The Super: A Bad Boy Romance (11 page)

He even said himself that he wanted to get away from everything. He meant that he wanted to get away from his real life. And I’m just not part of it. I never will be. He’s got his women and his stacks of money and his closet full of shoes and ties. I’ve seen the pictures. Despite all my best efforts not to look, I’ve seen his Instagram. There’s no place for me in there.

But why does he have to look so good?

He turns back to me and flashes that million-dollar smile, but I also notice that he doesn’t have any drinks in his hands.

“What, nothing here is up to your sophisticated taste level, fancy guy?”

“Come on. I knew you thought I was hot, but I didn’t think you thought I was a snob.”

“Maybe a little bit,” I say as I shrug my shoulders.

“So you admit I’m hot.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You also didn’t
not
say it, baby”

“That’s not evidence of anything.”

“I thought your friend was the legal professional. And anyway, I know I’m not the kind of guy you like. You like nerdy guys.”

He isn’t completely wrong, but I’m surprised that he’s suggesting I like any guy other than
him
. I am a sucker for a guy in glasses, for a guy who has a brain and can do a full literary analysis of the latest fiction pieces in the
New Yorker
. That much really is true.

“I do like nerdy guys,” I confirm. “But I don’t discriminate.”

“I know. And you know, I used to be a big nerd. I can pull out my old glasses and graphing calculator and fuck you while I recite Pi to thirty digits, if you’d like.”

I feel my face blush and the tips of my ears get hot. His comment renders me absolutely speechless. I shouldn’t be. I’m an aspiring reporter. I should never be at a loss for words.

“So I
am
your type.” He slips his fingers between mine and my hands soften. I don’t even care that the table is making my hands sticky.

It sparks something inside me. Something that’s been dormant. The pads of my fingers feel soft and warm on his as he weaves his fingers through mine and places them back down on the table.

My heart is beating out of my chest and I swear Drew Anderson can hear it over the bass line of the classic rock song thumping out of the jukebox in the corner.

“Oh, here we are,” he says as he waves over the waitress coming toward our table.

His hands slip out of mine and I feel their absence on me, almost more than I felt their presence a moment ago. I’m already craving his touch again, but I’m relieved that I can take my hands away from his and pretend they were never there to begin with.

The waitress brings over a narrow, long wooden plank with a row of three small glasses filled with different shades of brown liquid, ranging from light amber to dark, chocolatey brown.

“What’s all this?” I ask, pushing the salt and pepper shakers aside and plunking my hands back down onto the table quickly.

“This is a beer flight,” he explains, gesturing along the row of glasses. “I thought you’d like it. You get to have a little bit of a few different things, and then, if you want, you can have more of whichever one you pick.”

I look at the glasses, skeptical but intrigued. I was never really one to drink beer. I’m more of a cheap white wine drinker. Even better if the wine comes in a box.

“Okay. I’m game for this.”

“Start on this end,” he says, indicating the glass with the lightest color liquid, “and work your way over.”

“Okay. I can do this.”

I’m just glad that Drew has given us something else we can do with our hands. Any more of his touch on me and I’m not sure I would be able to control myself.

I take the first glass and bring it tentatively to my lips. It has a mild, slightly sweet aroma, and as I sip it, a cool and refreshing sensation coats my tongue.

“Ohh! I like it!”

“You look like you like it. Okay, now try the next one.”

The next one is slightly darker, with a more heavy scent.

“This one is good too, but I prefer the first one. This one almost tastes like oats.”

“Okay. That doesn’t surprise me. I don’t think you’re going to like the next one, but try it anyway.”

I take the glass to my lips and sip it slowly. I don’t want to drink it too fast in case it tastes bad.

“Hm,” I say thoughtfully, putting the glass back down on the paddle.

“Not your favorite?” Drew asks.

“No. That one’s not my favorite. Too bitter.”

“That’s fine. I’ll have that one. You have the first one. We can share the middle one.”

“Sorry, but I don’t want to swap spit with someone I just met.”

“Suit yourself,” he says, grabbing the middle glass and shooting the liquid back quickly. He puts the glass down on the table and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “But I have a feeling that’s not all we’re going to be swapping.”

“An open house. I love these.”

We’re walking back to my apartment after finishing our beers, and my head is spinning. It’s not from the drinks, and it’s not because I’m on the first date - accidental date - I’ve been on in too long. It’s because I can’t get Drew’s words out of my head. I can’t shake the feeling of his hands on mine. His hands are an oxymoron. They’re too rough to belong to a man who sits in his cube of glass above the city, making deals and signing contracts. But they’re too perfect and smooth to belong to a man who does manual labor.

The sun is just setting over the city’s horizon of rooftops, painting the sky pink and blue behind the black outlines of the buildings, and his words take me out of my head and back to reality. I’m no longer lost in a daydream about the guy standing right next to me.

He starts up the stairs of the brownstone with “For Sale” and “Open House” signs perched in the windows.

“Aren’t you coming?” he asks, one foot on the top step, hovering between me and the house. He reaches his hand out to mine, as if to help me up the stairs.

“Um, I’m not really in the market to buy a house right now. And what do you need with a house in Brooklyn? This isn’t really your target for investments, is it?”

He hops down a few of the steps and sits on the bottom step.

“No, it’s not. But it would be fun just to check it out, right? Sometimes they have good snacks at these things. And,” he says, gesturing for me to follow him, “you can pretend to be someone else.”

