Boys Next Door (7 page)

‘What the fuck. What. The. Fuck.’

I opened the door to a raised hand – knuckles cocked to knock – and fierce green eyes. That unruly lock of raw honey-coloured hair was brushing sensually along his eyebrow and that cocky half-smile had taken over his mouth.

‘Hi,’ Coop said, putting his hand down, taking a step toward me.

I took a step back, clutching my robe to me for all I was worth. It had not escaped my notice that my heart was pounding again and my body was humming with an electric warmth. ‘Hi. What the hell was … that?’

He poked his head in, taking one more step up onto the threshold. Without thinking, I took a step back into the foyer, effectively inviting him in.

So he came in and I felt a tug of arousal in the core of myself. Crap.

‘That was a pot.’

‘What the fuck kind of pot sounds like that?’ I gasped, hands still shaking. ‘And whose pot was it? And how did a pot make that much –’ I cocked my head and felt a rogue strand of hair drip shower water down the shoulder of my robe.

In an almost surreal state, I watched him reach out and brush my soaking wet lock back. ‘It was a pot, up on the power lines. We need a new one. So currently, you have no power. But I’m guessing you were in the shower so you might not know.’

His finger trailed lightly over the shoulder of my robe where the water had darkened the fabric. It was as if he were touching me. My bare skin. My nipples spiked and my tummy tickled and my pussy gave over a slippery flood of juices.

For a split second I feared he could smell my arousal. Sense it. As if I were dealing with an animal and not a man.

‘That’s just residuals from the dream,’ I told myself.

‘Pardon?’

I cocked my head and then blushed. I had said that aloud. I hadn’t meant to.

‘Nothing. Not enough coffee,’ I said, willing myself to move back and going nowhere. ‘And I guess I won’t be getting any more now will I?’

I laughed stupidly – nervously – and cringed to hear it.

‘I can make you coffee if you want more,’ he said, moving past me, his boots thunking on my wide plank wood floor.

He moved like a force of nature. Big and bold but controlled. He made me feel hot and cold at the same time, being so close to him. It was awful. It was wonderful. It had me feeling on edge, like I might laugh or weep at any given moment.

I felt a rush of guilt thinking of Deke and then reminding myself I was not in for anything serious. No long haul. No love at first sight or any off that bullshit. I was not ready to tie myself down to anyone before I had a handle on the life I wanted.

Whatever the hell that was.

This man, this big lean man, waltzed into my kitchen like he owned it. He took my red enamel pot and filled it with two coffee cups full of water.

'Matches?' he asked.

I handed him the box from the counter. Then Coop turned the burner until we heard the gas hiss and lit it with a wooden kitchen match. 'Gas and electric men, we always have tricks.' He grinned at me and then he opened the junk drawer and rifled through it. When he didn’t find what he wanted, he asked, ‘You have a small strainer?’

‘How small?’ I almost whispered. It was hard not to just watch him and his economical movements.

‘Size of a tuna can?’

‘Nope.’

‘Coffee filters?’

I opened a box on the counter and felt my robe gape a bit. I also felt his eyes on me and it made me flush hot, like I was out in the sun. I rummaged, clutching my robe with one hand, rifling with the other. Finally, I yanked out a package of filters and handed it to him.

‘Another pot? A bowl? A large measuring cup?’

More rummaging and I handed him a glass measuring cup with a spout.

‘Thank you, Farrell,’ he said. ‘Where are you off to today?’

‘Applying at a dog salon,’ I snorted.

He smiled at me, stunning me a bit. Turmoil started in my stomach and much, much lower. I nodded, unable to speak.

Deke made me feel bold and wild. Coop made me feel barely in control and on edge, constantly off kilter and unsteady. It was oddly pleasant to feel after so many years of trying so very hard to pilot a destiny that did not want to behave.

Which reminded me to be nervous about my looming dog salon job interview. I couldn’t decide if it was a step up or a step down from working at a bar. Or maybe it was just a lateral move. And maybe that was okay.

When the water came to a boil he asked me, ‘Strong or weak?’

At first I thought he meant me. And I almost said strong … I hope. But then I realised he meant coffee and I stuck with my original answer. ‘Strong.’

I stared at my ugly mukluks and my freshly shaved legs and waited. Embarrassed that I looked so bad, but partly relieved too. It’s not like I looked sexy or enticing. I was a wet, ugly robe-swaddled mess.

