Filfthy (5 page)

D
elilah

“
H
ere we are
, sugar. This building right here on the corner.” Aunt Rue unclicks her seatbelt, as do the three ladies in the back, and frantically waves toward a tall white building with glass doors and pale blue awnings Tuesday afternoon.

“What time am I picking you up?” I pull into a parallel spot out front and slide her Lexus into park as Rue’s Crew disembarks and ambles toward the spa on the corner.

I roll down the passenger window and Rue leans in. “We’re going to be here most of the afternoon, and then we have dinner and drinks afterwards. We’ll see how much Gladys drinks today, but there’s a polka party tonight at the pierogi restaurant on Callahan Street. I’ll call you when we’re ready to be picked up.”

“All right. Have fun. Don’t get into too much trouble.”

Aunt Rue waves, joining her herd as they file in. When she told me there would be a hefty dose of champagne involved in their spa day, I insisted on driving them. It’s the least I can do anyway. She’s paying me handsomely this summer for my time and assistance, and it almost feels like
too
much. I’m happy to play chauffeur when needed.

Pulling away, my stomach rumbles, and I spot a cozy sidewalk café tucked under a grove of shade trees.

By the time I park and head inside, the place is filling quickly. I stand in line, place my order, and wait at the end of the counter for my number to be called.

When I take my tray, I scan the place for an empty table and come up with nothing.

Just my luck.

“Hey, I know you.”

I follow a man’s voice toward a table for two to my right and smile when I recognize him.

Hercules.

“Hi there.” I move toward him, and he motions for me to sit.

“This place is a zoo at lunch time. I think we both picked the worst possible time to come.”

I take a seat, unwrapping my silverware. “I’m sorry, I never did get your name that night.”

“Weston,” he says. “Yours?”

“Delilah.”

“Did you ever find Zane?”

“I did.” I lift my brows, forking my salad. “Thank you for assisting with that. Apparently, Zane was very in demand that night.”

“Nah.” Weston smirks. “You just have to know where to look.”

“Are you two good friends?”

“We’re both Cougars.” He tugs on the t-shirt covering his barreled chest. Navy and gold letters spell out Gainesville, and I assume the rest is on the back.

“So are you friends or are you just . . . cougars?”

He laughs through his nose. “Both.”

“So, I’m curious,” I say. “Whatever became of your yellow shirt that weekend?”

He sits up, his eyes wide and his cheeks blushing. Seeing this gentle giant so humble is nothing short of endearing.

“My yellow shirt . . . stayed on my person. If that’s what you’re asking.” He laughs. “I definitely made the right choice that night.”

“Oh?” I take a sip of organic hibiscus iced tea. “Are you reconciling things with your ex?”

His expression grows somber. “No. Not at all.”

I shrug, foraging through the lettuce leaves on my plate in search of the best ones. “All right. Just thought I’d ask. I’m going to school to be a therapist, so I’m kind of fascinated with people and the inner-workings of relationships in general. Forgive me if I’m being invasive. Sometimes I forget that not everyone likes to have these kinds of conversations. I’m more than happy to discuss how my mouth tastes like a flower garden right now. . .”

He laughs.

I glance up, giving him a tender smile that he promptly returns. Weston seems sweet, but there’s something guarded behind those blues of his. I’m willing to bet money he’s the kind of guy who keeps everyone at an arm’s length.

And Weston has some pretty decent-sized guns.

“Nah.” He shoves a final bite of his sandwich between his lips, wiping his fingers on a recycled brown napkin. “It’s fine. I’d been with Elle since high school. Ten years, I guess. We’d just grown into completely different people. She wanted to go home to Tennessee to be closer to family. And then she wanted to get married and have a bunch of babies. My career was taking off. Neither of us wanted to force the other to sacrifice their dreams. Splitting up was the only humane solution.”

“Wow.” I rest an elbow on the table, my chin resting on my hand. “That’s really sweet. And dignified. You realize how lucky you are. A split after an entire decade together can sometimes get ugly. Not for the faint of heart.”

