Opal: A Contemporary Reverse Harem Romance (Jewels Cafe Book 4)

by Candace Wondrak

  Writing out sex was just weird, you know? You kind of just sit there, throwing out words that may make no sense whatsoever, and hope something sticks, pray that your characters get lucky and everyone gets their big O. And then do it again and again in different parts of the book, all while trying to make it seem like a new, fresh and exciting thing.

  Yes, I was aware that wasn’t how sex was in real life…in real life most men couldn’t care less about pleasing their partner, because men sucked, but this was a romance novel. It didn’t necessarily have to match the real world anyway.

  Maybe it was my new surroundings, maybe it was the fact that I’d taken some pain relievers to help with the migraine, or, hell, maybe it was because of that pumpkin spice latte, but my fingers flew along the keyboard. Somehow, writing a sex scene had never been so easy for me, so effortless.

  Seriously. I was making dick and vagina magic here. So much magic that I felt kind of jealous of my heroine. Even though she was a made-up character, she was getting the dick exactly how she liked it, orgasming like a million times—how the hell could I write these scenes and not be jealous?

  Hmm. Maybe the whole book needed a bit of an overhaul. Once I read through the added scenes, I’d go through the whole thing and make sure there was enough sexual tension. There was nothing better than that lead up, than knowing two people were right for each other. The anticipation of them finally throwing caution to the wind and connecting in a way only two people madly in love could.

  Hoo boy. There must’ve been something in that latte, because I was on fire. Literal fire.

  Well, not literal, because then my clothes would be smoking or something, but you know what I meant.

  I drank the entire latte as I continued to write. Thousands of words, thrown into my manuscript. I’d have to work on transitions later to make sure the scenes were seamless, but one thing at a time.

  And you know the weirdest thing? The sex scenes were hot. I was apparently a bona fide rock star when it came to whipping out sex scenes in a coffee shop. Maybe there was something to be said of writing in a place like this after all. Maybe I was a coffee shop writer. I never thought I would be, but then again, I also never thought I’d be stuck with three sexy as hell but irritating as fuck neighbors.

  I should not put the words fuck and neighbors in the same sentence. That would only give me ideas. Bad ideas.

  It was a few hours later when I closed my laptop, trying to stop from grinning to myself. If I could pat myself on the back and not look weird while doing it, I would. I would so pat myself on the frigging back for the scenes I just pumped out. I still needed a few more scenes towards the end of the book, but I think my creative juices were dry for the day. Needed to refuel and recharge, all that fun stuff.

  It might be the caffeine talking, but I was ready to throw it down with my neighbors, too. If I saw them. I wouldn’t go out of my way to find them, but if I happened to see one walking outside, all bets were off, whether they were shirtless or not.

  I cleaned up my table, feeling as if I had a new purpose. Silly, considering all I did was drink a pumpkin spice latte and write a few sex scenes, but as it turned out, those things invigorated me. I was ready to take on the world if I had to.

  To the world, to my neighbors, I just had one thing to say.

  Bring it on.

  Chapter 3

  It was probably for the best that I didn’t see any of them as I walked home. I set down my bag and my laptop on my desk, gripping the back of the chair as I wondered what I should do the rest of the day. I could exercise, clear my mind before trying to write more. I could take a bath. I could catch up on Netflix—there were bound to be new seasons of shows that I’d missed, although Netflix had a habit of canceling shows before I even knew new seasons were released, so…maybe not that one. Netflix and I were in a contentious relationship right now.

  I could cut my own grass, but that seemed like I was copying Ace from this morning.

  Ace.

  I shouldn’t think about him, because he was annoying as all hell with his music, but my mind wandered to him anyway. He was one of the most gorgeous guys I’d ever seen, it was true. The way his jaw was shaped, how wide his shoulders were…hmm. I wondered if he had any more tattoos hidden on his body. I’d seen the one on his shoulder while he was out doing yard work before, but I wouldn’t mind finding out if there were any below the belt—

  Whoa. Pause that thought. Step on the freaking brakes before getting into an accident. Just…no.

