Costars (New York City Bad Boy Romance) (87 page)

When
I pull away, he’s smiling.

“How
did it go closing up over there?” he asks.

“Not
too bad,” I tell him. “It was a bit rough saying goodbye to the old place, but
with all the volume we’re moving, it just wasn’t going to work keeping it
open.”

“You
know,” he says, “if you weren’t such a major control freak, you could have left
the other store open and just let someone else run it.”

“Oh,
shut up,” I scoff and hit him playfully on the chest.

“What
did you want to talk to me about, boss?”

“You
know,” I tell him, “we’re getting married tomorrow. I really think you can
start calling me by my name from now on.”

“Eh,”
he shrugs, “while we’re at work, you’re the boss and don’t pretend like that
doesn’t turn you on a little.”

He’s
right about that.

“What’s
on your mind?” he asks.

“Well,”
I start, “first off, Linda wanted to know if you’re going to be able to pick up
Jessica tonight.”

“Yeah,”
he says. “She just called. I told her I’d swing by just as soon as I’m off
work. I was thinking we could take her to the park tonight.”

“Cool,”
I say. “Now, I know we’re running out of time and everything, but I’ve been
looking at pictures of some of the more modern clothing stores, and there are a
few things I’d like to implement before the paint is dry. I know the schedule
is tight, but I really think we can get this done and it’s going to look so
much better.”

“Oh,
you’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” he groans.

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ROOMIES

By
Claire Adams

This
book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are
products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not
to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual
events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Copyright
© 2015 Claire Adams

Chapter
One

Room
Available

Leila

“Thanks, I still have a
few people to interview, but I’ll be sure to give you a call.”

Yeah, right. Even after
the guy’s out the door, I’m still choking on his cologne.

I’ve been in Manhattan
for less than a month and my internship isn’t cutting it. You’d think that,
even as an intern, working for one of the major stock brokers in the world
would be enough to cover a simple, two-bedroom apartment.
 
You’d think wrong.

The big boss at my
company makes something like 2,500 times my salary. Now, I don’t really expect
to bring in the millions as an intern, but I should, at least, be able to hold
onto an apartment.

You know, I’m really
starting to think that my landlord only rented me the place for the eye-candy.
The way he stares at my chest when he talks to me should have tipped me off,
but I was just happy to talk to someone who heard my salary and didn’t laugh in
my face.

Right now, I’m going around
opening all the windows, hoping to air the place out before my next appointment
arrives.

I’m waiting a while.

My final appointment of
the day, a Dane Paulson, is already five minutes late.

Maybe he passed the other
guy in the hall and had to be wheeled out of the building. I can’t begin to
explain how, but opening the windows has only made the lingering stench worse.

I’m in the bathroom,
putting drops in to lessen the stinging in my eyes when there’s a knock on the
door.

“Just a minute!” I shout.

The last thing I need is
for a prospective renter to think I’m some crazy, emotional woman, crying about
nothing. Either that would scare him away or make me appear that special kind
of vulnerable that the worst kinds of people prey upon.

Neither one is an acceptable
option.

I’m at the door one
minute and three tissues later.

“Hi,” I say, opening the
door. “Here to see the apartment?”

The man on the other side
is tall, tattooed, and handsome. His black hair is cut short enough to nicely
merge into his scruff. He’s leaning against the door jamb like an antihero from
a noir film. He’s got that self-important look with his chocolate brown eyes
staring at me that makes it appear like he lives here already and is wondering
why it took me so long to answer the door and let him in.

I hate him already.

“Yeah,” he says, acting
as if he’s chewing something which, as far as I can tell, he’s not. “Are you
Lily?”

“No,” I tell him. “I’m
Leila.”

He leans back and looks
at my door as if there’s some kind of useful information posted on it, then he
looks back at me.

“I thought the ad said
your name was Lily.”

“Well,” I tell him, “it’s
not. Would you like to come in?”

He doesn’t answer, but
just kind of struts in, his thumbs in his pockets. “Nice place,” he says.

“Yep,” I tell him.

“That’s quite the smell,”
he says. “Let me guess: modeling party?”

If it’s a line, it’s
about the worst one I’ve ever heard.

“No,” I tell him. “The
guy ahead of you seemed to think it necessary to actually bathe in his—what are
you doing?”

He’s by the countertop,
leafing through the newspaper I haven’t read myself.

“I was out late last
nigh
. I was hoping to get a peek at the sports section.”

Yeah, I already hate this
guy. Sadly, though, I’m desperate.

I have some money from my
modest inheritance, but it wouldn’t last long in a place like this. And this is
one of the more reasonably priced apartments in the city.

What I really want is to
get a full time position at the brokerage firm so I can save up for a nice
house; you know, somewhere far away from tattooed guy and the one who swims in
cologne. I’d try for a place like that now, but I’d much rather get settled
into my job before I blow all my money.

“Take it,” I tell him,
acting like he’s not being incredibly nosy.

He doesn’t bother looking
up from the paper. “That’s all right,” he says. “My team lost.”

For the next few seconds,
we just stand there: him, still going through the newspaper, me, pretending I
don’t want to chuck something at his head for the impropriety.

“I’m sorry,” he says,
finally looking up from the sports section. “I haven’t even introduced myself.
I’m Dane, Dane Paulson.”

