Boys Next Door (9 page)

He pointed to the shiny white trail on his dark T-shirt. ‘Me neither. Speaking of which, I have to go change.’

‘Wait!’ I said.

He turned and came at me fast. So fast that I felt an immediate flight response from the look of intensity on his face. But he only pushed his rough hands into my messy hair and pulled me in to cover my lips with his. My body relaxed and I angled myself against him, mashing our middles together again, and kissed him for all I was worth.

‘I have to go. You have to go. Didn’t you have someplace to be?’

‘Yes.’ I took a breath and tried to think. ‘If you’re the electric dude, then why are you here teaching me about my sump pump and not out saving the town?’

He chuckled. ‘It’s my day off.’

‘Wait!’ I said again.

Coop turned to me, crossed his arms and leaned against my island counter, looking amused. ‘Yeah?’

‘What else do you want to know? About me?’

‘What’s your favourite colour?’

‘Um …’ I blinked at him. Was he serious? ‘Purple. More specifically that purple that’s almost blue.’

He nodded, studying his fingernails. ‘Favourite food?’

‘Fettuccine Alfredo.’

‘Favourite music?’

‘Anything but country and rap.’

‘What’s going on with you and Deke?’

There it was. A flood of adrenaline let loose in my system and I felt on high alert. I tried to look calm, though. Which wasn’t easy.

‘Same thing that’s going on with you and me,’ I said, honestly, trying to sound calm. ‘Just fun. I’m not … that girl. I’m not looking for anything serious. Right now, I’m just …’ I shrugged and looked out my kitchen window. The trees around my house were all wearing flaming coats of orange and red and gold.

‘Just?’ he asked, coming to me and brushing my bangs out of my eyes.

‘Looking for
me
right now,’ I finished. I looked at Coop and smiled. ‘Honestly, I don’t have the energy to be in a relationship right now. So, if that’s not cool, I get it.’

He smiled and kissed my forehead. ‘Got it. I’ll see you later.’ He patted my ass and turned to go.

‘See ya.’ I watched him leave.

At the front door he turned and said, ‘Oh, Farrell?’

‘Yeah?’

‘Good luck at the dog salon. I think you’ve got it in the bag.’

* * *

He wasn’t psychic. Apparently, he’d just been in Donna’s before and met the crew. The crew consisted of Donna, who was a widow, a sixty-something, short stout woman with painted-on eyebrows that were visible from a mile away. Literally.

Her four dogs occupied the small storefront, cavorting about and creating chaos when dogs were brought in for grooming. From what I saw, customers didn’t mind.

After asking me a few questions, Donna introduced me to her brood. ‘This is Sampson,’ she said, nodding to a drooling, fat bull dog with the saddest eyes I’d ever seen. He wasn’t sad though, he wagged his tail so hard when I petted him he almost tipped over. ‘And this is Chester.’

Chester was the smallest, shakiest chihuahua I’d ever seen. He’d probably fit in my coffee cup. Oh and he had about four teeth, so his tongue lolled out the side of his mouth like a zipper pull. He growled at me and backed off the moment I tried to pet him.

‘He’s a wee bit standoffish,’ Donna said.

Over in the corner, Joy, who was dusting stock, snorted. She was the only other human worker at Donna’s Dog Salon.

‘This is Brutus,’ Donna went on, oblivious of her employee’s derision. Or good at pretending. ‘He’s a love.’

Brutus was a miniature dachshund with bald ears and buck teeth. He was also adorable. A small package of extreme love: with Doberman colouring and one blue eye.

‘Hi there, Brutus,’ I whispered, scratching his head. He immediately rolled to his back, baring his pink belly to me. I obliged by scratching him.

‘That dog is a man-whore,’ Joy said, dusting some dog shampoo.

Donna rolled her eyes. ‘Language, Joy.’

‘Sorry. Man-slut,’ Joy amended.

‘Joy is here because she works better with four-legged creatures than two-legged ones,’ Donna chuckled.

Joy grunted and continued dusting.

‘And who is this?’ I asked, pointing to a sheep dog with barely visible eyes.

‘This is Florence,’ she said. ‘My one and only girl.’

‘Which is why she’s spoiled,’ Joy said. But then she tossed a small bone to the dog who seemed to pluck it right out of the air.

‘By whom?’ Donna asked.

Joy grunted again.

The dogs turned into a shifting, malleable pile of excited fur so Donna shooed them outside. ‘They get bubbly when company comes.’

