Tease: A Kings of Korruption MC Novel (2 page)

I PLACE MY HAND on the door handle and push it open just as someone from the other side yanks it toward.
 
With my hand still on the handle, I stumble forward, hurriedly putting my hands out in front of me to prevent smashing my face off the sidewalk.
 
I don’t make it that far, though.
 
My hands connect with a wall of solid muscle.

“Sorry.”
 
The word is muttered from a gruff and smoky voice coming from about a foot above my head.
 
I’m five foot eight so that means this guy must be very tall.
 
By habit, I tilt my face toward his and smile.

“No worries.”
 
I move my fingers slightly and hear his swift intake of breath.
 
That’s when I realize that my hands are resting on his
very
firm torso.
 
I can feel the rough outline of his abs through his shirt.
 
I want nothing more than to explore further, and maybe even count them, but chances are, that might be creepy.
 
Standing upright, I readjust my hold on Dexter’s harness and pull away slightly, inhaling his scent as I go.
 
He smells like worn leather and motor oil mixed with a hint of cologne.
 
That smell is the sexiest thing ever to pass through my nostrils.

Realizing that I’m just standing there awkwardly smelling the poor man, I give him a tight smile and gently tug on Dexter’s lead, letting him know that it’s time to go.
 
I feel him step aside, and my shoulder brushes his chest as I pass.
 
I inhale his scent one last time before stepping out into the cool autumn afternoon.

Grinning like a fool, I make my way down the busy street, heading toward home.
 
I’m not one bit embarrassed that I just felt up that delicious-smelling man.
 
I don’t often get the opportunity to lay my fingers on such fine, toned flesh – like, ever.

Moving down the sidewalk, I put ab man out of my mind and think back to this morning and my counseling session with Max.
 
Max is an eleven-year-old boy who has lost most of his vision over the course of the last year.
 
My job, as his Vision Loss Counsellor, is to help him accept his blindness as his new reality and find something for him to be excited about again.

Today had gone well, and I’d finally noticed some progress.
 
Max even learned to play a chord on the guitar.
 
Over the past couple of months, I had tried to help him find something – anything – to be excited about, but Max is just pissed at the world.
 
He’s pissed he can’t play video games with his friends anymore.
 
Pissed that he can’t go outside and play road hockey with the neighborhood kids like he used to.
 
Mostly, Max is pissed because he loves sports, mostly soccer, and he just can’t play that anymore.
 
In his young mind, his life is over.

Last week I had given him one of the loaner guitars and an instructional CD for children that the hospital loaned out to patients of their various programs.
 
He had taken it, but I could hear the doubt coloring his voice; he was just too polite to voice it.
 
But the fact that he had gone home, listened to that CD and taught himself a chord on the guitar – I call that progress.
 

I love my job.
 
The hours are flexible, and I get to mentor some amazing kids in an area that I am passionate about.
 
My blindness happened when I was seventeen.
 
At first, I had been devastated, but then I realized that being blind is only a small part of who I am.
 
It doesn’t have to define me.
 
I was a strong and independent girl before it happened, and now I am an even stronger, more independent woman.
 
To be able to help children realize the same thing for themselves is an amazing feeling.

I know we’ve reached my building when Dexter slows, angling his body slightly to press against my leg.
 
This is my cue to slow down.
 
As we slow to a stop, I raise my hand, searching for the keyhole to the main door of the old stone house that holds four separate apartments, one of which I rent for an insane amount of money.
 
The apartment itself is huge, and its location is perfect, allowing me to walk just about everywhere I need to go, but I pay for it.

Dexter leads me up the familiar staircase to the doorway of my unit.
 
Once inside, I lock the door before turning and giving him an affectionate scratch behind the ear.
 
I unhook his harness, relieving him of his working duty.
 
As a Guide Dog, Dexter is trained to be in work mode from the minute that harness goes on in the morning until I take it off in the evening.
 
During that time, he is focused entirely on his job and ensuring my safety.
 
Once it comes off, though, he is just like any other gigantic lap dog.

He runs off in search of his stuffed rabbit while I move toward the kitchen to start making supper.
 
On the way, I stop to check for messages on my answering machine.
 
Within thirty seconds of it playing, I wish I had left that task until later.
 

As I walk down the hall, my mother’s nasally voice fills the apartment around me.

“Laynie, it’s your mother.
 