“Leila Tyler,” I say and
hold my hand out to shake his.

He looks at my hand, then
turns his head toward the apartment. “So, what is this place: 700, 800 square
feet?”

“750. Your room would be
over here,” I say and start walking, but he doesn’t move.

“Nah, that’s all right,”
he tells me. “I like it. I’ll take it.”

“It’s not that simple.
I’ve had a number of interviews and some pretty solid prospects. I’ll need to
know what kind of income you bring in, I’ll need to check your references. We
haven’t even had our interview—”

“I just moved here,
actually. I follow the music.”

A musician: fantastic.
Not only would I have to deal with him, I’d have to deal with whatever
instrument he can’t really play and all the nonsense catchphrases that go with
it.

“Well, it’s been nice
meeting you, but I think I have enough—”

“Guitar, mostly,” he
says. He stops looking around the apartment like he’s planning a break-in and
looks at me for a moment. “Sorry, most people ask what I play when I tell them
I’m a musician.”

“Sorry for my lack of
etiquette. It’s been very nice meeting you, but—”

“120
,000
,”
he says.

“What?”

“Dollars,” he answers. “I
make a little over $120,000 a year.”

“That’s wonderful. Now,
if I can just show you the beautiful craftsmanship in the hallway—”

“I could move in tonight.
I mean, I don’t know what your schedule is like, but fuck it. Why wait?”

“Listen, Mr.—”

“Paulson,” he says.

“Mr. Paulson,” I rejoin.
“I think it would be best if you just left. I’ve decided not to rent the room.”

“Look,” he says, “I know
$120,000 isn’t that much in New York City, but it’s more than enough to cover
my half of the rent. That is the deal, right? We each pay half, have separate
bedrooms, but the rest of the place is shared?”

“That
would
be the deal,” I tell him, “but
you’re not listening.”

“What do you pay here? It’s
got to be, what, $3,000 a month?”

“It’s something like
that. But I just don’t think it’s the right fit.”

“All right,” he says.
“I’m sorry to hear that. If you change your mind, I’m still new enough to the
city and would never know if you were fucking me.”

My mouth drops open a
little. “Excuse me?”

“Fucking me,” he says.
“You know, cheating me on my share of the rent.”

Right now, it’s down to
him, cologne guy and the woman who walked in alone and accused me of wanting to
sleep with her boyfriend. Lovely.

“I’ll keep that in mind,”
I tell him.

“Sounds good,” he says as
if certain the room is his.

“Okay,” I tell him, no
longer caring whether he wants to see the open room or not, “I’ll let you
know.”

“Sounds great,” he says
and smiles. He turns and heads for the door. “Oh, by the way…”

“Yeah?” I ask,
frustration thick in my voice.

“Would you mind just
leaving the sports page on the counter? New York newspapers are thicker than
what we had back home. I can never find the damn thing.”

“I’ll take that under
advisement,” I tell him.

He’s out the door a
minute later, and I’m on the phone with my friend Mike.

“They can’t be
that
bad,” he tells me, somewhere around
minute fifteen of my diatribe.

“You have no idea,” I
tell him. “Today was a cakewalk. Yesterday, I had four twenty-year-olds come in
here, not so much to look at the room as a living space, but a spot for their
weekly swingers’ club meetings. Don’t even ask me what that entails, and I’m
not saying that because I haven’t been very well-informed. Then, there was the
cat lover.”

“Cat lover doesn’t sound
so bad,” Mike chuckles.

“Oh, did I not mention
that she brought the cat, and that the cat was actually an old cardigan with a
thin leash around it?”

“Okay, that’s pretty
bad.”

“Yeah,” I scoff. “We’re
still going out tonight, right?”

“Nine o’clock,” he says.

“Beautiful.” It’s the
first good news I’ve had all day. “I think I just need to get out there and get
shitfaced.”

He laughs. “You always
say that, but after cocktail number one… well, I’m not sure that I’ve ever seen
you finish cocktail number one.”

I ignore him. Tonight’s a
night to get hammered and make some bad decisions. “I’ll see you there.”

I hang up the phone and
try to visualize what life is going to be like. You know, as soon as I’ve
clawed my way out of the hell that has been this week.

*
                   
*
                   
*

By the time Mike and I
are at the club, I’m starting to forget about the relentless cavalcade of
freaks and psychos.

Ultra-repetitive dance
music can do that to a person.

Just to prove that I’m
not such a cheap date, I order my customary cocktail—a tequila sunrise—and a
sidecar.

I’m not entirely sure
what a sidecar is, but it always seemed like the thing to order at a bar.

“I’ll bet you a shot of
vodka I end up drinking at least one of those,” Mike teases.

He’s lived here his whole
life. In fact, he’s the one that got me the interview for my current position.

Mike and I met when I was
seventeen and I came through Manhattan on a school field trip. He helped me
find my hotel after I got lost trying to find Tiffany’s.

What can I say? I loved
the movie.

“You’re on,” I tell him
and down the sidecar in a single tilt.

It’s a terrible idea—I
realize that before I finish the thing—but it gets Mike’s attention.

“So, how much of the
sunrise do I have to drink before you give me my shot?”

“Hell, I’ll buy you the
vodka now just to see what you taking a shot looks like.”

“Drop the money,” I tell
him.