Chapter 8
A
s I entered my apartment building, ahead of me was one smokin’-hot man-butt. Who in the hell was he and why was he in the lobby of my apartment building? I wondered if his man-face matched his man-butt . . . the hell with Mitch, this man-butt was way better than his and this one potentially lived in my building. Things were looking up. I pretended to get my mail so I could check him out. His hoodie sweat jacket hid his face and hair color from me, but as he retrieved his mail, I saw his left hand, and it was ringless. Awesome.
“Did you say something?” Hottie McMan-butt asked with his back still to me.
Oh my God, did I say any of that out loud? That was a total asshat move. I mean, he had a great behind, but I didn’t want him to think I regarded him as a piece of meat. That would be sexist, not to mention rude. Although if he were a piece of meat, I suppose he’d be a filet mignon . . . maybe. I hadn’t seen the face yet, but a butt that great had to have a good face. Right? Wait, what was wrong with me? He was not a piece of meat. He was probably a very nice guy who was going to think I was a crazy dingbat with loose morals and a man-butt obsession. Balls.
My gut clenched and I wondered if I could make it to the stairs without the new hot neighbor guy seeing me. The odds were slim, but I had to try. I shut my mailbox and ran.
“Goldilocks?”
I jerked to a halt on the third stair. No, no, no, no . . . Could this day get any worse?
“Mitch?” I choked out.
“How are you?” he asked, grinning at me.
I grabbed the stair railing because my knees were about to give out. Damn it, what the hell was it about this guy that turned me into a noodle?
“I’m good. What are you doing here?”
“I live here,” he said, pointing to Jack’s apartment.
“You can’t,” I gasped, willing my spaghetti legs to work.
“Why not?” His silky voice held a challenge. He stepped closer, and because my lower body was useless, all I could do was sit down to get a little farther away.
“I live here,” I stammered. “And since I’m avoiding you until I die, you can’t live here. It would make my life difficult and I’d be tempted to break my vows.”
“Are you going into a nunnery?” he asked as he sat down next to me and made my brain short-circuit.
“Of course not,” I giggled. “I’m Lutheran.” I tried to move away, but instead, conked my head on the railing. “Shit,” I muttered.
“Come here.” Mitch leaned in and felt around in my hair for a lump. For such a big strong guy, his hands were incredibly gentle. I wondered how they’d feel on my . . . Stop. Don’t go there.
“I’m okay,” I whispered, aching to kiss him. I stood up shakily and put a little distance between us. “I have to go.”
“Wait—” Mitch grabbed my hand. “Why won’t you go out with me? It feels like you’re liking me and God knows, I’m liking you.”
“Mitch, you seem like you’re very, um . . . nice, but I don’t date cops.” I tried to pull my hand away, but his grip tightened.
“Well, you’re in luck. I’m not a cop. I’m a DEA agent, so that argument won’t stand.” He grinned lazily and my heart skipped two beats.
“That’s the same thing,” I told him, trying not to smile.
“Nope, it’s not. You’ll have to come up with a better excuse for not going out with me than that.”
“Okay, fine.” I pulled my hand from his and crossed my arms over my chest so I wouldn’t bury them in his hair. “I can’t go out with you because if I do, I’ll have to eat lots of dinners with hostile lesbians and I’ll lose Brett Favre forever.” If that didn’t scare him away, then I didn’t know what would.
He laughed and I almost jumped him in a very sexual way. “I’m a little confused,” he said. “Let’s break this one down . . . I’m very sure Brett Favre is married. Am I wrong about that?”
“It’s not real Brett Favre. It’s Cardboard Brett Favre,” I explained rationally, halfway hoping my crazy would make him give up and move to Alaska. Of course the other half of me wanted him to grab me by the hair and shove his tongue in my mouth.
“You mean like the one in Rena’s office?” he asked.
“Yes,” I answered slowly. I was beginning to wonder what he already knew. Was he in on this? Had Rena convinced him to hit on me so I would lose the bet?
“And the hostile lesbians?” he asked, pulling on one of my curls.
