Love Him: A Love Him, Hate Him, Want Him Novel

by Blaze, Stella

  “And you’re feeling some performance anxiety?”

  I glared at him. He and Bette could make anything sound perverted.

  “You could say that.” I let my head fall back as the other weight pressed down on my shoulders. “Plus one of the authors is bringing her personal cover artist with her. And… he’s famous, and successful, and utterly brilliant at what he does. A real artist. And if I don’t wow the crowd more than he does…”

  I just couldn’t say it.

  “Then he might replace you.”

  My head fell so far forward that my chin touched my collarbone.

  “Pretty much.” I took another mouthwatering bite of zucchini bread, and mumbled, “I’ve gotta find a sexy dress and a sexy date by next week for this party too.”

  He nodded.

  Oh god this was hopeless.

  But the zucchini bread was getting better with every bite. “Can I take some of this home when I leave?”

  He nodded again. “Sure. I was saving those bananas for tomorrow,” he pointed to a bowl that held—ick!—some rotten bananas.

  I looked to him, horrified. “I don’t want you to have to eat rotten fruit.”

  His eyes went wide.

  “I can go buy you some more food if there’s a… a problem?”

  He started to smile, and then he started to laugh. “No, I’m not out of food. You just have to let the bananas get over ripened before you can make them into banana nut bread.”

  Oh…

  “You don’t cook much, do you?”

  I shook my head. “But I’m great with a phone and a carry out menu.”

  He stood there for a beat, just staring at me. “I’ll bet.”

  I had to remember to breathe. I took a step back.

  He chuckled.

  “I can’t help you with the dress. Maybe Bette… or one of my sisters could take you shopping.”

  “That’s a good idea.” And way better than trying to find one myself.

  “But I can help you out with your other problem.”

  I stared at him, waiting, but he just stared back.

  “What other problem?” I finally asked.

  “Finding a sexy date for the party,” he said.

  I still just stared. “Who?” I hoped he wasn’t considering hiring one of his construction crew to take me to the party.

  His brow furrowed and he made a fairly displeased sound.

  “I meant me.”

  I blinked, suddenly not understanding simple English. What on earth was he saying?

  “Huh?”

  He scowled and tilted his head, looking at me like I was mentally challenged, crossing his un-tattoo adorned arm over his tattoo adorned arm.

  I licked my lips just watching the muscles in his forearms—his biceps and triceps—flex enticingly.

  Then I looked up into his gorgeous face. Dark brown eyes—almost black—accented by the longest eyelashes I’d ever seen on a man or woman. Flawless deeply tanned skin that seemed to glow with health, and the most kissably thick, curvaceous lips.

  Then it hit me what he was saying.

  I closed my eyes, inwardly saying every curse word I knew. I couldn’t take him to the party. Except for the last ten minutes he had been the biggest asshole I’d ever met. If I let him anywhere near my career he’d find an excruciatingly evil, painful way of ruining it for me.

  Or, the sexy bastard might just go off and have sex with someone, maybe even one of the authors, and then what would I do? I’d be humiliated to the point I’d have to quit.

  “No way,” I blurted.

  He added some pique to his scowl. “Why not? You said you need a sexy date.” He opened his arms and gestured to himself like he was a prize on The Price is Right. “Don’t I fit the bill?”

  Danger, danger!!! Obviously he was, but I was not, not, not going to tell him that I thought he was. No way in hell. The sneaky bastard would find some way to use it against me.

  I gulped, bit the inside of my cheek, and then took a deep breath.

  “Thank you for the offer, but I can find my own date for the party.” See, I can be diplomatic… even when talking to a gorgeous, attempted-tree-murdering maniac.

  “Aha…” he said, his eye brows rising in a clear sign of not believing me.

  “Yeah, sure. I know at least five guys that would love to go out with me.” Lie, lie, lie… I knew no one, especially a sexy guy that would go out with me if I asked them.

