Chapter Four
M itch
“Can I just tell you my type instead?”
Mitch hemmed, avoiding Emma’s eyes since he knew the no-nonsense neighbor wasn’t going to take “no” for an answer.
“Maybe later,” she murmured, quietly, forcing him to lift his eyes from his grubby sneakers and meet hers across the slender hallway where they still sat after Emma’s abbreviated room search. “Why don’t you want to tell me, Mitch?”
The way she said his name was vaguely intoxicating. Not because she was purring or oozing or being otherwise sexy. Indeed, apart from her captivating looks and feminine curves, she was strictly all-business. But other than with professors back on campus, Mitch hadn’t had much experience with grown women.
His mother had left at an early age, leaving just Mitch and his father to carry on without her. The old man did his best but just couldn’t raise Mitch alone, leading to a series of live-in girlfriends and two whole ass stepmoms to do the job for him. To say they each got progressively worse as the years went on would have been the understatement of the century, but it didn’t faze Mitch much once he graduated high school and headed off to Coastal College. He hadn’t been home since and had no plans to anytime soon, either.
But Emma seemed ... different. Cool, calm, collected ... even concerned. After all, she’d stayed up half the night troubling over her neighbor’s house as the party raged and even barged in, despite Mitch’s best efforts to stop her from doing so, to check on the little shit who lived there. He wasn’t used to such maturity in his life and felt oddly compelled to tell her the truth. And, so... he did.
“I don’t know Reggie,” he blurted, their eyes meeting in the dim light of the second floor landing.
Emma seemed surprised, but still curious. Perhaps even more so. “But ... you. Here. House party. What do you mean you don’t know him?”
“He put an ad up on the campus bulletin board, in the Student Center,” Mitch confessed sheepishly. “Spring Break road trip. See the beach. Fun in the sun, that kind of thing. I think he was thinking just girls would respond but I’d never been to the beach before, so...”
Suddenly, Emma’s eyelids arched. “Never?”
“I grew up smack dab in the middle of Georgia, so... I’ve seen a few creeks and swamps in my day, but never a whole ass beach. I thought, for the price of gas and snack money, why not?”
“And Reggie?”
“He didn’t really want me to come,” Mitch related honestly. “He didn’t say it in so many words, but he kind of ghosted my calls and texts up until the last minute, and only then because one of his bros decided to fly to Cabo instead and he needed the gas money to make up for it. So...”
Mitch kind of held up his hands in a little “ta da” motion. Emma frowned. “So you’re not in classes with him or anything?” When Mitch shook his head, she glanced down beside her, at the stairwell and, by extension, the living room downstairs where Frat Bro # 1 was snoring heavily, sprawled out on the couch. “What about the rest of them?”
“Only met them this morning when we all piled into Reggie’s van for the three-hour trip here.”
Emma peered back, her face a mask of mixed emotions. “Okay.”
“Okay what?”
She smiled at last. “Not sure, I just ... thought you were old friends or something.”
Mitch shrugged and murmured, “I never made all that many at school. Friends, that is. Kind of a loner, I guess?”
“And girls?”
Mitch snorted. “Haven’t had much luck with them, either.”
“No?” Emma sounded legitimately surprised. “Cute guy like you?”
This time, Mitch’s snort bordered on derisive. “Are you screwing with me, because...”
She merely cocked her head, eyes widening above her clucking tongue. “You need to see more than just the beach this spring break, Mitch,” she announced, standing abruptly as he watched her sinews and curves anew, marveling at the delicate intricacies of a grown woman’s body in such close, quiet proximity.
“Yeah? Like what?” He joined her in a standing position, peering gently down into her soft brown eyes.
“Like the mirror,” she quipped, leading him gently back down the stairs. “You’re too young and handsome to sound so defeated. It’s spring break. You’re here. Go to the beach. Show off your little college boy bod. Meet some girls and, well ... do what spring breakers do, I guess?”
“What?” Mitch scoffed as they reached the bottom of the stairs. “Like Reggie back there?”
Emma winced predictably, turning halfway to the door. “Maybe take her out to dinner first, huh? Get to know her a little before you drink tequila out of her pierced belly button...”
He smiled and held the door open for her, even as Emma stood just inside of it, lingering for another moment longer. “Spoken like a true grownup.”
Emma’s sigh was heavy and laden with more than just impatience. “Would a grownup sit around chatting with some spring breaker in the middle of the night after doing her due diligence as a good neighbor?”
Mitch leaned against the open door, admiring her anew. “Good point, Emma,” he said, annunciating her sexy little name pointedly. “So why did you stick around?”
“Not sure,” she confessed. “Old times’ sake, I guess?”
“How so?”
“I never really had a spring break of my own,” she confessed. “Got accepted to school my senior year, a good one. Nice little liberal arts college in Tennessee. Was really looking forward to it and then Gran got sick and Dad was too busy at the office to take care of her and she couldn’t afford home care, so...”
Mitch was nodding, seeing Emma in a whole new light. No wonder she was such a good neighbor, he mused to himself. She was just a good person. Period. “So no college means ... no spring break?”
“Sad to say,” she sighed. “I guess, sitting here tonight, listening to you talk about the beach and seeing your university t-shirt and sweet, youthful face I suppose I just got a little wistful, that’s all.”
“I can help you with that,” Mitch blurted before he could stop himself.
“With what, my sudden midlife crisis?”
“Whatever you want to call it, Emma.”
She paused, inching past him back onto the welcome mat where their brief night together had begun. “How’s that, College Boy?”
“I mean, I could use a guide to the beach still...”
She made a “pfft” sound to join her rolling eyes. “Kid, the beach is that way, just point and shoot. No guide necessary.”
“What, I should go to the tourist beach like some ... tourist?”
“That’s where the girls will be, stud.” She punched him playfully on the arm, inching gently away.
“What if I don’t want a girl, Emma?”
“That’s fine,” she teased with a wink and a quick finger gun point. “Plenty of boys will be there, too.”
“You know what I mean. Just ... show me around, you know?”
“I would,” she lied, already turning away, “but duty calls, you know?”
“Food truck. Downtown. Right, I got it, well...”
She paused midway down the sidewalk, chipper face illuminated by the half-full moon, the street as deadly silent as the stranger’s house at his back. “Listen, Mitch, I’ve had a blast tonight. Thank you for my first night of spring break. I hope you have fun this week and, for my sake? Try to keep it down, okay?”
He mumbled something under his breath, but she was too far away to hear it. Instead he just watched her walk away, memorizing every smooth ripple of her perfect little ass and every seismic swish of her effortlessly sexy ponytail until she disappeared, across the yard and up her walkway and into the house next door.
And even then he lingered, watching the lights go off in Emma’s house, imagining her kicking off the fuzzy pink slippers in her own foyer and, eventually, tugging off those clingy yoga pants. Unzipping her skimpy little hoodie and slipping back into her nightgown before sliding into bed.
Would she think of him? Mitch wondered, idly, before finally shutting the door. Would she think of him the rest of the night and into the early morning, the way Mitch would surely think of Emma?
And what would she think, later that day, when he showed up at her food truck, beach bag packed and ready, just waiting for her to get off?
In more ways than one...