Chapter 1
It’s quarter to eleven Sunday night when someone knocks on my apartment door. I’m awake and online, trying to eke out another three hundred words on an article I’ve been struggling with all day, and the last thing I need is an interruption. This piece needs to be on my editor’s desk first thing Monday morning or it won’t make the deadline for next week’s issue of Style. Who the hell could be bothering me at this hour? I’m tempted not to answer.
But I’m the only guy living upstairs—the apartment across the hall from mine houses a quartet of giggling college girls who think it’s cute their neighbor is young and gay, and the other two apartments are rented by elderly women who frequently ask me to change light bulbs or hook up their DVD players. It’s the thought of one of these ladies needing my help that forces me to answer the door.
The knock comes again as I reach for the door handle. I unlock the door—when I open it, a blast of cold air swirls in around my legs, chilling my skin through my thin pajama pants. My arms pimple in goose bumps. I tell myself it’s from the cold, but a glance at my visitor is enough to send delightful shivers down my spine.
The man at the door is my age, maybe a few years older. He’s hidden inside a bulky jacket that reads Arianna’s on the left breast and, in his hands, he holds a couple pizza boxes. Beneath the brim of his baseball cap, dark brown waves fall to his chin. He tucks the left side behind his ear in an absent gesture that makes my toes curl. When he smiles at me, his teeth are even and white.
Then I see his eyes, and all thought of returning to my story disappear at those large, brown depths. Soulful eyes, with heavy lids and thick lashes that make me wonder what they’d look like first thing in the morning, peering from between the covers of my bed. Sweet Jesus.
For a moment we stare at each other—me in a ratty old T-shirt and those damn PJ bottoms that do little to hide the erection beginning to tent my crotch, he with his pizza and his heavy jacket. The smell of freshly baked cheese wafts toward me, heavenly, and beneath it I catch the faintest scent of his cologne. Come in,I want to tell him. I’d give anything to take off that coat of his and see what kind of body we’re working with here, or tug off that cap and watch the curtain of his hair fall to hide those sexy eyes. Why haven’t I been able to find a guy like thison those damn personals sites, or when I’m out at the stores, or having a drink after work? Where has hebeen hiding all my life?
Clearing my throat, I wrap my arms around my shivering chest and hug myself against the cold air. “Hey. Can I help you?”
That smile again—it lights up his eyes and makes me grin foolishly in return. Holding up the pizza boxes, he asks me, “Did you order two large pepperonis?”
I wish. Suddenly I’m hungry for something hot and ready, and I don’t mean pizza. Almost reluctantly I have to shake my head. “Not me.”
Those lips pull into the tiniest pout I want to kiss away. “Is this apartment G?”
He has a low, scratchy voice that would sound wonderful crying out my name during sex. Before I can stop myself, I counter, “If I say it is, will you give me your number?”
He laughs. It’s a rich sound that complements his voice and makes me want to pull him inside my apartment, lock the door, and keep him all to myself. Where can I get me one of these?I wonder, not bothering to be subtle as I look him over. Arianna’s, that’s where. I’ve been ordering my pizza from the wrong place all along.
Digging into his pocket, he pulls out a magnet and hands it to me. The phone number for the pizzeria is written across the bottom. Not quite what I had in mind. Indicating the pizzas again, he asks, “So these aren’t yours?”
“I wish. I’m F,” I tell him. I point at the door, but the apartment letter is hidden behind the Christmas wreath I have hanging up. In fact, a quick look around the corridor shows all four of the apartments have wreaths in place—no wonder he picked the wrong one. It’s with the heaviest of hearts that I point across the hall to the co-eds’ apartment. “That’s G, over there.”
He glances behind him but doesn’t move. I can almost imagine the way the girls will pounce on a sexy boy like this—the moment they open the door, they’ll be all over him. But there’s something about him, something I can’t quite put into words, that makes me think he might not rise to such an occasion. It’s his hesitation to turn away from me, the covert look from the corner of his eye, the way his gaze is drawn to the bulge in the front of my PJ’s.