Chapter One #2
And my last? Well, let's just say it ended when we got pulled over on the way home from the movies, and he was arrested on an absconder warrant out of Oregon. Apparently, he'd been on the run for a while.
I can read the signs. When the Universe decides that you're destined to spend life with a book addiction and a cranky dog instead of a man, you accept your fate. Before you end up tied up in someone's trunk.
I cannot express enough how much I do not want to end up tied up in someone's trunk, so I took a break from trying to find my forever. Instead, I'm living vicariously through my favorite heroines.
Mason doesn't seem dangerous…but neither did Stephen, and he had a whole damn criminal history. It wasn't even a little criminal history, either. It spanned years! And Joey didn't seem like he was going to pull out a baggie of cocaine and offer to cut me a line, either.
Clearly, my judgement cannot be trusted.
Or maybe it's just something about me that attracts the worst kind of people.
I mean, once is an accident, twice is a coincidence, but anything after that is a pattern, right?
It's not like my dating life is the only disaster, either.
Basically, my whole damn existence is one isotope from being radioactive.
I'm pretty sure it's me. I am the problem.
"We'll see," I tell Sarah instead of committing.
"Chicken," she mutters.
"You're one to talk."
She just sticks her tongue out at me in a very mature retort. I don't push her on it, though. She's a shy little bookworm who struggles to string sentences together in front of the opposite sex.
She'll never admit it, but she's in love with my brother, Jasper.
I set them up on a blind date recently. Guess how much she's told me about it?
Nothing! She has no idea that I know he was her date, though.
She still thinks I think the guy was some random man who popped up in her direct messages.
Please. It was me, plotting her future wedding to my brother.
At least one of us deserves to be happy.
She's still seeing him. She looks guilty as hell, all day, every day, but she hasn't confessed yet.
He hasn't either…not that I'm surprised.
He's like Fort Knox when it comes to her.
But she'll crack sooner or later. In the meantime, I'm happy to wait her out.
I don't want to push and ruin whatever is going on with the two of them.
We shelve books in silence for several long moments before the bell over the door rings.
"Welcome to the Book of Love!" Sarah chirps without even turning around.
"Thanks," a familiar deep voice drawls from the opposite side of the door.
I spin around so fast I make myself dizzy.
Holy shit.
My hot new neighbor is in my bookstore. Well, it's not my bookstore, but that's beside the point. Mason is here.
I grab Sarah's arm, yanking her around the side of the shelf.
"That's him!" I hiss.
"What?"
"The guy who just came in. That's him."
"Him?" She stares at me blankly.
"My new neighbor."
"Oh!" Her eyes fly open wide. "He's here?"
"Yes!"
She peeks her head around the side of the shelf, her mouth popping open before she lets out a muted squeak and pulls her head back like a freaking turtle retreating into her shell. "Holy shit, Olive. He's hot."
"I know," I growl. "Why is he here?"
"Because he likes to read?"
I narrow my eyes at her. "Men who look like him do not read the same things we read, Sarah."
Trust me. The last time I asked a man who looked like him for his thoughts on whether you'd still be a virgin if you had sex as a ghost and then got your virginized body back after, he called me a weirdo and then left the library without even checking anything out.
Loralei wouldn't let me come back to the library for two weeks!
"Some of them do."
"Very few of them do," I sniff, fully prepared to die on this hill.
She opens her mouth to argue and then snaps it closed because she knows I'm right. Most men who find their way here are not here for themselves. Most of them don't even want to be here.
I march around the side of the shelf, determined to find out why Mason is here. I draw up short when I nearly bump into him.
"Hey, Rebel." He grins, reaching out to steady me. "I thought that was you."
"It is. Why are you here?"
He blinks, his grin slipping. "Huh?"
Jeez. I sound like I'm ready to whip out the Malleus Maleficarum and accuse him of witchcraft.
"I mean, I'm surprised to see you in my bookstore."
"Your bookstore?" His lips twitch as he glances around. "You own it? Nice."
"Yes. I mean, no. Lilah Davis owns it. I just…" I wave my hand, deciding it's probably better not to tell the hottie-next-door that the sum total of my life consists of petri dishes, arguing with a Yorkie, and this bookstore. "That's beside the point. I'm just curious what you're doing here."
"Uh, I came to get a book?"
He's lying, and he isn't very good at it.
Why is he lying?
Oh, my gosh. Did he follow me here?
"What book?" I ask, narrowing my eyes at him.
"Uh…" He stares at me for a moment before his lips curve into a grin. "Haven't decided yet. I thought I might look around a little bit first. I mean, if that's okay with you."
"Fine with me." I move aside, presenting the store with a flourish.
This should be good. The way he reacts when he realizes exactly what kind of bookstore this is will be telling.
If he's a jerk about it, I can cross him off the list of fantasy material.
No way am I getting myself off to thoughts of a man who looks down on romance. My vagina will blow dust first.
He cocks his head to the side, eyeing me silently. And then he chuckles and steps around me, close enough that his arm brushes against mine. I pretend I don't shiver…but I definitely do.
I also watch him like a hawk, trying to figure him out as he browses the shelves, picking up books, reading the cover copy, and then replacing them. He doesn't look surprised, disgruntled, embarrassed, or even slightly annoyed at all. He's perfectly…chill.
What the fuck?
"Stop staring!" Sarah hisses, bustling past me.
"I'm not," I lie.
She just snorts wordlessly, which I take to mean she knows I'm full of shit but isn't going to call me out on it yet. She'll wait until we're alone, like a true best friend does.
"How's Oscar?" Mason asks as he drifts closer again, running his finger over the spines on one shelf in a way that screams sex. God, he's ridiculously gorgeous.
"What?"
"How is Oscar?"
"Oh. Fine." I pause. "Vicious and deadly."
His lips twitch. "Is that a warning, Rebel?"
"Why? Do you need one?"
He doesn't answer. Instead, he plucks a book from the shelf, shoots me a smirk that makes my clit twitch, and then strolls toward the counter. "See you later, neighbor."
I stand rooted in place, watching until Sarah finishes checking him out and he disappears. I'm not sure I breathe the entire time, and then I mutter a curse.
I forgot to see what book he bought.
Dammit.