Page 9
I’m trapped in the world’s tiniest bathroom, beside a hungover woman happily peeing in front of an audience, with a fluffy pink towel fisted in both hands as my only line of defense in covering my junk. Right about now is when I’d gladly be swallowed up by the floor.
And just at that moment, the doorbell goes off.
She locks bleary eyes with mine, looking green around the gills. “Please answer that. Tell them to go away … unless they have burgers and a crispy Diet Coke. Then they can come on in. But my brain can’t handle this kind of torture.”
I don’t even have time to argue or at least ask her to hurry the fuck up and leave so I can get dressed in peace. The doorbell rings more insistently this time.
“FLINN,” she squawks. “Please. Just get your ass out there and deal with it.” The blaring chimes fill the house on repeat as she scrunches her face up and whines about how much vodka she soaked her liver in last night.
“Give me goddamn horses any day of the week. This is not how I planned to start my morning,” I mutter while having to ever so carefully inch past her, and I end up awkwardly jumping from foot to foot while pulling my sweats on in the open doorway. Buck naked. Trying and definitely failing in my attempts not to give her an eyeful of balls or ass.
The doorbell screeches loudly again and she lets out a pained yelp. “I’m literally dying over here. Iz has gone to the library to study. You gotta take one for the team.”
“Fine. Jesus.” Tossing the towel over the hook, I fumble for my glasses and slip them on as I jog to the front door, wet hair and all.
Now there’s knocking—actually more like an insistent hammering—which is completely unnecessary. What is this? The king’s fucking debt collectors hounding villagers for their taxes?
“I’m coming. Jeez—” Wrenching the door open, I nearly butt foreheads with the guy standing there with his fist raised, mid-knock.
Messy dark hair beneath a cap.
Perfect cheekbones.
Forest-green eyes.
My dirty fantasy I’ve been lost in for days on end.
CHAPTER 6
“This is total bullshit,” I mumble into the phone as I juggle the enormous bag of my ex-girlfriend’s crap and make my way along the snowy sidewalk.
Sky hums distractedly on the other end of the call. “You’re doing the right thing returning everything of hers. She might be a piece of shit and a cheating loser with a capital L, but you get to walk away from both college and this breakup knowing you were the bigger person. Fresh start, clear conscience, and all that.”
“How did I end up with half of her fucking things at my place?”
A wry laugh tinkles down the line. “Uhhh, try because you were in a blissfully ignorant little relationship bubble, genius? That’s what happens when you date someone, B. Things … mingle.”
Snorting under my breath, I shake my head. Less than impressed with her early-morning sensibility. “I hear the innuendo all over that word, miss.”
“Speaking of body parts and other things that mingle.” Sky giggles and I roll my eyes. “Offload her shit, then get your ass over here to my place so we can plan what to wear this weekend. You and I both need to look hot as fuck, and that will require preplanning.”
Yeah, there’s one person I’d very much like to be reacquainted with in a way that involves horizontal intertwining and mingling, but that notion is entirely fucked up. I gotta forget that he even exists. Pretty sure I’ll never see him again, anyway.
“Speak for yourself, ma’am,” I tease. My best friend is too good to me. Forever putting up with my ribbing. “But consider me nothing but generous. I’ll pour blood, sweat, and tears into giving Skylar Addams a Yule Ball–worthy glow-up. It’ll take everything I’ve got, mind you.”
“Oh, fuck you very much.”
“Not everyone has this kind of naturally gifted, Rhodes-level genetic blessing.”
The speaker rustles as she covers the receiver and splutters with a coughing fit in the background.
“Guess I’ve got a lot to thank my old man for, since he donated me the goods in the DNA department.” As I get closer to the pathway leading to Izzie’s house, I realize Sky has gone dead silent. “Hello? Are you still alive?”
“Yup,” she says, popping the P sound. “Okay, just, whatever. Hurry up and remember to pick up a bagel and coffee for me on the way, or I’ll throat punch you.”
“Adore you, too. Bagels and coffee it is, but hold the throat punching, please. See you in about thirty.” I hang up just as I reach the front steps.
While I’m tempted to dump all this shit outside and bail, I also very much do want to be the more mature one out of the two of us. I don’t need to be accused of tossing her stuff in the trash if it gets stolen off her front porch—not when I’ve gone to all this fucking effort to bring it over here in the first place.
