CHAPTER 2 #2
The house is huge, fucking massive, to the point I would categorize it as a mansion, and it’s old.
It’s the kind of home which would have been considered a place of import back when the comings and goings of more polite society was what mattered in this city.
I can almost see it lit up from the inside out with glittering lights as fancily dressed maidens and smartly dapper gents walk through the front door for a ball everyone wants an invitation to.
While the size of the place is far from the problem, one glance at the monstrosity in front of me makes it obvious what the problem is.
It needs to be overhauled from the studs out. Hell, some of the studs probably need to be replaced. The whole home has fallen into disrepair and I’m not sure how much will be salvageable.
I might be a guy who loves a good restoration, but this is beyond that. This is a rebuild while keeping the old charm in place. Everything must be stripped and then rebuilt.
The cost will be astronomical; the thought makes me shiver as I get out of my truck.
There’s no way I can lie to myself that someone, pretty much anyone, is going to have the money to make this job doable.
And that is a fucking shame because this house is amazing as a dilapidated eyesore. I can’t imagine what it would be if brought back to its former glory.
As I head toward the porch steps, movement in one of the upper windows catches my eye and makes me pause. The thought of someone in the house makes my stomach flip because nothing about this place is even a little bit habitable beyond a wild animal squatting where it doesn’t belong.
I stare at the window where I saw movement, but there’s nothing there. Still, it is as if I can’t tear my eyes away for a solid minute. Once I do, I step up onto the porch and move toward the front door. No one should be inside, but the SUV parked out front tells me someone is here.
Why does the thought make my blood boil?
Before I can make it to the door, I take a step, and my leg falls through the rotted wood on the porch and is swallowed up to my knee.
“Fucking hell! Mother fucker, cock sucking damn it!”
The words are ripped from me and compete with the clattering of my metal clipboard and notebook holder against the wood as it falls from my hands as I hope I can brace myself and not fall completely through the porch. As if falling through as much as I have isn’t bad enough.
It is.
And it’s fucking annoying as hell.
I feel suspended in a horror movie, surrounded by my own personal hell.
My leg aches and I hope I didn’t snag a nail or some shit, and I don’t have a gash I’ll need to go and get checked out. The last thing I need is an infection; those are the kinds of things that take you out.
After testing the wood around me and finding it as solid as I can hope for, given the situation, I’m about to use my upper body to pull myself free of the hole when the front door swings open. A light gasp cuts through the air and the creepy vibes of this place.
When my head snaps up, I’m met with a fucking vision which steals my breath and has my heart pounding in my chest for a reason that has nothing to do with falling through a wooden porch.
The woman in front of me is the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen. She has on shorts that should be fucking illegal, and a tank top covered in paint splatter. Her blonde hair floats around her like every strand has a mind of its own and their combined purpose is to make me need her even more.
I desperately want to wrap her hair around my fist and tug her head back as I take her mouth in a brutal kiss which leaves us both breathless and begging for more.
What the fuck is going on?
“Are you okay?”
The woman’s voice is soft and a little husky as she reaches toward me like she’s going to help me out of the literal hole that I’m in. The thought of her being hurt, of her finding another soft spot on this porch, has me seething.
“Stop,” I growl, “don’t come any closer. You will not be falling through this porch.”
She stands up to her full height, which can’t be more than 5’7”, or 5’8” on a tall day, and stares me down as if anything about her is intimidating.
“No, I won’t be falling through this porch, I had already identified that soft spot and am aware of a few others around here.
” She waves her hand toward the rest of the antebellum porch as if what she says doesn’t have me seeing fucking red. “But I can help you if you need it.”
“No,” I grunt as I push myself up enough to get my leg free and then stand up.
I step closer to her, avoiding the hole and the surrounding wood.
She doesn’t step back from me and there isn’t an ounce of fear on her face as she looks at me and something like interest sparks in her grey eyes.
“Now,” I growl, my eyes raking over her, “please tell me you haven’t been sleeping in this death trap? ”
The woman is unphased by the warning in my words or the hunger I know she must see in my eyes. Fucking hell, I can just make out the way her nipples pebble underneath her tank top as I shuffle a little closer.
Her eyes narrow and she crosses her arms across her chest which effectively pushes her tits up like a damn offering which has my mouth watering.
“I don’t see how where I’ve been sleeping is any of your business.
” She arches an eyebrow, the challenge written all over her face.
“Now,” she mocks me, “do you want to tell me who the hell you are, or should I just make assumptions even though you do a damn good job of it all on your own?”
Fuck. Me.
This woman. She’s mine. My cock is a steel bar in my pants that I desperately need to reach down and adjust. I’m not sure how she would react to such a move, but the last thing I want is for her to run for the hills.
My gut is screaming at me that this isn’t the type of woman to run, but still.
After taking a deep breath, I stick my hand out between us, my voice rough with a need I’ve never felt before, “I’m called Hammer, but you will only ever call me Tripp. I’m from Devil’s Construction.”
Her grey eyes roam over my face for a moment and then her smaller hand tucks into mine and my fucking knees buckle. As my body lights up from the inside out, I would have thought I just electrocuted myself considering the sensation flowing through my body.
But I know better.
This is just as severe. Just as life changing. And no less deadly.
If I hadn’t already known, I would know now.
This woman is mine.
“I’m Laiken and this death trap, as you so eloquently put it, is now mine.”
Yeah, I’m done for this woman. She just doesn’t know it yet.