“I’m sure you know exactly what I’m talking about,” I said with a sarcastic edge to my voice. I was sooo not falling for this. He was as bad as all the rest of the loser cops I’d dated . . . maybe worse.
He stared at me for a long moment and I almost forgot how much I didn’t like him. Those damn blue eyes. “No, I have no idea what you’re talking about. If I did, I wouldn’t ask.”
“Right,” I snapped. “I really have to go, Mitch. Good luck with the new apartment. I’ll be moving out next week.” I turned and ran as quickly as my stupid pasta legs would carry me . . . which was not very fast.
“Kristy. Stop.” The sexy command in his voice made my throat go tight and everything inside my body tingle in anticipation. God, this jack-off knew how to push every one of my hoochie mama buttons. “Look at me,” he instructed.
I turned and waited.
“Your reasons aren’t good enough. I’m not quite understanding the Brett Favre and hostile lesbian thing, but it’s very clear you have dated some asshole cops. I’m not one of them. I’m the guy who can’t get you out of my head ever since I saw you the other day. That kiss in the library is burned into my brain and I keep replaying it.”
“Me too,” I whispered, then purposely banged my head against the wall. Admitting I wanted to trade spit with him was not going to help my case. His sexy answering smirk lit my panties on fire.
“Give me a chance,” he said, sending some kind of magic hoodoo straight to my brain and other unmentionable parts of me. “Get to know me . . . Let me take you out.”
I was pretty sure I wouldn’t have been able to say no even if the fate of mankind was resting on my answer.
“Okay,” I said in a voice that belonged in a porno. I quickly cleared my throat and tried again. “Okay, but here’s the deal . . . You can’t tell anybody. Not Jack, not Rena . . . no one.”
He put his hands on his hips, stretching his T-shirt across his insanely hot chest, and tilted his head to the side. My mouth went dry . . . “Are you ashamed of me?” he asked with mock severity.
“No,” I gasped. “It has something to do with the, um . . . lesbian–Brett Favre thing.”
“I’m going to take your word on that,” he chuckled. “Hell, short of doing something illegal, I’d do anything to go out with you. So if you want to keep it a secret . . . it’s a secret.”
“Thank you,” I blurted, grinning like an idiot.
“Tomorrow night?”
I thought for a moment. Rena and Jack were going to a concert . . . perfect. “Yes, tomorrow night.”
“Seven o’clock,” he said. “Do you want to meet me somewhere?”
“Um, no. Rena and Jack won’t be here; you can pick me up at my apartment . . . if you want to.” Crap, did that sound like an invitation for nookie?
“I’ll be there.” His voice was so damn hot I found myself leaning toward him. Thankfully I caught myself before I tumbled down the stairs and landed in a broken mess at his feet.
I righted myself, turned, and walked up the stairs with a little extra swing . . . I knew full well he was watching my butt. I might have to break bread with the hostile lesbos, but I had a weird feeling it would be worth it.
“Aunt Moon-Unit has called six times for you,” Rena informed me as I scrounged through the fridge looking for something that didn’t have a past-due date or wasn’t growing fur. Damn, nothing but salad dressing and hot dog buns.
“What did she want?” I pulled out a hot dog bun, checked it for mold, and ate it.
“No clue, I didn’t answer,” Rena said, grabbing another bun and joining me. “Holy fucking hell, we need to go grocery shopping.”
“Agreed,” I replied with a mouth full of dough. “Did she leave a message?”
“Not really. She just kept yelling your name louder and louder—like you would answer if she broke your eardrums.”
“Why didn’t you pick up?” I asked, searching for something that might taste a little better than an old stale hot dog bun.
“Because I spent an hour on the phone with her this morning discussing ways to murder bad chi with spatulas and fly swatters when I should have been crunching numbers for my clients.”
“’Nuff said. I’ll call her back in a minute.”
“How was your day?” she asked, unearthing some vanilla pudding from the salad crisper.
“Sucked. What’s the date on that stuff?” I asked, digging my own pudding cup out of the drawer.
“I can’t make it out.”
“I didn’t buy this crap. Do you remember buying it?” I asked, searching the little container frantically. I realized I was starving. In the midst of my hellacious day, I’d forgotten to eat.
