Chapter 3
Ishika
“What am I doing? My dad will kill me if he finds out about my intentions.”
I am about to do the unthinkable. Parking outside an old garage, I am about to meet a man who apparently sells his soul for money.
I am wearing my little black dress and black, four-inch heel Manolos, with a jeweled buckle in front. My black hair falls straight over my shoulders and my lips are colored blood red. And, it took me twenty minutes to get the winged eyeliner right. So much effort to please a stranger.
This is an investment for my future.
Walking to the front desk, I ring the bell that sits on the counter.
“Just a minute,” someone yells from the inside room.
I check the old run-down place; it could use a new coat of paint for sure.
The desk is so cluttered, how does anyone get any work done sitting in this space?
It looks like a dumping ground for receipts and papers.
Don’t even get me started on how much paper is wasted.
There is a reason why digitalization is a necessity.
Reduction of clutter and everything stays organized with a click of a mouse button.
But looks like this office lost that memo a long time ago.
Appearances make lasting impressions. My bedroom isn’t exactly tidy but my work space is professional at all times.
“Yes. How can I help you, ma’am?” a man says distractedly. He looks like he can’t wait for me to leave so he can go back to doing whatever he was doing in the back room. If this is the guy I am supposed to meet, I am disappointed. I don’t think he can help me get what I want.
“Oh, are you the one in charge?”
“I’m the manager. Does your car need fixing?” he asks.
“No, my car is fine. Actually, I’m here to see someone named Savage. Owen sent me. He said ‘Savage’ could solve my problem.”
The guy lifts his head and really looks at me for the first time. Like really looks at me, from head to toe. Up and down. Twice.
“Owen said you should see Savage?”
I nod.
“And your name is?”
“Ishika Fernandes.”
“Oh, like Owen’s friend, Ishika. Why didn’t you say so earlier? You are not what I expected...” He gives me an amused smile.
Oh God! He knows what I’m here for?
“Is Owen here? He said he would join me for the meeting.”
“He’s running a little late. But he asked me to show you in.”
We enter a narrow corridor, which leads to the work shed off the garage at the back of the property.
He walks over to a blue car and bangs his fists on the hood. “Savage. There is a young lady waiting to talk to you. Owen sent her.”
I hear someone grunt in response from under the car that is sitting on jacks.
“He won’t be long.” With that, he gives me his sly knowing smile again and leaves me to fend for myself.
I study the cars around me to calm the restless energy. The one right in front of me is a 1966 Shelby GT350. My granddad has one of those. A shuffling scraping noise jolts my attention, making me look down toward the front of the car.
Black combat boots are the first things that come into view.
His feet are really big, and his shoes are very dusty.
The metal creeper underneath scrapes and noisily swivels on the floor, and I see his denim-clad, long muscular legs next.
He is a tall guy. I clear my throat when his muscular thighs spread out to stretch his long legs and he drags his lower body some more into the opening.
His pelvis is next in my line of sight and I blink rapidly, mentally scolding myself.
Don’t look at his junk. Don’t look…
Nice!
Damn it! I told you not to look.
The creeper that holds the person hidden under the car squeaks louder. I swallow as his flat abdomen, broad chest, chin, and a hard jawline dusted with scruff reveal itself.
Hot. Damn!
I am drooling.
I can’t believe I am reacting like this for a man I have never even met before, whose face is still a mystery. Nervous energy courses through my body, making me want to turn and run back to my car.
I am about to propose something so unconventional to a complete stranger.
While I want to run and hide, I am also desperately intrigued to see what this stranger looks like. Maybe he is ugly. Maybe he has plaque on his teeth. Or maybe he has a chipmunk voice. My pheromones demand to know these facts. And that is why I stay put and drool some more.
A pair of arms come up to hold the bumper as he pushes himself out.
His fingers are long and coated in black soot and grease.
Blue veins run down from his forearms and disappear in the bulge of his biceps, confirming he works out.
There are tattoos on his biceps that are hiding beneath his light gray T-shirt.
He bends his knees and slides out of the covering to unveil his gorgeous face.
I take it all in. His face, his big hands, his taut muscular body. I am momentarily mesmerized by the masculine perfection in front of me.
Until I feel a pinch of a distant memory. A flavor of tease spreads on my taste buds.
My grandma says memories have tastes associated to them.
