Chapter 1
Serayah
I was coming back home to Cupid City from a book signing in New York, just riding the high of an unbelievable turnout.
I’d written everything from small town romance to paranormal romance, but the trope that had really been my bread and butter that year was stalker romances.
I had been an author for almost five years, but it had just been in that last year that I’d really found my audience.
My readers made it known that I needed to stay in that lane, and at least for the time, I didn’t want to disappoint them.
So, I just kept churning the stories out and making my rounds on the romance convention circuit.
While I loved being in The Big Apple of New York City, it was nice to come back to my apartment. It felt like a warm hug, and I was so excited to kick back and relax in the heart of Cupid City again. It had been good to me.
When I unlocked my apartment door, I was hit with a stench. It smelled like something had died, not at all like the usual cozy scent it had when I had left it. So much for the warm hug.
Dropping my bags on the floor, I began my investigation.
I had only been gone for a week. What could have gotten in my apartment that quickly?
I wondered. I started opening cabinets, left and right, until I discovered the culprit.
There was a dead mouse under the sink. I never knew mice could leave such a foul smell.
Just then, my phone went off. It was my best friend, Tasha.
“Hey girl!” I greeted her.
“Welcome back, superstar. We’re going out tonight. Get dressed.” I could tell she was all smiles on the other end.
Rolling my eyes, I said, “Oooh, no, no, no. I’m exhausted. I’m jet-lagged, and I found a dead mouse. Did you know they stink? I didn’t know that.”
“Girl. Ew. Get dressed. You can sleep tomorrow.” She was insistent. Tasha is my party girl friend. She’s as loyal as they come, but she’s always trying to hook me up with someone.
My eyes turned suspicious. “I know what you’re doing…”
She laughed. “And what’s so wrong with that? You probably got cobwebs down there.”
Gasping, I said, “That’s really fucked. You don’t know me.”
“Hmmm. Tell me I’m lyin’ and I’ll shut up.
Tell me about the greatest dick you’ve had recently.
I’ll wait…” She started whistling. I didn’t say anything.
“That’s what I thought. For someone who writes about getting railed on the regular, you really need to follow your own advice.
Now, get dressed because we are going to clear those webs. ”
She laughed as she hung up the phone. I hated her…and loved her. I was exhausted, but a night out could be fun, I thought. If anything, I would use it as a reason to celebrate a great book signing.
*
Tasha picked me up two hours later. “Where are we going?” I asked her.
“There’s this new place. Velvet Arrow. I’ve seen photos. Verrry sexy,” She winked.
With a smirk, I said, “I bet.” Tasha didn’t have the best track record for picking classy places.
“No, I’m serious. Candlelit venue…serving the best of the best drinks.”
Pulling the visor down and popping open the mirror, I applied lip gloss and fixed my hair. “We’ll see. You’ve taken me to some crazy places.”
She giggled. “Ok, we need a code word if we decide to leave with someone.”
Sucking in a breath, I was louder than I meant to be when I said, “Leave with someone! You’d freaking leave me?”
“Oh, calm down. We could make it a threesome if you really wanted to come with.”
I laughed so loud. “That’s HIL-arious! Not.
Look. If you leave with someone, they had better be driving, because I need a ride home.
Same with me. Neither of us get left without a car.
And we have to tell each other what’s up.
AND meet the guy…this way if he’s a serial killer, you can identify him when you get called in to look at a line-up. ”
We laughed and agreed as we pulled up to Velvet Arrow.
They had a valet, so we pulled right in front.
I was already loving the place for the valet, alone.
Tasha was right, it was sexy. Candlelight sconces ran along the wall of the long hallway entrance.
All of the tables had candles, and the bar itself was dimly lit.
The place felt like a secret, and I felt like I wasn’t supposed to be there.
“Tash, how did you find out about this place?”
She turned toward me and hooked her arm in mine. “A friend of a friend of a friend. Look over there. Break me off a piece of that.”
My eyes landed on a group of men in suits, mixed in with men in casual attire, but still nicely dressed. Some men had a woman on their arm, and some were flying solo. At least it seemed like they were flying solo.
Tasha nudged me and said, “Serayah, girl, take your pick and get it on.”
I nudged her back with my elbow. “Cut it out. I’m not just going to jump on the first guy that talks to me.”
She giggled, “I might. Let’s get a drink. You need to loosen those cheeks, girl. You’re supposed to be celebrating.”
I blushed and laughed, knowing she was right.
I’d been overworked and needed to celebrate.
We walked up to the bar and ordered a couple of drinks.
Before I knew it, one martini turned into four, and I was feeling it.
The room was warm, and I had to pee. I tapped Tasha on the shoulder and said, “I need to find the bathroom. Can you order me some water? I need to slow down.”