“I never buy shit like this.”
“Well, we don’t have a pudding fairy as far as I know,” I snapped, still searching for an expiration date.
“Relax your crack,” Rena laughed. “Jack loves this stuff and the only time he ever grocery shopped for us was a week ago, so knock yourself out.”
I did and it was amazing. “God, we should buy this all the time,” I said grabbing another pudding out of the veggie drawer.
“You know what?” Rena said, stopping mid-pudding-shovel. “I think that wanker hid these. He thought if he put dessert in the veggie bin, we’d never find it.”
“What else do you think that rat bastard hid?” I asked, giving the crisper another search.
“I don’t know, but I’m going to find out.”
Ten minutes later we were settled on the couch with chips and salsa we’d found in the laundry room, cheese puffs we’d found under the bathroom sink, and beer we’d found on the top shelf of Rena’s closet.
“Jack’s a dick,” I said, enjoying the fruits of our hunt.
“Totally,” Rena agreed. “I think I’ll withhold sex for a week.”
I almost choked on a puff ball I laughed so hard.
“What?” she yelled. “You don’t think I’m capable of keeping my legs closed?”
“Nope.” I took a swig of warm beer to wash down the cheese ball that almost ended my life.
“You’re right, I’m not. Not where Jack’s concerned.” She rolled her eyes and laughed. “Speaking of not keeping your legs closed . . . Mitch is staying in Jack’s apartment.”
“First of all, that made no sense and second, why do you even call it Jack’s apartment when he’s completely taken over this one?”
“He has, hasn’t he?” she giggled, looking like a lovesick teenager. “All I’m saying is that Mitch thinks you’re a total babe and you need to have sex . . . like yesterday.”
“That’s just lovely,” I huffed. “I don’t know how to make it any more clear . . . I am done with cops. I will not poke the po-po or pork the pig. Ever.”
“Okay, that’s just disgusting and I’m the queen of inappropriate and gross.”
“You’re right,” I muttered. “Sorry.”
“Kristy, if you really like the guy, I’ll drop the bet.”
“You will?” I was shocked. Rena never backs off of anything. Especially something that would cause me massive embarrassment and involve Bigfoot or lesbians. To be fair, I’d do the same thing to her, only never on such a grand scale.
“No fucking way,” she yelled, laughing. “Although I would be really happy for you if you got laid by the fine specimen living downstairs.”
“Not to mention the inordinate amount of time I’d be spending with Edith and Mrs. C.”
“That’s just an added bonus,” she said gleefully.
Before I could call her a fucktard and fail yet again at having a curse-word-free existence, the phone rang and saved me from myself. “I’ll get it.”
I sat in shocked silence for six minutes and forty seconds while I listened to Aunt Moon-Unit’s dilemma. Pale, pissed, and confused, I told her I’d be there in a half an hour.
“What in the hell was that about?”
“Apparently an emergency Bigfoot meeting has been called for tonight and the trolls and fairies have told Aunt Moon-Unit if she doesn’t go, either the world will end or
Jeopardy!
will be cancelled. I’m not sure. I kind of zoned out after she said she knew something was wrong when she caught the cyborgs trying to copulate with your dead uncle Carlton.”
“Oh my God,” Rena groaned. “I’m worried if other people hear her talk, she’ll get institutionalized. Look, this is above and beyond the terms of the bet. I’ll take her.”
“No,” I sighed. “She said she’d rather I take her. The trolls said I was the one to solve the riddle of injustice, whatever the hell that means, and Moon-Unit said all you do is laugh and make fun of everybody.”
“Oh shit, I didn’t think she noticed that the last time I went with her.”
“Apparently everyone did.”
I went quickly to my room and changed into a cute sundress and sparkly flip-flops. Could this day be any longer? I was so looking forward to cheese balls and
Toddlers & Tiaras
. . . and all because of that jack-off
Baywatch
star, I was going to hang out with Yeti lovers.
“I just have one thing to say,” I told Rena as she finished off her beer, looking contrite about my evening. “David Hasselhoff is a fucktard.”