‘So I see,’ I said.

‘Bubbly means insane,’ Joy interjected.

I blinked at her and Donna shook her head and smiled. ‘Joy used to work for a major catalogue company, freelance. She was a customer service rep.’

I nearly choked but held my shit together.

‘Got fired, I did,’ Joy said. She almost smiled at me for the first time.

It made me brave. ‘Why?’

‘A woman called and said her pants were too tight. There was something wrong with our pants or the pattern for the pants. She wore a size twelve. She
always
wore a size twelve. And these size twelves she couldn’t button.’

I waited, biting my tongue, anticipating the punch line.

‘So what did you say, Joy?’ Donna prodded.

‘I told her maybe it wasn’t the pants.’ Joy dusted the higher shelf and I heard her snicker softly. ‘I suggested maybe it was her spreading ass that was the problem and not the pants
or
the pattern.’

Then Donna bent over, put her hands on her knees and started laughing. ‘And now she works with dogs,’ she managed.

‘It’s safer that way,’ Joy said and returned to her dusting.

‘So when can you start?’ Donna asked me.

‘Me? I get the job?’ I was a little stunned and sort of excited. Who knew working with a short beehive-sporting older woman and a cantankerous young woman and a flock of dogs would be so … exciting.

‘Well, honey, it’s not like people are banging down the door, but you seem to be a good kid. You’re nice, the dogs like you, you have work experience multitasking.’

She meant bartending.

‘And this place can be as quiet as a tomb or –’

‘Noisy as a war,’ Joy said.

Donna nodded.

‘Wow … um, today I guess. My power’s out and I have nowhere to be so …’

‘We close early today,’ she said. ‘Wednesday’s are noon and out. But you can start by running to the bakery and getting us some “yay-it’s-a-short-day” donuts. We need donuts, don’t we, Joy?’

‘We sure as hell do,’ Joy said, rearranging items on the last shelf.

‘Language,’ Donna said.

‘We sure as shit do,’ Joy amended.

I had to bite my tongue. But Donna didn’t. She just shook her head, tsked and handed me a ten dollar note. ‘Donuts,’ she said.

‘Vogel’s bakery?’ I asked.

‘Of course,’ she said.

Of course – the third little pig.

‘There she is,’ he said.

I felt that tumbling in my stomach that signified nerves. Stephen Vogel. Handsome Stephen Vogel. The last neighbour on my towered street.

‘Hi there, I am here to buy donuts.’ I said it like I was surprised to hear it myself.

‘Good thing we have donuts.’

Those grey eyes studied me, working up and down my length from my dark hair that I’d twisted up in a messy knot complete with two chopsticks down to my lace-up calf-high boots.

‘Yes, I want …’ I shoved the bill at him. ‘Whatever this will buy for us.’

‘Us?’

‘Oh!’ I chirped, happy to have a change of subject. ‘I got the job at Donna’s.’

‘Cool,’ he said, bending to fill a blue bakery box with donuts. It gave me a chance to admire his thick black hair and the way it fell to frame his squared off, handsome face. His forearms were mesmerising me again and I tried to not let him notice. He stood up so fast I jumped back a bit.

‘You okay?’

‘Fine,’ I stammered.

‘You sure?’

‘I’m sure.’

He put the box on the counter and held out his hand. I put the ten dollar bill in it and he smiled. ‘Usually they’re twelve a dozen. But I gave you a baker’s dozen just for fun. And because you’re cute.’

When I inhaled, even I heard my breath waver. He laughed.

‘God, that was super duper smooth wasn’t it?’ I felt my cheeks heat.

‘I like it. You’re … unique.’

‘Like a new species.’

‘Like a beautiful woman. When I see you I feel like I’m licking a light socket.’

‘What?’

Stephen laughed again. ‘You know. Electric. Maybe I’m in the kitchen too much. Don’t know how to talk to girls anymore.’

‘Ah, I think you’re doing fine.’ I grabbed the box and held it in front of me like a shield. What I really wanted to do was touch his forearm that was currently resting on the counter next to his other nice forearm.

One little pig … two little pigs … why not go for three?

I shifted, my boots clacking on his shiny hardwood bakery floor.

‘So it doesn’t disturb you that I feel electric around you? For no other reason than you let me feed you and boss you around? I’m not normally a very bossy man.’