“Yeah, I gotchu. The bathroom is on the other side and down the hall. Be careful. I have my phone.”
Nodding and smiling, I made my way to the ladies room.
It was sweltering, so I wet a paper towel and dabbed my neck, face, and between my boobs.
Geez. The one time I wish these girls were a bit smaller, I thought.
The sweat was unreal. After reapplying some lip gloss and fluffing my curls some more, I stepped back into the hallway.
There was an intoxicating scent hanging in the air.
Cologne. Of course it was, there were a million men around.
Looking to the left, I spotted a back door.
Fresh air. I just wanted to step outside for a few minutes to cool down some more.
The crisp air hit me, and I instantly felt better. Just then, I heard someone say, “Hey, sweet thing. What’re you doing out here alone? It’s not safe.”
I snickered because the line sounded awfully cliché, and familiar, but I couldn’t place it. I said, “I’m good, thanks. Just needing some fresh air.”
“I don’t think you heard me. A pretty little thing like you shouldn’t be here alone.” Then he came up and grabbed me by my arms.
I turned to try and get a look at his face, but he had a hood on, and he was wearing some sort of face mask.
I could barely see him because it was so dark out.
“Hey! Stop. Stop it!” I tried to pull away from him, but he held on tighter and slowly started to move me to the other side of a parked car.
“HELP!!!!!! HELP!” I screamed as I stumbled backward, trying not to fall.
“Shut up, bitch!” he said. It sounded like his teeth were clenched and he was vicious. Before I knew what was happening, he pushed me down to the ground, where my knees landed hard on the gravel. Pain shot up my body.
“HEY!” another voice hollered. A deeper voice.
The attacker said, “Oh, fuck off. We’re busy.”
“I’m pretty sure you’re not, asshole.” I looked up and saw a tall, muscular man with a dirty blonde buzz cut, five-o’clock shadow, and whiskey-colored eyes approaching the guy from behind.
When the bastard turned around, muscle man punched him so hard he hit the car and bounced off, landing on the ground a little distance away from me.
“Fuck. Who the fuck are you? I think you broke my nose.” Douchebag asked.
“Her boyfriend, asshole. Keep your fucking hands to yourself and learn what stop means.”
The guy jumped in the parked car and took off. He was out of sight before Muscles could get to them.
Seeing that I was having trouble standing, he came over and picked me up. “Wrap your arms around me,” he said.
“My boyfriend…?” I asked in a whisper.
“For now. Just to get you away from that shit stain.” Then, Muscles carried me back inside the building, stepping into an empty side room. He set me down on a padded bench and said, “Don’t move.”
I could see him through a crack in the door from where I was sitting and watched him walk to the bar and talk to the bartender and another guy standing near the entrance.
Then, he pulled out his phone and made a call that lasted about thirty seconds.
I saw the bartender hand him a few things before he finally made his way back to me.
Looking down, I noticed scrapes on my knees.
They were bleeding with bits of gravel in the cuts.
Muscles kneeled in front of me with a wet paper towel and started cleaning up the scrapes, removing little pebbles as he went.
Each pass of the towel made me wince. He said, “I’m sorry.
I’ve got a Band-Aid here. When you go home, shower, and just keep it clean.
Don’t scrub it or anything. Reapply the bandage if you’d like, but everything is out of the cuts now.
I called the police and reported that guy and the car. They’ll catch him eventually.”
I wondered, Who is this guy? Is he a doctor?
He was dressed sharply, wearing dark-washed jeans, black boots, and a clean black T-shirt with a suit jacket over it.
He took it off after he set me down. His muscles were bulging in the T-shirt.
It looked as if it were about to burst at the seams. Suddenly, I felt warm again.
“Thank you,” I said, but cautiously. “Um…I didn’t get your name.”
“I didn’t tell you my name.”
Well, Mr. Charming just turned into Mr. Grumpy, I thought. “Ok, well, I guess we’ll stick with Muscles then.”
He let out a low laugh that I don’t think he wanted me to hear because he stopped himself and went back to being serious. “Muscles?”
“Yeah, well, you have a lot of them, so I started calling you Muscles in my mind.”
“Hmmm.”
“Anyway, thanks, Muscles.” He finally stood up and held my hand to help me up.
When he pulled me up, we were standing so close.
The cologne. It was him. He smelled like the ocean, and he was just as intoxicating as the martinis I’d been drinking.
“You smell like the ocean,” I said nervously.
My eyes finally found their way up to his lips.
Tasha was right. I thought, I’m a romance writer.
I write about this sort of thing all the time, and now it’s happening to me.
A man rescues me, and we hook up in the side room.
I could go for a quickie one-night stand, never see him again type of hook up. Why not? It can happen to me. Right?