  Wait, maybe I should go to Wal-Mart…

  But a shockingly detailed mini movie trailer of my recent failure in the love department of Wal-Mart flashed through my head. It actually made my chest hurt.

  “So what day is this party?” he asked.

  I had to think. Oh sweet Jesus, it was in five days.

  “Five days,” I mumbled.

  He smiled and reached for his coffee, taking a languid sip.

  “That’s plenty of time to find someone. I’ll probably have a guy by this afternoon.”

  He shook his head pitiably. “So you’re going to call an escort agency, is that it?”

  How the hell did he know about Vinny?

  Oh, wait. He didn’t mean a model agency, he meant…

  “You see,” I said, plunking my now empty coffee cup down hard on his polished granite counter—nice counter space, by the way. “I could never take you anywhere, especially anywhere near the people I work with. I’d have to quit on the spot just from the humiliation you would cause me.”

  “You think I can’t behave myself in a public environment?”

  It was my turn to scowl, planting my hands on my hips. “You can’t behave yourself for the duration of a cup of coffee.”

  His dark eyes darted to my empty cup and back to me. His lips quirked in a smirk.

  “Fine, you made it through an entire cup of coffee, but you lapsed right back to your… your smart-assed ways right after. You’d have to be good for hours. You really think you can do that?”

  He took a step closer to me, making it so I’d have to look up at him even more.

  Why, oh why, was everyone taller than me?

  I could smell him. Not cologne, but whatever primal scent he naturally exuded. A couple of sniffs and I started to feel hot all over.

  He was too damn close.

  “You’ll find, if you’re very lucky, that I can do many things… for hours at a time.”

  I gulped again, and took a step back… and tried to pick up the aroma of the zucchini bread to wash his scent away with.

  I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out. I cleared my throat while I took another step back. “T-that’s okay, really. Thanks again for the offer. But I’ll be fine.” I ran into the counter, not watching what I was backing up into.

  I jumped, and made a little squealing sound as I whirled around to make sure it was just the counter I’d run into. You never knew, he might have another homicidal maniac just like him roaming around the house.

  When I turned back Raphael had his arms crossed over his chest, one hand casually covering his infuriating smirk. But he was chuckling: I could see his shoulders and chest rising and falling in little jerks… the big jerk!

  I took a big breath, luckily getting a lungful of zucchini bread scented air instead of infuriatingly sexy man smell.

  They should make that into an air freshener for your car… in the shape of, well, him…

  But then I’d never be able to drive my car. I’d be sure to have an accident if I inhaled too many of the man’s fumes.

  Ha! I smiled at that. The man’s fumes…

  “Thank you for the coffee, and the offer… but I’ve got to go back home now.”

  I turned and dashed for the back door, grabbing the knob like it was a life preserver and I was sinking on the Titanic.

  I turned the knob, well, tried to turn the knob, but it wouldn’t budge. So I tried to just pull the door off its hinges. Which didn’t work… I’m not the Hulk.

  “It’s locked,” he said sl
owly, as if he were explaining it to a small child. “If you turn the little thingy in the middle of the knob, it will unlock.”

  I nodded my head and shot him a rueful, totally fake smile. I got the little latch thing to turn on the first try and yanked the door open, making it bang noisily against the nearest counter.

  I jerked and winced at the sound. I was just lucky I hadn’t broken the glass in the door with that.

  I had one foot out the door when he said, “Hope, wait.”

  I stopped, frozen, as if I were a deer in headlights. I turned and looked at him.

  He had the knife in his hand again… and a large dish. With practiced skill he used the knife to slide the remainder of what was left of the loaf of zucchini bread onto the plate—which was most of a whole loaf—and with a careless nonchalance he pulled some plastic wrap out of a drawer and wrapped the dish over with it.

  He stood there and held out the bread to me. “You forgot your bread.”

  Shiiit…

  I so didn’t want to get one step closer to the man. I didn’t trust him… I didn’t trust myself either.

  Fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck, fuck!

  How do I get myself into these kinds of fixes?