I thought it was weird when she mentioned it the first time. “How can you taste memories? They are not edible. They are not like a flavor of ice cream or like a piece of fruit, Avó,” I had argued. I called my grandmother Avó.
“The important ones do, Ishy. While some memories leave a bad taste, some churn your gut and make you queasy. Some make you question your decisions and actions of the past. And then there are those precious few memories that bring a smile to your lips,” Avó had explained.
A sweet taste of my first kiss hums in my mind. This taste brews and brews as it intensifies into a nameless flavor, something like an equal dose of poison and elixir.
What I feel leaves me confused and irritated. My blood boils with rage at that memory, while at the same time thrill courses through my body, making my toes curl.
And that’s not all, my lady parts decide I have priorities. And my priorities demand that I gawk at this fine male specimen shamelessly.
He is so handsome. His hair is dark brown, ruffled, a little long so it curls at the tips that rest on the neck of his T-shirt.
His jaw is chiseled perfection and covered with scruff.
His eyes are blue, like the skies meant for flying kites on bright summer mornings. His lips are a darker shade of pink.
The color of a man’s lips is most likely the same color of the tip of his penis.
So then his cock is dark pink…
Shut up! Don’t dare look at his junk.
Stare at his high cheekbones instead.
There is a line of grease mixed with dirt on the arch of each of his cheekbones.
Like that of war paint applied before heading into a battle.
And this is a war that he would instigate anytime now simply to spite me.
Any minute now, he will scream a battle cry, throw down the proverbial gauntlet, pounding his chest.
And because I have issues, clearly, I will accept his challenge for a duel.
He will grapple and wrestle me to the dirty floor.
And I will possibly kick his nuts because, well, he is asking for it.
And then he will grind his square jaw in pain and frustration only to tear off his T-shirt with his bare hands to reveal his broad manly chest because…
Oh gosh!
Is it getting warm in here?
He is still on the floor, lying flat on his back, balancing on the metal creeper. He stares at my face for a minute.
Then he blinks and at the same time, I blink too.
Wow! Our eyelids are really in sync. Let’s try it again to test a theory.
Once.
Twice.
Thrice.
Three perfect coordinated blinks.
This cannot be a coincidence!
Before I can test our blinking eye routine again, the man jackknifes from the floor and immediately a scowl mars his face.
My stomach drops. Gooseflesh breaks out on my skin as I remember the night when this man who was once a boy, put a knife to my throat then stole my first kiss.
Reality knocks me out of my lustful fantasies finally.
I am standing face-to-face with Savage. My words betray me, as I cannot find my voice, and my feet are stuck to the ground.
I can’t move.
“Can I help you?” he says in a baritone voice with no hint of recognition. It’s deeper and richer than the last time.
“I-I-” I mutter unintelligently.
“Miss, does your car need fixing?” he asks, leaning on the hood of the car.
There is no way I am discussing my problem with Ryan Harper.
“It’s fine. I think I lost my way,” I say, gaping at this man before me.
Does he not remember who I am?
Well, that’s convenient, isn’t it?
And here I am, recalling every single moment from all those years ago like it was yesterday.
I can’t forget the boy I never had a chance to know.
The boy who stared at me for hours from the other side of the fence at the country club.
Who never looked away when our eyes met.
The boy who seemed so dangerous that I’d rather detour than ever dare to cross paths with him. That boy had a sordid reputation.
But this man is far worse. He is everything forbidden. He is what a forbidden sex fantasy looks like.
Ryan Harper doesn’t hide that he is looking at me as if he wants me. His eyes gleam with desire as they travel up my body seductively, taking in all of me and admiring what he sees.
Shameless. A man like him has no boundaries.
We are amid some sort of stare off. Yes, I am aware I am checking him out too.
Call me a hypocrite, but I am at least discreet in my actions.
This guy is blatant. He makes me want to hurl something at his head or throw something heavy on his foot so I can watch him in pain.
But he also makes me pant in heat, he fills my head with dirty thoughts.
Thoughts where I climb his taut muscular body and get him to kiss me one more time.
I will certainly handle him better this time. So many nights I have tossed and turned in bed, thinking what would have happened if that kiss had prolonged.
Even though I know that he wasn’t right for me then, and he is definitely not right for me now.