I didn’t get a chance to talk to you yesterday, and I’m worried.
 
You know I like to talk to you every night.” I roll my eyes, waiting for it to end, but she keeps talking.
 
“You need to call me, young lady.
 
I need to know that you’re OK.
 
I need to hear your voice, honey.
 
Please call me back.”

Entering the kitchen, I go straight to the fridge and pull out the lasagna that was left over from the night before while the next message plays.
 
My mother again.

“Laynie Marie!
 
I’m now officially worried.
 
Call me back immediately!”

God!
 
My mother drives me up the wall.
 
I love her to pieces, but she is a shameless worrywart that hovers around me at all times.
 
Even from three hours away, she still manages to keep tabs on me.
 
I can’t escape her.

The next message is from my brother, Daniel.
 
“Laynie?
 
Mom’s freakin’ out.
 
Why do you do this to her?
 
You need to call her.
 
She wants me to pop over and check on you.
 
Call me.”

Yanking my lasagna from the microwave, I make my way over to the couch and dig in to my supper.
 
Filled with frustration, I think about my family, wondering when they are going to realize that I’m a grown ass woman, and I need to live my own life.
 
If I had my sight, would they still treat me this way?
 
They may still have
their
sight, but they don’t really
see
me for who I really am; I’m not sure if they ever will … if
anyone
ever will.

It had never been my intention to talk to her.
 
I’d only come into the coffee shop to get a closer look.
 
I wish now that I hadn’t.
 
She was even hotter up close, and fuck me, she smelled like goddamned strawberries.
 
A whole fucking field of them.
 
It made me want to taste her.

I’d first seen her a couple weeks ago when I’d been keeping tabs on Charlotte, my buddy Ryker’s woman.
 
Charlotte works at a nursing home directly across the street from The Bean, a hipster-type coffee shop that I normally wouldn’t be caught dead in.
 
I drink my coffee black.
 
Coffee isn’t meant to have fucking whipped cream and chocolate shit drizzled all over it.

But today, I did go in.
 
I went in because I couldn’t fucking take it anymore.
 
Every time Charlotte worked, I sat outside, watching the shop for another glimpse of this woman, and every fucking time, there she was.
 
I needed to see her close up.
 
To see if her hair was as golden as it seemed to be from across the street.
 
I needed to see what color her eyes were and whether her figure was as smoking as it was from a distance.
 
It was.
 
Fuck, all of it was.
 
I never did see what color her eyes were, though.
 
They’d been hidden by a large pair of round framed sunglasses.

When I pulled that door open, I had no clue she was on the other side.
 
She comes flying at me, landing against my chest, her strawberry scent filling my nostrils.
 
A muttered apology is all I can manage.
 
I don’t know what the fuck to say.
 
She is there, right in front of me – fucking touching me — and I freeze.
 
I don’t want to scare her, which is odd because I
like
being scary.
 
I’ve worked at it.

I just stand there like a complete fucktard and stare at her.
 
It all happens so fast; I’m still frozen when she smiles tightly at me and walks away.
 
Stepping out of the shop behind her, I watch as she struts down the street, her ass swaying seductively in her long, tight-fitting dress.

After she turns the corner, her Guide Dog leading the way, I shake my head and go back to my post outside the nursing home.
 
Now that I’ve seen her up close, I have more questions than before.
 
What is her name?
 
Why is she at the coffee shop each day, always at the same time?
 
What color
are
her eyes?

I’m curious about her Guide Dog.
 
Is she blind?
 
She doesn’t seem to be, but she always has those glasses on, and her dog is always with her.
 
He wears a Guide Dog harness and vest, and it says Canadian Deaf Blind Association right on it.
 
And why the fuck does she smell like strawberries?

I don’t know why I care.
 
It’s not like I will ever find out.
 
It’s not like I want to.
 
There’s no room in my heart for her.
 
I’m pretty sure my heart’s dead anyways – black and shriveled.
 
It died a long time ago, back when I was just a kid.
 
I’ve been broken for as long as I can remember, and nothing will ever fix the fucked up pieces of my soul.
 
The truth is, I don’t even want to.
 
Everybody that I have ever loved has contributed to the fucked up mess that is my life, and I never want to love another person ever again.

A bitch like that would be scared shitless of a mean son-of-a-bitch like me anyways – as she should be.