“Yeah.” His jaw flexes as he stares at his empty plate. “I suppose you’re right.”

“You still love her?”

“Always. We grew up together. We’re still friends. Still talk every day.”

“You just going to love her forever?”

He’s quiet, twisting a crumpled straw wrapper between his fingers.

“One of these days, she will move on,” I say gently. “And she’ll get married. And have those babies. And it won’t be with you.” I resist the urge to place my hand on his when I see his mouth tighten. “All I’m saying is you need to put yourself first. And you might want to think about getting back out there at some point in the very near future.”

He drops the wrapper and leans back in his chair, arms folded, jaw tight. “Yeah. You’re right.”

“You’re lucky to have loved someone for that long though,” I muse. “My longest relationship lasted eleven months. We couldn’t even make it to a year without almost killing each other.” I lean in, brows scrunched. “You know, now that I think about it, Zane reminds me a lot of my ex. Smug face. Smart mouth.
Too
good looking.”

“Don’t let Zane know you find him attractive.” Weston’s lips twitch at the corners. “If his head gets any bigger, it’ll explode.”

“I’m sure he’s well aware.” I roll my eyes. “Maybe that’s why I find him completely obnoxious.”

“You don’t like Zane?” The look on Weston’s face is a mix of confusion and amusement. “I’m pretty sure you’re the only woman I’ve ever known to speak those words. You know, that’s damn near blasphemous in these parts.”

“Let’s just say we didn’t exactly hit it off at his party and things have sort of gone downhill since then. We can’t have a civilized conversation. One of us always makes a left turn and it gets ugly fast.”

“Zane has a tendency to be his own brand of asshole sometimes,” Weston says. “But at the end of the day, he’s got a good heart. His past has been a bit of a crooked line, but he’s making progress. He’s working his ass off to turn things around.”

“Tell that to my aunt. She’s convinced he’s a bad seed.” I take another sip of tea, brows lifted. “You think he’s a good person?”

“I do.” Weston doesn’t hesitate, and his mouth rises in the corner. “His mouth gets him in trouble from time to time, but that’s Zane.”

I think about the daffodils sitting in a crystal vase on my nightstand. Rue wanted to toss them out last weekend, but I wouldn’t allow it. Instead, I removed them from her presence, and she seemed to have forgotten about them ever since.

My mother would have a heart attack if she knew I allowed the senseless tossing out of perfectly beautiful spring pretties.

My phone buzzes in my lap, and I lift a finger when I see it’s Taylor calling.

“I’m sorry, I have to take this,” I say.

Weston nods.

“Taylor, hi,” I answer. “What’s up?”

“We have a showing,” his overly excited voice booms through the phone. “It’s in an hour. Is the house ready?”

I rise, my mind immediately conjuring a vision of my unmade bed and the trail of dirty clothes I left leading to the bathroom. I meant to pick them up earlier, but I was in a hurry to get Rue’s Crew to their spa appointment on time.

“Um,” I say, glancing at Weston. “No. Give me a half hour. I just need to make sure everything’s in order.”

“Move quickly,” he says. “Normally I like to give a twenty-four hour notice, but the agent said their buyer is only in town until five and they’re very interested.”

“Got it.” I hang up with Taylor and gather my tray. “I’m sorry, I have to go. My aunt has a showing, and I need to get back to the house.”

Weston smiles. “No worries. See you around.”

* * *

I
pull
into Rue’s driveway and slam on the brakes, barely shutting off the engine before I grab my bag and head in.

Stopping in the kitchen, I grab a package of chocolate chip break-and-bake cookies and pop them in the oven. They should be done in fifteen minutes, and this article I read online said the smell of fresh baked sweets helps sell houses.

While the cookies bake, I scamper off to my room, fling the comforter over the sheets, fluff the pillows on my bed, and toss my dirty clothes in a hamper. By the time I’m finished inspecting the place, the timer on the oven is beeping.