  What the hell was wrong with me? I did not want to see Ace naked, as lovely and attractive as his body was. My mind was still too focused on the sex I guess. I couldn’t remember being this horny in…well, a while. I had a vibrator, but I couldn’t recall the last time I used it. This writing deadline had me all kinds of stressed out.

  I shook it off, heading into the kitchen to grab some water. Maybe some cold water would wash away those terrible thoughts—thoughts that could never, ever be repeated again. Because…ew. Just no. He was a dick, and I didn’t like dicks.

  Well, I liked dicks, just not the one attached to him.

  There I was, minding my own business in the kitchen, wondering if I should make myself a late lunch or early dinner, when I heard it. Music. Again. More of it. I let out an annoyed sound, staring at the ceiling above me as if it could give me answers. I was going to go insane here. For real. I could feel my sanity slowly slipping away every time I heard them play that stupid song.

  They must’ve had it set on repeat, too. It wasn’t a single that was released to the radio, because I’d never heard it before moving here, but by now, I knew the lyrics pretty well. They were depressing. And what’s worse, the song was catchy and still stuck in my head from this morning. I didn’t need to hear it again.

  Gripping my water bottle, I then did something I wouldn’t be proud of tomorrow. I did the one thing I never thought I’d do: I stormed out of my house with the intention of making a scene. A big scene. A scene so huge it would be explosive. Had to be the caffeine in that latte.

  With my feet bare and only a little cold, I walked across the shared driveway, the afternoon sun warming up my head as I went to their front door. My free hand curled into a fist, and I knocked as hard as I could, preparing myself for a fight. Not a real, physical fight, but a verbal fight, at least. If I had to call the police because of a noise disturbance, I would. I was not above…

  Every single thought in my head trailed off when someone answered the door. It wasn’t Ace; and deeper in the house, I still heard the music playing. A guitar, mostly, along with its matching voice.

  I didn’t even have the chance to put two and two together about that—that Ace was some kind of musician stuck in a depressed rut—because I was too busy staring at the man who’d answered the door.

  Brock. Ace’s friend. Ace’s friend who was tall and thin, and still attractive somehow. His black hair was combed to the side, a few inches too long. It hung over his face, his eyes dark as they stared down at me. He wore a white shirt, but the fabric was stained with what looked like paint, colors of all kinds.

  I didn’t think I was one to swoon over artists, but damn, he looked mighty fine today.

  “Hi, Opal,” Brock spoke, giving me a dimpled smile that sent my insides tumbling, twisting in a way that I instantly had to ignore. I blamed those sex scenes, giving me ideas. Stupid, really. “What’s up?”

  “You’re too loud,” I said, measuredly taking a step back from him. Standing too close to him right now, smelling his musky scent, was downright dangerous. If something happened between me and him, or Ace or that other one, I’d be fucked. And not in the good way. “You need to keep it down.”

  Brock’s face held a small frown. “I’m sorry. I am—it’s just…” He glanced over his shoulder. “Ace loves his music. It’s the only thing keeping him sane right now, you know? If I tell him to quit it, he might go off the deep end.”

  The wind blew, and since I had no jacket on
, I shivered. The weather was starting to grow colder, starting to turn to winter. I was not looking forward to the snow or anything like that.

  “I don’t care,” I said, biting out the words. “I need peace and quiet in my own home, Brock.”

  “And I get that, I do,” he said, and as he spoke those words, I realized he had a smidge of paint on his jaw. Just a bit of white paint, making his skin look tan. For whatever reason, I had the urge to reach up and wipe it off, but that would’ve been crossing the line. “But Ace has been going through a rough time and I…” He trailed off, cocking his head. “Are you cold? Do you want to come in? I have some, uh…well I’m sure we have something—”

  He was inviting me inside his house, even though I lived right next door, for a drink to warm me up? What kind of messed-up, twisted universe did I wake up in this morning? This day was all different kinds of weird, and I didn’t know what to think.

  Or what to say, apparently, because all I was able to croak out was a noise that made me cringe, and then I turned on my heel and hurried back to my house, closing the door as if it would block out the rest of the world.