He dumped four tablespoons of coffee into the water and twisted my egg timer to three minutes. It started to tick.

‘You okay?’ He had a way of setting his jaw after he asked a question, as if daring you to disappoint him. I found it unsettling because the thought of upsetting Jim Cooper was distressing. And there was no logical reason it should be.

‘I’m wet.’

I didn’t even backpedal verbally when he cocked that half grin at me. I just dropped my eyes and shook my head and sighed.

‘Literally,’ I said.

A soft chuckle.

‘My hair. My robe. And I want coffee and something that sounded like a cannon shook my windows.’

He waved a hand at me when the egg timer gave a shrill sound.

‘Get used to it, the pots around here blow all the time. They’re old lines and overtaxed and need to be replaced.’

‘Well you’re power, can’t you do that?’ I asked, watching him start to slowly pour the brewed coffee into the filter he’d suspended over the large measuring cup. He patiently, steadily, held it aloft while coffee dribbled through the paper into the cup.

‘Hey, I tow the lines and repair and all that. I don’t control the budget.’

‘Oh.’

One more rush of rich dark liquid and then he was pouring us mugs of coffee from the measuring cup. ‘Just takes some patience,’ he said.

He clinked his mug to mine and I watched him study me. It was such an intimate gaze that I felt my cheeks colour again. The man was a mind fuck to say the least.

I took a sip, realising that he had MacGyvered a better cup of coffee than I normally made with use of electricity.

‘Let me just … I’m going to …’ I took one more sip to steady my nerves.

‘Go get dressed, Farrell,’ Coop said, his gaze sliding along my cleavage, over my shoulders, down to my hips.

When his eyes hit me at hip level a heat bloomed in my pelvis that was disturbing in its intensity. I ran from the room as if a serial killer was drinking coffee with me instead of one of the most handsome and eerily self-assured men I’d ever met.

I scurried off like my ass was on fire. Even as I was pulling on black leggings and a checked purple shirt, I was imagining Coop peeling them off.

‘Get a hold of yourself,’ I hissed. And then I shoved my feet into black flats and hurried back downstairs – only to hear a hellacious, repetitive and maddening beep coming from my basement.

‘What now?’ I sighed. I grabbed my mug and watched him appraise me with that sharp stare. Why did I still feel naked?

‘That is your sump pump, Farrell.’

‘Oh.’ To be honest, I had no idea I
had
a sump pump.

‘It’s on a battery backup in case of …’ Coop waved his hands around. ‘This.’

‘Ah,’ I said.

Brilliant. One word answers, dingbat
.

I listened to the infernal beeping for another moment and tried not to squirm as he studied me, that mysterious twist of a smile on his sensual lips. Coop crossed his arms and there was a Celtic cross, a feather that might or might not be a raven or a crow, a swatch of blue and … he crossed them the other way and there was the hint of a scaled tail. A mermaid?

When I took a shuddery breath and simply could not stand the
beep-beep-beeeeeeep
anymore I blurted, ‘My God, how do I make it stop?’

He chuckled, gave me a decisive nod and took my hand. ‘Let’s start by going in your basement where the sump pump lives.’

‘Yes, let’s,’ I echoed, rattled by his strong hand on my wrist. When he held my arm, though, I saw more of that tail and yes, it had to be a mermaid. Or a very curvy fish.

‘It’s a mermaid,’ he said, following my gaze.

‘Oh, I didn’t – I wasn’t –’ I shook my head and we took my very steep, wooden, horror-movie-esque basement steps slowly.

‘Have you been down here yet?’

‘No,’ I admitted. ‘I have a basement phobia.’

‘Spiders?’

‘Nope. Just basements.’

Another smoky laugh and then he was tugging me into the corner by the washbasin and the laundry area.

He squatted down and I tried very hard not to study the firm line of his ass and thighs in his dark blue work pants. Or the way his work boots made my body flash all hot like and needy. Or how the small swatch of skin I could see and the slice of boxer short waistband was visible, or how
any
of that made my breasts feel tender and my mind sizzle like I’d been electrocuted.

I was learning about my sump pump. Sump. Pump. And that was all.

‘This red light,’ he said, pointing.

I nodded. Thankful, suddenly, for the flood of sunlight from the small window high over the washbasin. I realised without it we’d be down here in the darkness – okay, murky
daytime
‘darkness’ but darkness nonetheless.