I’ve been replaying my conversation with Weston since I left the café. He’s a nice guy. Almost too nice. He seems like the kind to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, but if he knows Zane and says he’s a nice guy . . .

. . . then
maybe
?

I let the cookies cool for a few minutes before arranging a few on a plate on the island. I scribble a note telling the buyers to help themselves before packaging up the rest in one of Rue’s Tupperware containers.

Armed with cookies and peaceful intentions, I lock up the house and walk next door.

Maybe I’m crazy.

Maybe he’s going to think I’m crazy.

But it feels like the right thing to do.

Z
ane

“
A
nything new with you
, Zane?” Coach’s voice plays through the speakers as I drive home from a two-hour session with my trainer.

“Nothing.” I grip the steering wheel. I know exactly what he’s asking. “Nothing at all.”

“Keeping your nose clean?” His voice is low, and judging by the sound of children laughing in the background, I’m guessing he’s hanging out at the lanai in his backyard while his four boys try to out-do each other with cannonballs.

“You’d know if I wasn’t.”

“Good, good.”

“Your need to babysit me is concerning.”

He laughs. “Not babysitting you, Zane. Looking out for you. Want to make sure you’re not going anywhere.”

“Wouldn’t be by choice. The owners say anything lately?”

“They’re laying low,” he said. “Didn’t bring you up in the meeting last week, which was the first time in months.”

“Good. I live a saintly existence.” I huff, intentionally leaving out the innocent ruckus I’ve been known to cause with the Laguna Palms HOA. It’s all in good fun. Those people need a life. They need a little entertainment beyond ice cream socials and shuffleboard. “Still can’t believe you talked me into moving to a fucking retirement community. I have no idea how you pulled that off.”

“Yeah, well. When money talks, people listen.”

“Anyway.” I run my palm along the steering wheel, pulling through the security gate and veering right toward my street. Ahead, I spot Delilah sauntering down my sidewalk with something in her hands. “Coach, I’ll call you back.”

I park in the driveway and climb out of my truck, and she stops, doe-eyed.

“What do you have there?” I ask, slipping my hands in my back pockets when I meet her halfway along the front walk.

“I want to call a truce,” she says, shoving a little plastic container in my hands. It’s warm, and when I pry the lid open, the scent of fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies fills my lungs. “You didn’t have to bring me cookies, gorgeous, but I’ll take ‘em.”

I pop one into my mouth, loving the way she longingly watches me lick melted chocolate off my fingers. I bet she doesn’t know she’s making that face, her lips parted and moist from her tongue slicking their length.

“You want to come in?” I offer.

She looks over my shoulder toward Rue’s driveway. “Yeah. If you don’t mind. Rue has a showing, so I can’t be there.”

As soon as we’re in, I point her toward the living room and kick off my shoes. Peeling off my gym tank, I toss it over my shoulder and snap the waistband of my shorts.

“I’m going to grab a shower,” I say, sitting the container of cookies on the coffee table. “Just finished working out. But you make yourself at home, all right?”

* * *

W
hen I finish showering
twenty minutes later, the sound of her voice trails down the hallway.

“So how do you know him again?” she asks.

The dampness covering my skin evaporates into my cool, air-conditioned surroundings, but damn if my nether regions aren’t all hot and tingly at the thought of Delilah Rosewood actually seeking me out.

Because let’s face it, she fucking wants me.

She came here pretending like she just randomly decided to bring me cookies, but I know what this is. Delilah’s not the first and she probably won’t be the last. All she needed was an excuse to step into my world for a minute, and the second I round this corner, she’s going to expect me to take the lead. To make a move. To be all over her like white on rice.

I know exactly how this is going to go. We’ll chat. Flirt. Eye fuck.

And then she’ll trace her fingers along her neck, trailing down between those two perfectly round tits of hers, and then she’ll give me a reluctant smile, grazing her tongue along her bottom lip as she waits for me to go in for the kill.

Too bad for her it’s not going to happen.

Not that I don’t want it to.