  A million and one questions rang through my head at that moment: was Brock always so cute? Why did I become tongue-tied like a stupid tween who just realized she had her first crush? I went over there to yell at them, so why the hell didn’t I? What was wrong with me? Was I getting sick?

  Perhaps I needed to take a page out of a guy’s book and take a really cold shower. Get my head out of the gutter.

  So that’s what I did. Okay, not a super cold shower, because I wasn’t a monster, but a lukewarm one. I stood there for a long time as the water pelted my head, wondering just why today had been so weird. First, me being a beast at the sex scenes, and then all that with Brock… I felt like an idiot. Like I’d made a fool of myself.

  Maybe there was something in the latte. It was the only weird thing I’d drank today. Nothing else was out of the ordinary for me.

  Hah. Right. There’s something in the water, or in this case, the lattes. No, I wasn’t superstitious. I was just me, stuck in a weird situation with my neighbors.

  I mean, I’d known they were attractive before, but standing there with Brock was like…wow. That one especially was so tall I could easily imagine climbing him like a tree, and Ace…I shouldn’t think about him, but he was ripped and muscled in all the ways that were perfect for pinning you to the wall and tearing off your clothes.

  Not that, uh, anyone ever did that to me before.

  Ugh. Fuck. What the hell was I going to do? I couldn’t become some sniveling wimp when it came to my neighbors. If anything, I wanted to have a neighbor war with them, not lick every inch of their hard bodies and get to know them intimately. No thanks, even though that did kind of sound like fun.

  Hmm…licking every inch of their bodies sounded like my kind of night—

  No! Bad Opal. Down, girl.

  After a long while, I got out of the shower and dressed. It clearly wasn’t helping, anyway. I ran a comb through my hair and started dinner. Something simple: pasta. Nothing that would take me a long time, and nothing that required a lot of clean up. I was a simple and easy kind of girl…except today, apparently, because my mind had decided to turn traitorous.

  No matter what I did, I could not get those stupid guys out of my mind.

  Once dinner was done, I plopped myself down on the couch and turned on Netflix. I ate in silence as I scrolled through the options. I could probably eat my entire dinner while lost in trying to find something to watch. I was just about to select one of my go-to's, a comedy about an office space and the bumbling workers in it, but my doorbell rang.

  I turned my head, as if I had X-ray vision and could see through the door. Spoiler alert: I couldn’t.

  I slowly got off the couch, set down the remote and my plate, tiptoeing toward the door. It was six-thirty, too late for anyone to be visiting, and if it was someone trying to sell me something, they were going to get told off. Today was not a good day for me, so I’d be more than happy to spread the misery around.

  Hugging the hoodie I wore closer to my chest, I figured I looked frightening enough to scare off whoever was on the other side of that door. A baggie hoodie—surprisingly comfortable, by the way, my favorite one—some leggings, and no socks. I’d rather have my feet freeze than wear socks, no joke.

  And, what do you know? The person standing on the other side of the door was the one neighbor I hadn’t yet seen today. My luck was going for the trifecta, I guess. All three. Why not? My life was already weird enough as it was, so why not toss in a bit more?

  One more sexy man. Let’s see if I could handle talking to him and not sounding like an idiot.

  Chapter 4

  “Kent,” I said, meeting the green eyes of the blonde man standing outside my door. I leaned on the door, tossing him a frown. “What are you doing here?” It wasn’t what I wanted to ask him. What I wanted to ask him was why he had to come to my door wearing a freaking suit and looking so unbelievably sexy, but here we were.

  Kent and Ace were brothers, I think. They looked similar. Both beefy and muscular, both blonde, but Kent’s eyes were a pretty jade where Ace’s were a crisp blue. Kent also had an air of haughtiness around him, a smug attitude that grated against my nerves. Plus, you know, he wore a suit. I didn’t know what he did for a living, but a man in a suit was ten times more attractive than a man in regular clothes.

  The man sent me a frown, inviting himself into my house, pushing past me as he shrugged off his suit jacket and tossed it on the couch…making himself at home like he lived here.