I set the box down. Deke had been a … collision of sorts. I’d fallen ass backwards into that hook-up and had relished every minute of it. The ballsy and domineering James ‘Coop’ Cooper had pulled every string of our encounter, and when I thought of him, I still felt like he was pulling my strings. And now here – oh dear Lord,
here
– was one beautiful, breathtaking sexy man and I wanted him.

I wanted him.

The realisation smacked me in the face and I sighed mightily.

‘It does bother you, then?’ His grey eyes had gone darker and I imagined stormy skies before a cleansing rain. I could almost smell the storm if I concentrated. Or maybe it was his electricity and my attraction.

‘No. It doesn’t bother me. What bothers me is I can be so … skittish.’ I stepped closer to the counter, feeling the heated glass against my hipbones. The light inside had warmed the thick glass.

Stephen watched me, looking attentive and a bit confused. ‘Yeah?’

He nudged the box with his elbow and pushed himself a bit closer to his side of the counter. I put my hands on his forearms, almost expecting them – thanks to my mental build-up – to glow like the Holy Grail, and stroked his skin.

He watched me touching him, his lips pressed together – a definite sign of him exercising self-control over his emotions. I liked that my touching him made him exercise his self-control. I liked it a lot and I liked his pretty hair and pretty eyes and pretty mouth just as much. If he were just a touch more beautiful he’d be nearly effeminate.

‘Kiss me,’ I said.

He blinked at me the way I felt like blinking myself. Where had that come from?

‘For real?’

‘For real. Hurry. Before I realise what I just said and tell you never mind and that I’m crazy.’

He leaned over swiftly and pressed his lips to mine. Nothing of us besides our mouths were touching, and that fact made all my naughty bits tingle all the more. I felt a thump and rumble of arousal in my pelvis and I wanted to push my hands into that impossibly black hair.

I wanted to push my pussy to his pretty mouth. I wanted to pull his pretty hair while he fucked me. I wanted to watch his eyes studying me while
I fucked him.

It all flashed through my mind like one of those movie brush-with-death-and-your-life-flashes-before-your-eyes moments. And I smiled – my lips still pressed to his, his tongue snaking between my lips. He tasted of sugar and spice and everything nice. So storybook-silly but true.

‘So, baker boy, can I come over tonight? I think I’d like you.’

His eyes went wide for a heartbeat and then he cleared his throat. ‘Sure thing. What time?’

‘Six? I know bakers keep crazy hours.’

‘For you, I’d stay up,’ Stephen said.

‘You don’t even know me.’

‘I know what I like and I like how I feel when you’re around. I’ve always been that way. Can’t help it.’

I nodded. ‘Fair enough. I guess that explains the electricity.’

‘It does.’

I grabbed my bakery box and he tugged me in by my wrist and planted one more kiss on me. ‘You smell like clean air,’ he told me.

‘You smell like dessert.’

And that’s what I planned on him being. I walked out of Vogel’s and realised – I was going to fuck the third little pig.

* * *

When I was a little girl my father told me to go after what I wanted. He told me to daydream my wants into reality. My mother, on the other hand, being raised in a very religious home, taught me to mind my manners, always say thank you and be happy if I had anything that I wanted at all, let alone wishing for more.

Needless to say it was a confusing childhood. A rebellious, bold father raised in a strict Irish Catholic home with nine brothers and sisters. My dad had always told me he had to use cunning and will just to get a second piece of beef at dinner and that life didn’t hand over wants and wishes. You had to make it happen.

My mother, who was wonderful and loving – don’t get me wrong – taught me to strive to be … well, her. Husband and a child and cooking and cleaning and normalcy. I wanted none of it. And though I felt such an all-encompassing grief when I was twenty-five and my mother passed away, part of me felt a sense of relief that she was no longer sitting there waiting for that reality to become my life. That she was not waiting anymore to attain a son-in-law and then for me to make her a grandmother.

I felt a small surge of freedom to be what I wanted to be. Which was – I had no idea. An actress maybe. Or just a person. No bright and shining star. No super-famous stage-dominating actress. Just – me. Just Farrell. Just a person who was happy.

And that’s where I landed and why I was at Tower Terrace. I just wanted to be happy. It didn’t have to be some blinding explosion of success. Just lying down at night to go to sleep and feeling peace would work.

‘So I’ll get what I want. Right now I want Stephen Vogel, who seemed very sure of himself at first, but now – Now he seems a bit more gentle than I originally thought,’ I told my reflection.