But it’s going to be fun as hell watching her squirm and try and act like she hates me when every part of her is lit like a cherry bomb on the Fourth of July every time we’re in the same general vicinity.

I see it in the way her eyes glint when they meet mine. I see it in the way her thighs clench. The way her hands tremble when I step into her space like I own it.

She can say anything she wants, but her body language wastes no time showing her cards.

“Oh, so you’ve known him quite a while then?” I hear Delilah’s voice once again. She must be on the phone.

I check my reflection in a hall mirror, finger-combing my hair into just the right position before checking my breath on the back of my hand and strutting toward the living room like a man who gives no fucks.

And then I stop. Dead in my tracks. Frozen.

Because Delilah is not on the phone.

She’s sitting across from my goddamned
stalker
, interview style, chit-chatting away like a couple of prattling finches.

I glance at the psychotic hot mess that is Carissa and brace myself for the familiar gut-check that follows.

“What’s wrong, Zane?” Carissa laughs like we’re a couple of old friends, lifting one of Delilah’s cookies to her lips and taking a nibble. “You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”

My lips form a hard line as I look between the two of them.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” I say. “You know that, Carissa.”

She shrugs, turning to Delilah. “I was in the neighborhood visiting my grandparents, and I happened to drive past and see my
favorite
man taking a pretty lady into his house. I thought I’d stop by and say hello. Just being cordial. That’s what you wanted, right Zane? For us to be cordial?”

Carissa stalked me for three straight years, showing up at every public and far too many private events for me to count. The first time I met her, she was posing as a sportscaster and waiting outside my locker room after a big game. Complete with a press pass and tape recorder, she looked the part, and she was sexy as fuck.

When she pulled me away from the team and led me down a hallway and into a private conference room under the guise of conducting a quick interview, nothing seemed off until she locked the door, fell to her knees, and wasted little time taking my cock between that pretty red mouth of hers.

The arrogant twenty-four-year-old me thought it was pretty fucking hot. I blew a load in between her cherry lips, and she drank every last drop. Delicately composing herself afterwards, she rose to her feet and slipped me a note with her phone number before disappearing.

But I never called her because girls like her are a dime a fucking dozen, and I don’t feel bad saying that because they do it to themselves. They throw themselves at us and cheapen their looks and soften their values and spread their legs because their only goals in life are to be baller wives.

Show me a girl who hates football and is crazy into me anyway, and I’ll marry her on the spot. I’ve yet to meet anyone like that. Haven’t even come close.

Not to mention, it’s impossible to respect a woman who has zero respect for herself.

“Carissa, you need to leave.” I fold my arms across my chest, jaw clenched.

“Is he serious?” Delilah points at me and laughs.

Carissa rises, moving my way and slipping her hand along my shoulder. “Always so dramatic, this one. It’s why I love him
soooo
much.”

Her declaration of love makes molten vomit rise in my throat, and her touch lingers intentionally.

“Go.” My command is a harsh growl. “Now.”

“Don’t be rude, Zane.” Delilah waves for Carissa to come back, and then she pats the seat beside her. “She can stay. Or better yet, I can leave so you two can catch up. Carissa said you two used to be close but you fell out of touch?”

I laugh under my breath. Leave it to Carissa to paint a picture that doesn’t make her look seven kinds of psychotic.

With a stern hand, I guide Carissa toward the door and walk her to the front steps, seeing to it, personally, that she’s on the outside of my fortress.

“Don’t ever pull that shit again,” I say when I pull the door closed.

Carissa pouts, her giant olive-green eyes framed by shiny jet-black hair. The woman is beautiful, no question, but all that crazy inside of her cancels out every last bit of it.

“Who is she, Zane?” There’s a wistfulness in her tone that doesn’t belong there, and she stares at me like I’m the best thing in the world. Her fixation with me is mind-boggling, but I stopped trying to understand it years ago. Nothing about Carissa has ever made much sense.

She’s nothing more than a spoiled princess who never learned the definition of “no.”

“None of your concern,” I spit.