  Easy, you came over here.

  Whose side are you on, anyways?

  I shook my head. This was a no brainer. I would just turn back around and leave. I had plenty of bread at home…

  But that wasn’t just bread; that was one of the most delicious things I’d ever had in my mouth.

  Way to double-entendre yourself!

  And you don’t even need Mr. Wiggles…

  Shuuuuuut… Up!

  I edged slowly toward him, with every step ready to jerk away and run for the door.

  Finally I was close enough to reach out and take the dish from him. I had my eyes trained on him, so I didn’t watch where my hand was going, so when I took the bread from him our fingers grazed each other.

  An electric shock went through me and I jerked back and used that momentum to head for the door. I wasn’t even going to close it behind myself, I just wanted out of there and as far away from Raphael Morales as possible.

  “And Hope?” he said just as I was about to pass out of his kitchen. I stopped but didn’t look back. I could tell he had that smirk on his face. “Call me if you don’t find a date for the party. I’ll leave that night open for you.”

  I closed my eyes and felt a dark doom fall over me. What if I didn’t find a date in time? What would be worse, taking him, or showing up alone?

  I opened my eyes and walked through the doorway, pulling it shut behind me.

  Chapter 24

  Jake

  I’m not a stalker. And I hadn’t intended on doing a drive by, not initially. I was just taking the little Escort I’d slipped an alternator into for a little test drive, just to make sure it charged right before I sent it off with its owner.

  But since I was out, and somehow I’d driven all but a couple blocks toward Hope’s neighborhood, and I was in an unknown car—okay, that does sound kind of suspicious…

  I turned onto her street and immediately wanted to turn around. This was crazy obsessed stalker shit, and I was too damn old—almost thirty—to be pulling the infatuated teenager routine.

  I drove forward. Making a U-turn would only attract attention. If I just zipped down the street and didn’t stop to gawk at her place, maybe I could just forget I’d even come here.

  Passing by her new neighbor’s (the asshole) house, I looked over to it and hit the brakes.

  Shiiit… there she was, walking straight toward his backdoor.

  What the hell?

  She looked upset too.

  Hope disappeared around the back of the asshole’s house, and I just about flipped out, ready to jump out of the little car and follow her. I was so going to punch the living daylights out of that guy.

  But I thought she hated him? They’d looked pretty quarrelsome yesterday…

  Yeah, but that was passion too. Passion could change from hate to lust like flicking a switch.

  I’d pulled the Escort over in front of the asshole’s house, and was just about to get out and head for his backdoor when I spotted the sleek white of Bette’s immaculate Cadillac.

  I ducked down behind the dash, keeping an eye on the advancing Caddy. Maybe she’d been too far away, or distracted, to see me sitting here.

  As the Caddy swung around and into her driveway, she didn’t show any sign that she’d seen me. Bringing the luxury automobile to a tire screeching halt, she popped out of the driver’s side door, balanced delicately on stiletto high heels. She sashayed to the back of the car as the trunk popped open, and then bent over at the waist to retrieve some multicolored shopping bags.

  Was that all the woman ever did?

  While she was bent over I just happened to notice how nice she looked… I mean, the woman really dressed well. A clingy silk button down shirt, and a form fitting skirt that came up a few inches above her knees. Between that and the stilettos, and the way she was bent over, she made quite a moving picture.

  Practically a pin up.

  I shook my head.

  What the hell was I doing?

  I was obsessively stalking one woman, and ogling another.

  Maybe there was a twelve step group out there for dating-confused men.

  I watched as Bette pulled her loot from the trunk and then slammed lid back into place. She jiggled in all the right places…

  Another mental head shake. I had to stop this. I was still distraught—dear god, I just thought the word distraught! What was I, a prissy lawyer or accountant whining about my problems to an overpriced therapist?

  Sometimes I really wished I hadn’t had a high school business English teacher for a mother. I had to be able to type my term papers perfectly, without misspelled words or grammatical errors, by the seventh grade.