I enter the foyer of the building after him. He puts his hands on the solid wooden handrail of the staircase and looks upstairs quietly, peeking around corners and taking his time.

“I wonder how many bedrooms it has, honey,” he says to me. “We need at least a three bedroom, if we want this to be a place we can grow into.”

I don’t know why, but I pretend to go along with his little game.

“Right. Little Timmy needs his own room, and then Samantha, and you never know what the future might hold after that.”

He winks at me and turns to walk down the hallway and into the kitchen.

“Nice work, here. Nice cabinets. Custom.”

A woman’s heels click from the other room and a slightly older, maybe mid-30s woman comes through the doorway and into the kitchen. She’s wearing a pantsuit and big gold hoop earrings, and has a dramatic mane of blonde hair.

Her look, her attitude, everything about her screams
Brooklyn
.

“It’s nice, right? The owners are moving to Florida, and they’re very motivated to sell.”

She puts her hand out to shake Drew’s.

“Older couple?” he asks, shaking the woman’s hand and looking from her to me, grinning.

“That’s right. Snowbirds, they were, up until now. Two kids, married with their own kids. You know, these older folks don’t want to be up here with the ice and cold in the winter. They’ve had enough of it.”

“This is a very nice property,” Drew says, folding his arms across his chest and making his way through the kitchen, around the center island with a large barn sink.

“You should see upstairs. The owners did all the work themselves, and they did a good job of it, too.”

I stand in the doorway opposite the broker and look around, peeking my head into the room. I don’t feel like I belong here. I’m sure I’ll never have enough money to buy a gorgeous place like this. It’s all old wood and new appliances, and way out of what my budget will be when I’m ready to settle down with a family.

“God, I’m so rude,” the broker says, striding over to me with confidence. “I’m Marie. It’s very nice to meet you.”

“It’s nice to meet you, too.”

“That’s my wife, Cindy,” Drew says as I’m about to offer my name.

He stands behind me and puts his hands on my shoulders. His hands are warm and safe. Protective. Reassuring.

“Yes. I’m Cindy. And this is my...husband...”

“Chip,” he offers, giving my shoulders a little squeeze. “We’re kind of on the fence about Brooklyn. We’re from Pennsylvania ourselves, and we always wanted to live in New York, but we’re not sure about making the big move yet.”

“Well, I’m glad you both came to the open house today,” Marie says, grabbing a flier from the kitchen counter and handing it to me. The price shocks me. “Please take a look around, and let me know if you have any questions at all.”

I walk past her and Drew and into the dining room. I can imagine having a big family here. Two boys and a girl, a loving husband, a big bowl of my grandmother’s sauce and ziti in the middle of the table.

Bustle, commotion, love. A lot of space to grow into. A yard. A cat
and
a dog. At least one of each.

“Do you like it?” Drew doesn’t make much noise as he walks up next to me and moves the lace curtains on the window aside to look out at the backyard.

“I do like it. It’s very nice.”

“Did you have a dog growing up?”

“No. No dog. Our building didn’t allow them. Other tenants had them, but my mom and dad were real sticklers for rules.”

“I had a few dogs growing up. They liked to run around at my mom’s place. There’s a lot of land there.”

“I read that your mom lived upstate when you and Eric were young.”

“That’s right. Still does. I went up there a couple of days ago.”

There’s a little bit of tension in his voice, and I’m not sure if I should ask if something is wrong, or just leave him alone, even though I want to know that everything with his mom is okay.

The way he parts the curtains on the window makes the light from the setting sun dance across the warm brown hardwood floors. Even though the overhead ceiling light is off, the room is awash in gold and pink tones, like the colors you see inside your eyelids while falling asleep on your towel on a hot day at the beach.

“Everything okay with your mom?”

“Yeah. She’s fine. She’s going to try to sell the house. I wish she’d come live in the city. I’d buy this place for her, if she wanted it.”

“Do you think she’d like it? It’s got a sort of country vibe to it.”

“Yeah. You’re right. It does.”

He takes his hands away from the delicate lace curtains and lets them go slack, brushing and whispering against the floor.

“Do
you
like this house?”

He walks toward me, gently and purposefully, not taking his eyes off mine, until he’s standing squarely in front of me. He looks down at me from above, his chest moving up and down with his steady, even breaths.

I should just walk away. Go out the door, back to my apartment. Forget that Drew Anderson ever landed in my building. Think of him as a random rich guy who hit on me at a bar, someone whose name I don’t know. Someone whose backstory I don’t care about. Someone whose struggles I don’t identify with.

“Yes. I like it.”

He cups my chin and brushes his thumb along the edge of my bottom lip, his breath still calm and even.

Inside, my body is screaming. My heart is pounding in my chest, my ears, my throat. I feel like there is a string connecting me to Drew Anderson. I want to cut the tie between us. He is too hot, too confident, too cocky and too rich for me. He would only be at my building for two weeks, and then he would go back to his life. Even if something had happened with him at the bar the first time we met, it wouldn’t have been good. I don’t want to get my heart involved with a guy who has a reputation like Drew’s.

But for all his arrogance and cockiness, all his teasing and ribbing, he is actually being kind to me. And I want to know about him. He isn’t just what I thought he was at first.

That might even be worse.

But I’m already getting swept up in him.

My breathing is speeding up, and even though I want to be cool, to match his wit, I can’t in that moment. I’m unable to be cool.

I’m on fire.

I’m melting.

I’m left helpless by him.

As he finally tilts my chin upwards and moves his soft, full lips to brush against mine, I feel myself giving myself over to him.