Block Party

by Stylo Fantome

  “Liam.”

  “Okay, eight minutes.”

  “Liam.”

  “Maybe five if you play with yourself at the same time.”

  “Stop!” she burst out laughing, shoving harder at his chest so she could climb off him. “Maybe next time, okay? But Wulf and Katya are already headed down here.”

  “Party pooper.”

  They stepped away so they could get cleaned up. Ayumi put her shirt back on and pulled her skirt into place, but couldn't find her underwear. She was bent in half, trying to look under the sink, when she felt his fingertips between her legs.

  “Liam,” she said, her voice full of warning.

  “Did you see what you did?” he asked, but she didn't see anything. Her eyes had fallen shut when his fingers had traced over her scar before sliding inside her body.

  “No,” she panted. “What ... what did I do?”

  “You left your calling card.”

  Her eye lids fluttered open and she looked straight ahead, then burst out laughing. She stood upright and his hand fell away.

  “I can't believe we did it again,” she snickered. His arm snaked around her waist and he hugged her from behind.

  “I can. Your ass has super powers, I swear.”

  There wasn't a dent like the wall in his laundry room, but there was most definitely a tell tale crack going across the wall of his utility room. She was pretty sure if she stood in front of it, it would be the exact width of her hips.

  “It's almost embarrassing,” she commented, tilting her head to the side so he could kiss her neck.

  “But mostly hot,” he added, and she nodded.

  “Definitely mostly hot.”

  After she'd finger combed her hair and put her shoes back on, and Liam had buttoned up his shirt and put his belt back together, he yanked open the door. Katya and Wulfric were just walking past and the sudden movement startled them. They both stared at the doorway, and Ayumi just stared back. Finally, Liam stepped into the hallway.

  “I told you, Ayumi,” he said in a booming voice. “You have to stop sexually harassing me at work! It's inappropriate!”

  She turned beet red, but Katya just laughed. Wulf rolled his eyes and simply walked into the office at the end of the hall.

  They filed into the room behind him. Katya produced tacos, like she always did, and they all tucked into lunch.

  “You know I was just making it up, right,” Wulf was saying when Liam brought up his best man duties.

  “Totally.”

  “I was trying to guilt trip you into coming to the party,” he kept going.

  “Yeah, I got it.”

  “I don't need a best man.”

  “I know.”

  “So why the fuck are you still acting like you're going to be my best man?” Wulf demanded.

  “Because no take-backs, dude. You said it, it's happening. Tell me, what do you think of kelly green tuxedos?”

  Both women laughed as the men argued, then Ayumi leaned close to Katya.

  “Have you picked a date yet?” she asked.

  “Eh. I don't know. Part of me just wants to be crazy and go to Vegas or something. Another part says a year from now and plan the biggest wedding ever,” Katya replied.

  “Are you going to make your own cake?”

  “You know, at first I thought 'no way', but then I actually started looking at other designers, and I kept thinking ... but I know exactly what I want.”

  “And you do make the best.”

  “Sometimes,” Katya laughed in agreement. “But who knows. If we do the Vegas plan, we won't need a cake. But what about you? Am I going to get to make a wedding cake for you two, someday?”

  Ayumi choked on a piece of tomato.

  “Uh ... it's been a month,” she finally said. “Let's see if we can make it to spring without killing each other or driving each other insane, and maybe you can bake a housewarming cake when we move in together.”

  “Deal.”

  “What was that about cake?” Liam asked, tuning into the pertinent part of their conversation.

  “Katya, tell him he's not invited to the wedding anymore,” Wulf snapped.

  “Boys!” she yelled, waving her hands at them. “If you can't play nice together, then you're both dis-invited, and Ayumi and I will get married, instead.”

  There was silence for a second, then Liam cleared his throat.

  “Can I be invited on the honeymoon, then?”

  Everyone burst out laughing and they almost didn't notice the phone ringing.

  “Shut up!” Liam shouted, picking up the receiver. “Hello? Yeah, yeah, this is him. What? Just a second.”

