4. Tess
TESS
O h, God. This place is disgusting.
I’m kicking myself for not sending a team of cleaners in here before I packed my bags and flew over.
What had I been thinking? It certainly hadn’t occurred to me that the apartment would be in this sort of mess.
I’d known about the tattoo studio downstairs, but I’d figured the two places had remained independent of each other, with the doors shut between them.
I’d thought the apartment might have been dusty and in need of a good airing, but I’d been told it had been left to me furnished, and so I’d assumed I’d have been able to move straight in.
I certainly hadn’t thought the guys downstairs would have been using it as some kind of flophouse.
I stare around at the mess. Empty beer cans, pizza boxes, and overflowing ashtrays fill every surface. I don’t even want to think what the bathroom will be like.
This guy, Art, is an asshole, too. My whole ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’ thing had been completely wrong.
I absolutely could judge this one. He looks like a hard-ass, and he acts like one, too.
I’m amazed he carried my suitcase for me and hadn’t just watched me struggle up the stairs with it while he laughed with his friends.
I hesitate. I have two options—I can turn around and walk out again, and find a hotel until this place is cleaned up, or I can roll up my sleeves and get stuck in.
While the hotel option is more appealing, I’m not exactly drowning in money.
It cost a lot to fly out here, and even though the property might be worth a fortune, I’m not cash rich.
A hotel and cleaning crew would set me back several hundred pounds, which is even more in dollars.
Plus, I can tell this guy is spoiling for a fight.
I bet he deliberately left it like this, hoping to frighten me off. Well, it isn’t going to work.
Instead, I force myself to smile brightly. “What time do you guys finish?”
He narrows his blue eyes. “Why? Are you taking us out?”
“No, you’re going to come up here and help me sort this place out.”
He barks laughter. “The guys are never gonna go for that.”
I glance at the empty boxes and cans. “How about if I throw in free pizza and beer.” I don’t think I should need to bribe them into doing the chores—after all, they aren’t ten years old and this is their mess, but I figure a few pizzas and some beer is going to be cheaper than a professional cleaning crew and a hotel.
“Besides,” I continue, “it looks like a lot of stuff here belongs to you all, and I’m sure as hell not going to be sorting through it. If you can’t be bothered to come up and help, I’ll be throwing everything into black bags and it’ll be going in the trash.”
He scowls at me again, but I know I’ve won this battle at least.
“Fine,” he snaps. “I think the last client is at seven. We’ll be up after that.”
“Great.”
He leans into me, and for a moment, I have the strange idea that he’s going to press the side of his face against mine.
My heart beats hard, the masculine scent of him making me heady and my stomach swirling in a sensation I haven’t felt for some time.
He’s totally male, unrefined, coarse, yet somehow my body reacts to him on a purely primitive level.
He snatches something from behind me and moves away, and the moment is gone.
“Sorry.” One side of his mouth lifts in a smirk. “I need this for later.”
He holds a folder, which I realise he took from the bookcase behind me, and waves it at me.
With that, he turns around and stalks out of the apartment, leaving me standing there, watching his back as he leaves.
I exhale a breath and lean my shoulder against the wall.
Wow. I hope every meeting with him isn’t going to be as fraught as that one had been.
I’ll end up a nervous wreck within a week.
He’s clearly the sort of man who doesn’t like the idea of a woman stepping into his territory.
Well, tough. I’m here and I’m not going to allow myself to be bullied out of a place I own.
It isn’t in my nature to take people on, but I’m also not going to be walked all over by some British meathead.
The exhaustion of all the travel, plus the jetlag, sweeps over me.
I desperately want to sleep, but there’s no way I can bring myself to lie down on the bed in the small bedroom.
I can’t imagine when the sheets have last been washed, if they’ve ever been washed.
I’ll go out and buy myself new ones. A new bed would be nice, if I can afford one, though I think I might have to make do, for a while at least.
I sigh again and push myself back upright.
I wish I wasn’t so tired. I’m sure everything will be easier to handle without the fog of exhaustion surrounding me.
It might be midday here in England, but it’s still early back home, and I barely slept on the flight over.
I’d been so worked up about starting this new life, and wondering if I’d made the wrong choice, I hadn’t been able to get my mind to switch off.
I’m still questioning if I’ve done the right thing.
I shake the doubts away.
No, I had to leave. There’s no question.
Staying in the small town where I grew up wasn’t going to work.
Everyone knows too much about my business and I’m sick of all the patronising enquiries into how I’m doing, when all people really want is a bit of gossip they can pass onto their friends over coffee.
When this place landed in my lap, it had been like my aunt had handed me a lifeline.
I had only ever met my aunt once—during that trip here I’d taken with my father when I’d been ten—but I’d been her only living relative, so it makes sense that I’m the one who’s been left the property.
Even so, I can’t help wondering if both my father and aunt were looking down on me, saw me struggling, and gifted me something from heaven.
Right, now, however, this might turn out to be closer to hell.
Figuring I needed something to do that doesn’t involve cleaning up another person’s mess, I decide to go grocery shopping in preparation for the clean-up crew later. Besides, if I’m going to stay awake until what constitutes a reasonable bedtime, I’m going to need coffee.
I headed downstairs and sneak out through the rear exit so I don’t have to come face to face with the angry, hot tattooist again.
No, not hot. I don’t think he’s hot.
He’s an asshole, and I’ll do best to remember that.