Her bittersweet expression morphs into something darker, and she stomps her foot. She knows damn well the kind of hold she has over me, and I know damn well she’s not afraid to use it.

Her father is the sole owner of the Gainesville Cougars. Declaring that his precious baby girl is a crazy stalker would be career suicide, and admitting it publicly would do nothing but make me the laughingstock of the locker room.

“She’s staying with family here,” I say. “For the summer.”

“Jesus, Zane.” Her hand lifts to her heart. “You’re already fucking her, aren’t you?”

“No.”

“You want to.”

“My personal life is none of your business, Carissa,” I say. “And for the record, Delilah hates me, so don’t get your panties in a bunch over something that’s probably not going to happen anyway.”

There. Hopefully that’ll make her back off. The last thing I need is her terrorizing Rue’s niece, involving her in this craziness.

Carissa laughs, crossing her lanky arms beneath her fake tits. “You’re not that dense, are you? She brought you cookies. Don’t be a moron. She’s totally down to fuck.”

“Anyway, I think we’re done here, so . . .” I shoo her away, glancing over her shoulder at the parked Audi in the street.

“Zane.” She sighs, reaching for me, but I jerk my arm away. “It’s not fair for you to hate me so much.”

I refuse to engage in this bullshit stall tactic of hers another minute.

“Do I need to file the restraining order?” I know my threat is empty, but it’s the only card I have left to play.

“You would never.” She calls my bluff in two seconds flat.

“I will if I have to.” I take a step closer, leering down, which elicits a smile from her. And maybe I shouldn’t. It’s like giving a temper-tantrum-throwing toddler attention. I’m rewarding her for bad behavior. But she needs to hear me one last time. She needs to listen up. “You’ve been doing good, Carissa. You’ve been staying away, keeping your distance like I asked. Why’d you come here today?”

She brushes a strand of dark hair over her shoulder and licks her curling lips. “I already told you. I was driving by and saw you coming in here with a girl. I was curious. Can’t blame me for wanting to check out my replacement.”

“You weren’t replaced, Carissa. I never
had
you. I never
wanted
you. You were
never
mine to replace.”

“I’m sorry. I meant
Mirabelle’s
replacement.”

Just like that, she pulls the rug out from under me. My breath grows weighted in my chest and my body is anchored for war.

“Don’t,” I seethe, “ever fucking say her name around me again.”

By the time I’m done seeing red, the door has been slammed in her face and I’m standing in the middle of my foyer.

“Everything okay out there?” Delilah’s voice trails from the living room.

“Yep.” I hook my hands on my hips, take a deep breath, and pull my shit together because I’ll be fucking damned if I let someone like Carissa rain on the parade that is Delilah Rosewood sitting in my living room at this very moment.

“What was that about?” she asks when I return.

I take the seat beside her and stretch my arm across the back as I settle in. It takes everything I have to pretend like there aren’t fifty tons of explosives coursing through my veins, but something about seeing Delilah’s expressive dark gaze and observing her cool, collected mannerisms brings me a sliver of peace.

“That,” I say, “was my stalker.”

Delilah laughs. “You have a stalker? Like a real-life stalker?”

I exhale, eyes rolling back. “Yeah. It’s
hilarious
.”

“She’s so sweet. There’s no way.” Delilah won’t stop snickering. Glad my personal drama can be someone else’s cheap entertainment.

“A girl gets stalked by a guy and it makes the five o’clock news. A guy gets stalked by the team owner’s daughter and he’s just supposed to keep it to himself or brag about it like it’s a goddamned rite of passage.”

“When you say she
stalked
you . . .”

“Followed the team from city to city, hung out outside locker rooms, faked press passes to get into places she wasn’t supposed to be, snuck into hotel rooms on the road, convinced her daddy to give her all-access passes to team parties and events, hid in bushes outside my house, sent me creepy-ass love letters, snuck into my home when I wasn’t here, detonated an atomic bomb in the direction of my personal life . . . do I need to continue?”