  He put his hand out in the universal “tone it down” signal, and when they all saw how serious he suddenly looked, they complied.

  “Yes, this is Liam Edenhoff. Yes, I'll accept the charges,” he said, then there was a long pause. “Hey! I had no idea you were all the way over there, what the hell have you been doing? You said you were ...” his voice died off. He glanced at Katya, then stood up and turned his back to the room. “Uh huh ... Uh huh ... Oh, jesus ... Jesus ... How did this happen? ... Okay ... No, no ... Please, don't cry ... Don't cry, we'll figure this out ... whatever you need ... I don't care about any of that – whatever you need, just say it, we'll do it. Want me to get on a plane? ... Okay, listen, do you still have the credit card for the bar's account? ... I don't give a shit, you're going to use it ... Go check into a hotel right fucking now, a nice one, and call me back ... Just do it ... If I don't hear from you in an hour, I'm getting on a plane ... stay calm, we're all here for you, we're going to fix whatever is wrong ... bye.”

  Ayumi was pretty sure everyone in the room had stopped breathing during the odd conversation, and they all stared while he slowly hung up the phone. He didn't say anything for a long time, so she knew it meant something really bad had happened. Something awful.

  “Was that Landon?” Katya was the first to speak. Liam took a deep breath and finally turned around.

  “No,” he said, and he cleared his throat. “That was Tori. She's in Thailand.”

  “Thailand!?” Katya yelled as she jumped to her feet. “But ... but ... she told me she was in Cabo!”

  “I know, us, too,” Liam said, gesturing between him and Ayumi.

  “Well, is she okay? That sounded bad, was it bad?” Katya was starting to breath fast. Wulf got out of his seat and moved to her side.

  “It sounded ... bad,” Liam finally said. “She's in a lot of trouble. She was upset, I couldn't understand it all. I guess she's been there the whole time, with Landon.”

  “Landon!” Katya gasped.

  “Yeah. She went over there with him and they've been doing ... whatever, I don't fucking know, and now she's alone and she doesn't have any money and Landon's gone and I don't know, but it sounds like there were drugs involved.”

  “Drugs,” Katya breathed, and she fell into her seat.

  “Yeah. So you heard me, I told her to go to a hotel and to call me back. I'm sorry,” he said, turning to face Ayumi. “But if she needs me, I'm going over there to get her.”

  “Me, too,” Katya said immediately. Ayumi snorted.

  “Is that a fucking joke? We're all going. I'm going to book accommodations right now,” she said, pulling her laptop out of her attache case. “Wulfric, arrange for the jet, and call your friend at the embassy here.”

  “I'll call her mother,” Katya said, pulling out her cell phone and moving to the other side of the room. Wulf had his own phone to his ear as he followed her.

  “And I'm gonna call my bank, raise the limit on that card, make sure she can get whatever she needs,” Liam said, sitting back down and reaching for the phone again. Ayumi leaned forward and put her hand over his.

  “It'll be okay,” she whispered. He smiled sadly at her.

  “You know why I called you down here?” he suddenly asked.

  “Huh?”

  “This afternoon,” he said. “I told y
ou I wanted you to tell help with this software.”

  “Uh huh,” she remembered.

  “I lied.”

  “About the software?”

  “I was sitting here thinking about this morning, and all these mornings, and I was just so fucking in love with you, I wanted to tell you,” he said simply.

  Ayumi's breath caught in her throat. They hadn't said those words to each other, not yet. They came too easily for him, and not easily enough for her, so they'd been waiting till they were both one hundred percent positive. Apparently, that moment had happened this morning for Liam.

  And apparently, that moment had happened that afternoon for Ayumi.

  “That's good,” she breathed, licking her lips. “Because I love you even more.”

  He let out a deep breath and closed his eyes.

  “Thank you for being the best thing that ever happened to me,” he whispered. She nodded, then slapped his hand.

  “You're welcome. Now get to work, Edenhoff. There's a damsel in distress that needs saving, and no one does that better than you.”

