you crash or which bar in town did you shut down while dancing on the tables? Come on, give this old married and pregnant lady someone to live vicariously through.”
I smile but it’s vacant of all happiness as I think of the woman I usually am. The one who has stories to tell and men to confuse. Instead all I do is chuckle in response.
“There aren’t any, are there? And you tell me not to be worried about you?”
“I’m just in a funk is all.”
“No, you’ve put yourself in a funk. You tell me that you’re fine when you’re not. You tell me this creep being in your house hasn’t affected you, and yet you’re afraid to leave your house. You tell me you know you’re not to blame for this, but you’re afraid to be the you I know and go dance with some stranger in a bar just because he can sing the lyrics louder than you.” She tsks.
“That’s not it.” But it is it. The damn man in my bedroom has scared the shit out of me. He’s made me fear that I’ll meet him face to face, maybe even share a drink with him, and I wouldn’t even know it.
“That’s bullshit and you know it.”
“Em.” Her name is a sigh. A plea.
“Then come have lunch with me.”
Fuck.
“Okay. I’ll find a light client day and let you know.”
“And there you go hiding again.”
“It’s just…it’s just hard to explain is all.”
“No one said you had to, but ferreting yourself away in hibernation isn’t good for your soul either.”
“I promise you I’ll let you know a good day,” I say to get her off my back.
“You better...or else I’ll come there and watch you shave dogs and then throw up when you do all the gross stuff you have to do with them—”
“I should have never explained to you what expressing an anal gland was like.”
She gags on the other end of the phone and I laugh. “You burned my memory forever.”
“Goodbye, Emerson.”
“Don’t avoid me, or else I’ll sic the cops on you.”
“Oh, please.” Her husband already has.
“I’ll make up a reason—a well check or something—because we all know how much you don’t want that to happen.”
“I’ll send you a day that works. Happy?”
“Very.”
“Love you.”
“Love you too.”
I open the garage door and get out of my car, preoccupied with the bags of groceries I’m carting inside. Once the rustling of the plastic settles as I set them on the counter, I hear it.
It’s a distinct sound. One I can’t place, so I stand completely still with my heart lodged in my throat to see if I hear it again.
It happens. The thunk of metal against dirt. The squish of sodden mud.
The curse muttered under a breath.
“What the hell…” My words fall flat when I fling open the back door to see Reznor in the backyard with a shovel in one hand, on his knees in a slew of mud, and said mud covering so many parts of him I can’t see them all.
“This pipe is really a bitch. Whoever laid this sprinkler system needs to change careers.” He looks over at me for a split second and then goes back to digging like it’s completely natural that he’s in my yard fixing my sprinkler system.
And I don’t know how it makes me feel. On one hand, that means he noticed the plumber never showed—so that means he was watching...and I kind of like that he was watching. On the other hand, he just stepped into my life and took over, and I’m not sure I like that—the domesticity of it.
“What are you doing?”
“Fixing your sprinkler system,” he says with a grunt as he shovels a scoop full of mud onto a tarp that’s blanketing a corner of the back patio.
“But why?”
“It’s broken, isn’t it?” He’s fiddling with a pipe, with the piece that connects them—or that looks like it connects them—and is putting some blue goop around the inside before joining them together. “I already fixed the damn thing once and then when I turned it back on, your pressure regulator wasn’t turned right so it blew another fitting off. It’s as if the guy forgot to glue the pieces together.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Not your fault.”
“But, Reznor...why would you do this?”
“Because I’m a nice guy? Because you had your water off, and I didn’t want your flowers to die?”
I snort, not buying it for a second.
“What? You don’t believe me?” he asks as he takes a second to look my way behind his tinted lenses. He has mud smeared on his cheek and sweat running down his temple as he holds the pipe, but the slight smirk tells me my hunch is right.
“Why are you fixing my sprinklers?”
“So you wouldn’t have an excuse to miss class next time.” The smile he flashes me is as bright as the sun beating down on him and without saying another word, he turns back to the muddy trench and glued pipe and everything that is not me.
I should be pissed at him. I should tell him that no one tells me what to do or where I need to be. Instead I watch him. I stand and study him from my back stoop as my mind whirls over what to do about this man who has single-handedly pushed his way into my life and thoughts.
I have groceries on the kitchen counter that need to be put away. I have bills I need to pay. I have clients to call back, and yet I don’t move, unwilling to tear my eyes away from him.
“It’s a lot easier to talk to me than to have me try and read your mind, you know,” he says, breaking through my thoughts.
“Maybe I don’t like to talk.” I lie.
His chuckle tells me he doesn’t buy it. “The first time we met you talked a mile a minute without much prompting, so sell me a lie I might actually believe.”
“How about you’re irritating?”
That grin is back, and so is the damn flutter when he stands to full height from his spot in the mud. “That’s not a lie.” He looks back to the pipe, and without saying a word, strips his sodden shirt over his head and balls it in his hands. My eyes go to his chest. How can they not when I clearly remember the feel of those muscles etched in his torso as they moved against mine in class the other day?
Whew. They sure know how to make them good in the SWAT team.
When he turns to me, I’m sure he catches me taking a look—what woman wouldn’t?
Besides, I missed my chance to stare at him before. This time I’m going to enjoy the view.
His whole left shoulder, pec, and arm down to his wrist are covered in a dizzying array of designs and images. Color fills some, while others are shaded or left outlined. I take in the taut stomach muscles, the various scars hinting across his torso, and then the intensity in his eyes when I scrape my gaze back up his torso to meet his again.
“Yes?” he asks.
“What are your tattoos of?”
“A little bit of this. A little bit of that,” he says nonchalantly as he takes a few steps my way. “We all have our stories to tell. Some of us choose to put them on display for those who look close enough to decipher.”
“Hmm,” I murmur. Strangely, I want to look closer to know his story and yet don’t want to give him the satisfaction of knowing that I want to. He’s pushy, arrogant...but he’s here fixing my sprinkler because he cares whether I’m in class. He cares. “I figured you were trying to cover up old war wounds.”
His chuckle is soft. “I’ve got too many of those to cover up.” He moves beneath the patio cover, leaving a muddy trail with each footstep, and his undeniable energy sucks up the air in the small space between us. I slide my eyes back to his.