That boy in that dark room was an uncivilized brute and the man he has turned into is downright savage. Savage – his moniker is so apt to his personality.
“Ishika! There you are.” Owen’s voice shatters our stare off as he comes crashing into me and throws me into a hug.
“Sorry, peeps, I’m late. Things got a little wild last night. Ishika meet my brother, Ryan. This is the guy I was talking about,” Owen says.
Brothers? How can they be brothers? Owen is my friend from high school.
He came to live with his uncle after his dad’s untimely death.
I knew he had an older brother living in a neighboring town and their family business ran into some financial troubles.
Owen was a very private person; he didn’t like to talk about his family at all.
We were good friends and moved in the same social circles in school but that was it.
I didn’t know much about Owen outside of school hours.
But Ryan Harper and Owen Harper are brothers, never in a million years would I have pieced that together.
They don’t look alike at all.
Owen is the golden boy, blond hair, blue eyes, neat looking, well-mannered, polite, and a perfect gentleman.
My kiss thief is exactly the opposite.
A suspected criminal. Unruly. Unkempt. Raw. Rugged. Edgy. Scary. Savage.
“This guy, my elder brother, aka Savage, will do anything you ask for at a reasonable price,” Owen adds to his commentary. “And you bet it’s going to piss Brent off when he finds out you called Ryan for help. Didn’t I tell you I would find an answer to all your problems?”
“What problems exactly are we talkin’ bout?” Ryan asks, narrowing his eyes at Owen. I want to immediately dig a hole in the ground and hide in it forever.
Owen speaks before I can curb his enthusiasm.
“Okay, lemme explain: Ishika wants Brent to confess his feelings and enter a serious, monogamous relationship with her. Brent’s not taking her seriously.
He wants to date around and have a little more fun before they commit to each other.
So Sadie, Ishika’s best friend, said, ‘Ishika needs a pretend boyfriend to make Brent jealous. Once Brent sees he is about to lose Ishika, he’ll understand Ishika is not going to wait for him forever, and that’s when he is going to come running after her to get her back.
’ And why wouldn’t he, she is beauty with smarts.
Perfect wife material. Just look at her, Ryan.
Ishika is so cute, isn’t she?” Owen says.
I glare at him when Ryan turns toward me and cocks his head as if inspecting me. His gaze caressing on every inch of my face. As if he didn’t have a good look already.
“They were head-hunting for a pretend boyfriend, and I was sitting at the neighboring table in the same café. What are the odds?”
It’s Ryan’s turn to glare at his brother, but it looks like Owen is on a mission and nothing bothers him, so he keeps going with his verbal diarrhea.
“Anyway, I volunteered to find them a suitable candidate. Someone who can act like he is head over heels in love with this girl. Now, who better to piss Brent Davis off than Ryan Harper? His archnemesis since high school. Everybody knows Brent hates you. Imagine how much fun this is going to be, bro,” Owen says.
The two brothers stare at each other and something passes between them. Owen smirks at Ryan as if goading him on for something that I can’t understand. Ryan’s nostrils flare and his jaw hardens.
“No,” Ryan says.
One single syllable and I stand rejected.
“What? Are you insane? She is offering five hundred dollars for every date you go on. You don’t have to even pay for dinner; she is paying for all of it.
As long as you sign the NDA and keep your mouth shut after this gig is over.
This is the easiest money you will make.
I would do it myself, but Brent knows who I am and my acting skills are greatly lacking. ”
Ryan crosses his arms across his wide chest. His biceps flex and bulge, tightening and stretching the fabric of his T-shirt. “The answer is still no.”
Asshole.
“What if I up the price by a thousand dollars for every date?” I am out of my mind for saying that. But I don’t want him to have the satisfaction of rejecting me.
“You sound pretty desperate to have me.” He raises a thick dark eyebrow and I stiffen at the double meaning. He must find my reaction amusing because one side of his lips curve forming a dent, as he bites into his lips a dimple pops.
GAH!
I have no more words left in me. Gah! will have to suffice. I have a fetish for tattooed dimpled men.
But he opens his mouth again and ruins my GAH! moment.
“I’m not for sale, Princess.”
What an ass!
He turns to Owen. “Next time you make these shady deals, I’ll break your teeth. You can show your friend the exit.”
Just like that, I am dismissed. And that’s how my Gah turns to Argh!
Argh! I hate him.