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  I guess first I'd like to thank everyone who read Neighbors and The Neighborhood and fell so in love with Liam. Honestly, it was a bit of a shock – I was always #TeamWulfy, I knew who would win from the get go, so maybe I always kept myself detached from Liam, I don't know. But he was never, ever a contender to me.

  A lot of people, though, really wanted him to win, and when he didn't, they REALLY wanted him to have his own story, so I'm glad after a year of working on it and going through a lot of changes and him not being able to make up his mind, I was able to publish this book. He had to do a lot of growing up, but he's definitely a contender now. A winner. He also helped to inspire his brother Landon's story, which I'm really excited about now, so it'll be fun to watch these characters evolve and grow even more.

  Of course as always big thanks to the alpha and omega, Ratula. For not letting my discouragement get in the way of your encouragement. For knowing just the right touches and twists to add to a story. And for all the late night bag fests and brain storms and gossip sessions. Life would be depressingly lame without you. Hopefully this book makes a bazillion dollars and I can move to Brooklyn and be your neighbor-ish.

  Thanks to all my beta readers, you were amazing this time around, seeing as how I kept sending sections and forgetting parts. Jennifer, Nanci, Angie, Rebecca, Andrea, Pam, Paige, Teri, Amy – you all rock the house down. Thanks for helping turn this from an okay story into a good story.

  Thank you to Champagne Formats for the wonderful interior, and Najla Qamber Designs for the beautiful exterior.

  Thank you to Give Me Books for always squeezing me in and dealing with my last minute everythings and always being so nice to me. Thanks to Enticing Journey book promotions for taking on a new client and helping me change things up a bit in the ARC department.

  Thanks to all the bloggers who so selflessly read and promote. I don't do as good a job thanking you as I should, but please know that there also aren't enough words, not enough time, to even begin to express how thankful I am for all of you.

  Thanks to readers for sharing and reading and loving characters and authors and keeping this great big indie ball rolling. It's been three and a half years since I published, and I still can't believe I'm lucky enough to have people reading my words and enjoying them.

  And thank you to Mr. F. We began the year with these characters, now we're ending the year with him. Who knows what kind of characters next year will bring into our lives.

  SOUNDTRACK

  Songs that I listened to while writing, songs that made me think of the story, and a couple that inspired actual scenes.

   Jason Mraz – Won't You Be My Neighbor (cover)

   Beach Boys – Surfin' USA

   Calvin Harris ft. Asst. - Catch Feels

   Alessia Cara – Scars to Your Beautiful

   Maroon 5 ft. SZA – What Lovers Do

   Shawn Mendes – There's Nothing Holding Me Background

   Miley Cyrus – Malibu

   James Arthur – Say You Won't Let Go

   Florida Georgia Line ft. Bebe Rexha – Meant to Be

   Jose Feliciano – Feliz Navidad

   Kesha – Learn to Let Go

   Gym Class Heroes ft. Adam Levine – Stereo Hearts

   Bonnie Raitt – Somethin' To Talk About

  NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH

  A Twin Estates Novel

  excerpt

  Victoria “Tori” Bellows had led a pretty average sort of life, she felt. She'd grown up in a nice neighborhood, had gone to a good school. She'd done her fair share of partying, more than her fair share of bed hopping, but had also always shown up to work on time and always remembered her friends' birthdays. Over all, she was a good person who made okay choices.

  Which is why it was so surreal to find herself standing in a dark, dirty room in Thailand, with a gun pressed to the side of her head.

  I guess I always did get into more than my fair share of trouble ...

  one month earlier

  FUCK HIM.

  What did everyone else have that Tori didn't have? She was attractive. She was smart. She was funny. She was just the right amounts of sweet and sassy. She was a hell of an employee. She'd made it abundantly clear that if Liam Edenhoff were to ever say “jump”, she would immediately respond with “how high? On one foot, or two? Would you like me to make you a sandwich at the same time?”

  And yet she might as well have been a painting on the wall. He'd never noticed her as anything more than his pal. Like an old frat buddy. Or a golden retriever.