  “What…” I stood there, still holding the door open, having watched him push his way in here like he owned the place, so utterly confused. Confused and a little turned on by his stature, his clothes, and even his dumb face.

  Oh, that face. I could both punch it and kiss it.

  Since me keeping the door open was only letting in the cool night air, I closed it, glaring at him. I crossed my arms, trying to look, I don’t know, tough or something, as I walked to stand beside the couch. “What do you think you’re doing? You can’t just walk into my house!”

  Hey, at least I had my voice with him, unlike Brock earlier. I might’ve sounded a bit shrill, but I’d take that over selective mutism any day.

  Kent slowly crossed his legs, extending both arms on the back cushions of the couch. His blonde hair was shaved short, its top lengths spiked up in a fauxhawk. He looked like a businessman about to address someone he thought nothing of.

  I hated him. I really did.

  You could hate someone and want to jump them at the same time, right?

  “I believe I just did,” Kent spoke, his voice low and rough.

  “Well…you…yes,” I admitted begrudgingly. “You did—”

  Kent moved to pat the cushion beside him. “Sit. You and I need to talk.”

  I didn’t want to. I wanted to eat my dinner and go on with my night as if none of this was happening. And yet, what the hell did I do? I moved to sit beside him, listening to him, as if he was my master and I was nothing but his servant.

  My lower gut burned at that. Not something I should think about, and yet I couldn’t help it. I was less than two feet from a man who could make panties drop at command. How was I not supposed to think of sex every once in a while?

  “You need to mind your own business,” Kent spoke, eyeing me up. I couldn’t tell if he was disgusted at my choice of apparel, or simply curious as to why I looked like a giant potato. A semi-cute potato, I’d argue, but still a potato. “Ace is going through a rough patch in his life right now, and he doesn’t need you adding onto it.”

  It was what Brock said earlier, and yet Brock had sounded much nicer about it.

  I sent Kent a glare, fighting the warmth that flooded me from sitting too close to him. The freaking testosterone just came off him in waves. It was ridiculous…and also something I never quite noticed before. “Yes, well I have a life
too. I have deadlines, and—”

  “Deadlines,” Kent repeated, a single blonde eyebrow rising.

  “I’m a writer.”

  “Sure you are.”

  I huffed, instantly annoyed times a thousand. “I am!”

  “Uh-huh.” Kent shifted his weight on the couch, green eyes lingering on me. He was…turning his body toward mine. His chest was…looking way too fine in that button-up shirt. The top button, I noticed, was undone.

  What if I undid another?

  Hold up. Hold up that thought right now. No way, Jose. Not going to happen.

  I didn’t appreciate being talked down to. “I am a writer, and you guys are all making sure I don’t get sleep at night.”

  “Come on, we’re not that loud.”

  “The music—”

  “Is what helps keep my brother sane,” Kent spoke, shaking his head. “You…” He leaned forward, resting his wrists on his knees. “You really should just keep to yourself.”

  I still had my arms crossed, and I knew I probably looked silly and pouty, but I didn’t care. “Trust me, I want to keep to myself. I don’t want to step a foot into whatever mess you guys have going on over there, but I need my sleep.”

  Kent’s lips smirked, and a burst of molten lava erupted in me when he muttered the words, “I could tire you out, if you want.” He spoke the suggestion softly, a low rumble leaving his chest. It was, quite honestly, one of the sexiest things I’d ever heard.

  “I…” I blinked, finally stumbling over my words and sounding stupid. Yep. I knew it wouldn’t take long. “What are you…” I couldn’t get a full sentence out, it seemed. This man had me tongue-tied and all revved up with nowhere to go.

  Because I couldn’t go there. Being with a neighbor, even if it was just for fun, was a disaster waiting to happen.

  It was tempting though. Super tempting. He was temptation on two legs, especially in those clothes.

  Kent leaned toward me, and I found myself practically falling back onto the pillows of the couch. Still smirking, still making me feel like I both wanted to jump him and run and hide. “I bet, under that hideous jacket, you’re all hot and bothered.”