  Norma had insisted.

  I took a breath and tried not to stare too much as Bette clacked her feminine whiles across her driveway and then up the front porch steps. Her hips swayed back and forth as she ascended the steps.

  Out of the corner of my eye I saw Hope emerge from the back of the asshole’s house. She still looked glazed over, but she looked less stressed—which didn’t make me any happier.

  She was carrying a plate with some sort of loaf of bread on it, covered in plastic wrap.

  Holy crap, the asshole had baked for her! I knew her relationship to food, and if he could whip up food for her…

  Shit, shit, shiiit…

  Hope loped up her front steps and into the house, shutting the door with a muffled bang.

  So there I was, sitting parked in front of her house… well, her neighbor’s house, spying on her like a stalker in a bad movie of the week, and Hope was traipsing over to the new, too damn handsome for my liking, asshole neighbor’s house for breakfast bread and probably coffee.

  And probably a whole lot more…

  I bit down on the inside of my mouth. I wasn’t going to think about that possibility.

  Not that I wanted… or even had a right…

  It had only been the one night—and all those mini dates. But I’d felt so much more than just some primal attraction to her.

  Hell, I’d had a crush on her since high school. She’d been skinny and gawky, and smart—the artistic type. And she hadn’t given me a second look. Not until she walked into Wal-Mart with her dead Taurus and turned my world upside down.

  It was still depressing that she hadn’t noticed me so thoroughly that she didn’t remember me from then at all.

  But what did it matter. I’d broken up with her, hadn’t I?

  Yeah, I did.

  Did I?

  Had the words “We’re through!” passed my lips?

  Or had I just stormed out when I’d found out what she’d done?

  And what had she done?

  What had she done!?!? She betrayed me. The crazy picture she somehow took of me when we were having sex�
�� remember?

  Yeah…

  But what did I care about some stupid picture?

  You don’t. You care that she did what she did behind your back… like Janie. I’d really liked Janie.

  We’d married only because she was pregnant… or at least that’s what she’d told me. A few weeks later she’d dropped the bomb that she had been mistaken.

  I’d never asked if she’d gone to the doctor. She had only told me that she’d taken a home pregnancy test and that she was pregnant. We’d used protection, but I knew even the greatest condom on earth had its risks.

  She’d gotten bored with me, and disappeared not a week later. I only saw her one more time. That was two months later when her parents strong armed her home to sign the divorce papers.

  A month later she was married again, and I’ve only heard tales of her travels since then.

  Placed side by side, I guess the two instances didn’t come close in severity, or twisted plotting.

  But they both stung.

  I cleared my thoughts, turned the key in the little Escort and started to pull out from the curb. I needed to get out of there, and back to work, and forget all about Miss Hope Jones and her carnival of weird and crazy.

  I hit the brakes not twenty feet later. Standing on her porch, one hand pulling her sunglasses down to let me know she was looking straight at me, and the other hand wagging a finger at me in admonishment, was Bette.

  Holy fucking shit! The woman didn’t miss anything, did she? She was worse than the FBI, a tabloid reporter, and a sleazy Private Investigator all rolled up in one.

  She smiled; she had one hell of pretty smile, with cute little dimples. It suddenly hit me that she was a young, redheaded version of Dolly Parton.

  I gulped just thinking about the ample bosom she had stretching the fabric of that little silk blouse.

  I closed my eyes for a beat, defeated and humiliated and confused—and turned on… and then I gave her a half-hearted wave and slowly rolled the little car away down the street.

  I had to stay away from this street, Hope… and Bette. I just had to.

  Chapter 25

  Hope

  I was amped on adrenaline and desperation. I took almost every spare shot I had on my laptop and loaded it into my trusty GIMP program. I filtered, I brightened, intensified contrast, colorized them in black and white, scarlet, azure, jealous green, caramel, and added shading and wispy lines of fuzziness. And then typed “Your Title” and “Your Name” in the appropriate spots with color matching fonts.