  She'd told herself she could wait for him. She'd waited for a long time. Through the awkward months with Katya, when he'd been completely off limits. Barely more than a thought in her head. Then, when Katya had given Tori the green light, he'd been fucking his way through her building. After that, he'd had his weird thing with Brighton Stone.

  And that whole time, Tori had been there in the background. Hanging out with him at work. At home. Any time. All the time. Listening to him moan about Wulfric winning their little competition over Katya. Commiserating with him over how horrible his twin brother was to him.

  What could she say, she was a sucker for a surfer.

  Then, abruptly, he'd stopped sleeping with Brie. Stopped having sex, period. Now was finally her chance! She could make her move and he would finally see her. Finally realize she'd always been there.

  Before she could so much as take a step in his direction, though, someone else made a move, and once again, Tori was thrust into the background. Put on a shelf, gone and forgotten.

  It's always the quiet ones.

  “Fuck him!” Tori slurred loudly.

  “You got it bad,” Tim the bartender sighed. He'd worked upstairs at The Garden, Liam's club, for several years. Tori had only been there for six months, but she already outranked him. He didn't seem to hold it against her, though, and they got along great.

  “No,” she shook her head. “No, he's gonna get it ... bad. God! What's wrong with me!?”

  “Nothing that I can see from here,” Tim laughed, his eyes skating over her body.

  Tori glanced down at herself and for a moment, two sets of breasts looked back up at her. She was dressed in her usual club wear – a tight, low cut, cropped shirt. Tight shorts that rode low on her hips. Large ankle boots that took her from kind of tall to “are you a model?” height.

  “Exactly! Exactly! But does he want any of this? Nooooo,” she said, waggling her finger in the air. Tim laughed again.

  “If he's seen that and still doesn't want you, then honey, he must be gay.”

  Tim didn't know that the man they were both damning to hell was also their boss. Tori got sloppy drunk on occasion, but she never ever spoke out of turn. She knew how to keep a secret.

  “He's an asshole,” she said, nodding.

  “Maybe he's just an idiot. Most me
n are, you know.”

  “He is pretty stupid ...”

  Hiccup.

  “You know what you should do?” Tim started. “You should go find that boy and just grab him by the ears and kiss him.”

  “What?”

  Hiccup.

  “Yeah. If hints haven't been working and that cleavage hasn't been working, well, a kiss will sort it out once and for all.”

  “But what if ...” hiccup “... he doesn't want to ...” hiccup “... kiss me?”

  “Then he'll tell you to stop and you're right where you are, right now. No harm, no foul.”

  “That might actually work,” Tori sat up straight on her bar stool.

  “Duh! Who is this Tori, and why is she so shy? Stop bitching, and go get your man!” Tim ordered her.

  “Yeah! Yeah, I will! You're the best,” she made kissy faces at him as she slid off her chair and made her way to the door downstairs.

  “Wait, that's not the exit, sweetie, that's -” Tim tried to warn her, but she'd already slid her key card in the slot and the door popped open. She waved her hand over her shoulder as she started skipping down the stairs.

  She hadn't gotten drunk at The Garden. No, she'd started the night at home. Crying in her room because the boy she'd had a crush on forever seemed to like someone else. That had led to drinking the cooking wine, which had led to a trip to the liquor store, which had led to a really long, sad conversation with a stranger on a park bench. They'd polished off the pint she'd bought, so she'd decided to make her way to her favorite dive bar. Along the way, though, she'd gotten distracted and had wound up at The Garden, complaining to Tim the bartender.

  “Just gonna kiss him,” she repeated to herself as she stumbled across the main floor. “Just grab him and ... grab him and kiss him.”

  The club was busier than usual – she'd forgotten they'd started a trial-period-enrollment plan. Her idea. Lots of new people giving a down payment to test drive the club, as it were. Membership in a sex club wasn't something people just dove into; they'd had a lot of interested people.

  Couples were making out on the dance floor, and most of the booths were full of couples doing a lot more than making out. She'd long since gotten used to the spectacle and she barely noticed as she finally made it to the long, narrow hallway just off the end of the bar.