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With a final goodbye nod and grin combo, he tugged the bill of his baseball cap lower and pushed the mower down the patch of grass that he’d been working on before he’d been interrupted. Out of his peripheral vision he saw that the girl began following him. He was just about to turn around and let her know, in no uncertain terms that he wasn’t interested. It was better to nip these things in the bud before they got out of hand. Thankfully, he was saved from putting his newly appointed royal status in jeopardy when her phone rang again and she answered it before turning and marching up the pathway straight to his neighbor’s door.
For a moment he thought about letting her know that Stephanie, who lived next door to him, wasn’t home, but he decided against it. No reason to once again open up the lines of communication when she would find out for herself soon enough.
Of course, if she asked him to relay a message he would be all too happy to oblige. Not out of the Southern hospitality that was engrained in him, no, this service would be fueled with purely selfish motivation. He would take any excuse to pay a visit to his hot redheaded neighbor. Last week there’d been a mix up in a package delivery and he’d been more than eager to go next door to drop it off, face to face.
His neighbor was a nurse, but he’d decided that she was also living a double life as a ninja, because she slipped in and out unnoticed…and not for lack of him paying attention. And not just from her condo, he’d seen her at the grocery store, the gas station, downtown walking along the river, and even at a wedding that they’d both attended. Every sighting played out the same way. He’d catch a glimpse of her big brown eyes and a flash of her long, golden red hair and when he’d do the inevitable double take, because she was a double take kinda woman, she’d be gone. Poof. Vanished. Her now-you-see-me-now-you-don’t skills would make David Blaine proud.
The thought had occurred to him that she was a figment of his imagination, or that he was having a Sixth Sense moment and only he could see her. But when he went over to deliver her package, that theory was disproven. She was real. She was adorable. She was sexy. She was really, adorably sexy.
Every time Ace thought about the creases that lined her cheek when she’d opened the door he couldn’t help the grin that spread on his face. He had the same reaction when he remembered the way her hair was flattened to one side of her head and a mess on the other, her oversized shirt being inside out and backwards and her impressive speed talking skills. Over the past week he’d been walking around with a permanent smile on his face as his mind kept replaying that all-too-brief interaction.
When he reached the edge of the lawn he turned the mower to head back up and expected to see Simone still standing at the door, but she was gone. He assumed that she must’ve had a key or known where a hide-a-key was since Stephanie wasn’t home and he hadn’t seen Simone walk back down the steps.
Questions began filling his head. Was she a roommate? Sister? Would she be staying here?
As he pondered questions that he had no answers to, his phone buzzed in his pocket. After killing the engine, Ace wiped his damp palm on his jeans before pulling it out. When he saw that it was a nine-one-two area code he did the same thing he’d been doing for the past six months when he saw those numbers, he didn’t answer.
He stared at the screen and when he saw the voicemail he lifted the device to his ear.
The voice of the last person he wanted to hear from came through the speaker.
“Hey bro, Mom and Dad have been trying to get ahold of you and you haven’t called them back. I know your panties are in a wad, but you don’t have to be a dick to them. They had nothing to do with what happened, especially the article. If you’re going to be pissed at anyone, be pissed at me. Don’t punish them for what I did.”
That was it. The line went dead.
Was that supposed to be an apology?Ace wondered as he returned his phone to his pocket.
His brother had never been good at saying he was sorry. When Grant was twelve he stole the bike Ace had just gotten for his tenth birthday even though he had a perfectly good bike sitting in the garage. He’d then proceeded to leave the bike outside the movie theater while he snuck into an R-rated movie and the bike was stolen. Instead of showing any kind of remorse, or taking any kind of responsibility, Grant had blamed Ace. His defense was basically that if Ace hadn’t wanted Grant to take the bike he should’ve locked it up…at his own house.
That wasn’t surprising since Grant was a kid and what kid wanted to get in trouble? What was surprising was that his parents had grounded Ace for not “taking care of his property.” Actually, it wasn’t that surprising since Grant could do no wrong in his parents’ eyes. He was more than just the golden child, he walked on water. Grant believed it too. Growing up in the shadow of his ego had been a cold and dark place to live.
His phone buzzed again and he ignored it as he continued pushing the lawn mower up and down in perfect lines with adrenaline-charged energy racing through him.
The vibrating stopped but seconds later started again. Not picking up the call caused tension to spread in his shoulders. He forced himself to relax. He wasn’t in the Corps anymore, so he didn’t have anyone to report to. He wasn’t engaged anymore, so he had no one to check in with. For the first time in his adult life, he was accountable to no one, and he planned on keeping it that way.
He’d left his hometown of Savannah, Georgia on his eighteenth birthday to join the Marines and hadn’t looked back. The first eight years that he was in the Corps he truly believed that he’d never return home. Never spend holidays at his parents’ house. Never set foot in the city limits again.
Then, four years ago, all that changed. He was on leave and celebrating the wedding of a guy in his unit in Las Vegas. After the ceremony he was walking on the strip when he ran into, literally ran into, Kendall Lexington. She was his childhood crush and the girl that had taken his virginity when he was a freshman and she was a senior.
Their reunion was like a scene out of a bad rom-com movie. She’d been taking a selfie and hadn’t been watching where she was going and he’d been talking to his friend Tank and—bam!—they’d walked right into each other. They’d reconnected in a big way that weekend and stayed in touch. A year ago, after Ace made the decision that he wasn’t going to re-up after he’d served out his remaining months, he’d asked her to be his wife and she said yes. They’d decided that they were going to settle in Savannah since she’d moved home a few months earlier to work in her parent’s real estate development firm.
Six months and an ill-timed, or maybe perfectly-timed, Facetime call later and the engagement was off. Now he was back to his original plans of keeping Georgia in the rearview.
Ace’s muscles tensed as he finished not only his side of the front yard, but his sexily adorable neighbor’s side as well. He returned the mower to the back of his garage and just as he reached out to press the button to roll down the door, Simone popped inside wearing the same jean shorts but now she’d lost the shirt and was wearing only a bikini top.
She boldly strode up to him and handed him a white plastic bottle with an image of a beach on it.
“Turns out you can help me with somethin’.” She mimicked his accent as she turned and pulled her hair to the side and undid the ties around her neck, holding the front of the bathing suit in place with her arms. “I’m going down to the river and I don’t want tan lines.”
The fact that he wasn’t the least bit interested didn’t stop him from appreciating Simone’s straightforward approach. Ace wasn’t a stranger to confident, daring women. In fact, he’d always appreciated it. Looking back it probably had something to do with losing his virginity to Kendall. Not only was she four years older than him, she also had no problem telling him exactly what she wanted and where she wanted it. As he’d gotten older he’d definitely taken the reins in the bedroom, but still appreciated a woman that knew what she wanted and wasn’t afraid to speak up.
But this wasn’t going to go anywhere. For a lot of reasons, starting with the fact that she was way too young for him. Then there was the small detail that he had no plans on anything going anywhere with anyone.
At least that had been the plan before he’d moved next door to a certain now-you-see-me-now-you-don’t redhead.
Shaking the image of a disheveled Stephanie out of his head, he set the suntan lotion down on the workbench and decided this was a good time to exit. “You seem like a resourceful girl. I’m sure you can handle it. You have a good day now.”
With that he stepped into his house and shut the door behind him.
“You can run, but you can’t hide.” Her playful remark easily traveled through the thin wood separating them and he heard her flip-flops hitting the cement floor as she exited the garage.
He wasn’t running or hiding, that was his adorably sexy neighbor’s MO. He just had no idea why…