‘Yes?’

‘If it goes off on a glitch, you push it for one second. Once it stops beeping you move your finger.’

‘Got it. But this isn’t a glitch. This is an actual outage so …’

‘So you do this,’ he said. ‘You push the button down and count to five.’ He pushed his finger to the button near the red light and looked up at me. ‘One … Two …’ On two I blanked out because I was watching the plump invitation of his lips and yes, my eyes had darted back to that lovely strip of exposed skin and his ass. Oh, man, the man had an ass.

‘Are you counting?’

‘Yes,’ I whispered.

‘What number are we on?’

I blinked, took a step back, right into a clothesline strung from the rafters and I promptly freaked the hell out and started waving my arms, dancing in place, screeching – convinced I’d backed up into the world’s largest spider web.

Then I tangled myself in the slack line and screamed in earnest. It wasn’t until Coop, who I could tell was mightily trying not to laugh, grabbed my arms and whispered, ‘Settle down,’ that I stilled.

I’d looped one arm up and one under and had effectively twisted myself up. He reached overhead. ‘Let me just find where it’s hooked and I can …’ he stopped talking, feeling around in the rafters.

‘Spiders,’ I wheezed, reminding him that they were waiting to eat his hand.

‘I think I’ll be fine.’ He looked me in the eye and smiled and that was that. My cunt flexed wetly, my stomach bottomed out and I licked my lips without thinking.

I moved my arm and managed to get my wrist unwound. ‘I think I’ve got it –’

‘Here.’ He gave up trying to find where it was tied and untwisted my other arm as I worked on the right one. I had caught a flash of tattoo at waist level when he’d raised his arms.

‘What is it?’ I asked.

‘What is what?’

I gave up. I’d gone from scared of him, to panicked lunatic twisted up in ropes, to tentatively bold. ‘This?’

I lifted the tail of his shirt and touched the small swatch of colour visible above his waistband. But the blue work pants shielded the rest of the picture from me. When my finger brushed his skin, electricity – real or imagined – hummed along my own skin.

‘Be careful doing that, Farrell,’ he said, catching my hand in his. ‘I’m just a man. And you’re just a new, very beautiful, very intriguing neighbour.’

‘What is it?’ I whispered, moving my fingers so they brushed his skin again. Even with his hand over mine, I could spread my fingertips to feather over his skin.

Moisture flooded my panties and my body grew tight and needy just from feeling my fingers on his flesh.

I felt the muscles ripple from my touch and knew I was affecting him despite his stoic appearance.

‘Careful.’

I cocked my head, trying to breathe deep enough to stop seeing the spots in my vision that I was currently witnessing. ‘Careful?’

He grabbed my wrist a bit tighter but didn’t pry my hand away. ‘Yes, careful.’

‘What is it?’ I took a step toward him. The dusty dim basement making me a bit braver than I felt.

‘It’s a key.’

‘A key?’

‘Yeah, a key.’ He tugged me in, his eyes pinned to my mouth when I spoke. I felt his gaze tingling on my lips.

‘Like a key for a door?’ I was having a lot of trouble thinking this close to him. I stepped in again, and pressed my fingers firmly to that warm swatch of skin, feeling the hardness of his hipbone beneath.

‘No. Like a roller skate key,’ he said straight-faced.

But he was fucking with me. So I waggled my fingers, feeling a surge of self-satisfaction when his breath grew shaky.

‘You’ve done it now,’ he said and leaned in to kiss me.

His mouth was demanding. There wasn’t any question in that kiss. He wanted to kiss me so he would. Coop released my hand and hauled me in against him. My body crushing to his leanly muscled frame. His cock pressed, hard and long from the feel of things, to the front of me and I tilted my hips just a bit to feel it riding the split of my nether lips.

This is only your second day here …

‘Shut up,’ I murmured, twisting and stroking my tongue against his.

‘I wasn’t talking.’ His hands slid up the flat of my belly to cup my breasts, evoking a shiver.

‘I was talking to the voice in my head.’

‘Ah,’ he said, plucking at a button. Then a second; by the third my bra was peeking out and he was pushing his warm lips to my cleavage. I realised I was holding my breath and slowly blew out a wavering rush of air.

‘You still have time to change your mind, Farrell,’ he said, pulling my black bra cup back and licking the very tip of my hard nipple. I jumped, the sensation more like he was fucking me than just licking the tip of a single nipple.