No way was she inviting the new neighbor over. Hello, mental trigger, how are you?
As she plopped back down on the couch, she tried to shake off the memories her run-in with Hill had stirred, but after a few more minutes of the movie, she realized she wasn’t paying attention to the screen. Movie night was officially a wash.
She clicked off the television, knowing the only way to get her mind off the old looping track it was now on was to take a sleeping pill and go to bed.
She washed her face, brushed her teeth, and focused on her nightly routine to block out her anxious thoughts. But as she was finishing up, she heard the shower turn on next door. The bad memories that were pushing at the walls of her mind were suddenly replaced by images of the man who’d been standing on her doorstep. Hill was on the other side of the wall, right there. She glanced at the wall separating them, listening to the sounds and imagining what was on the other side. Hill taking off his T-shirt, revealing what she suspected was a very well-built body. Hill sliding those loose sweats down his hips, revealing…
Not cool. Stop. No mentally undressing the guy. Nope.
But her inner protests were no use. She could hear him groan with appreciation, like the hot water had been a relief. Hill was taking a shower. On the other side of that thin wall, only a few feet away, he was naked and wet. Water droplets on bare skin were involved.
Thinking of anything else was suddenly impossible. Her starved libido was now fully in charge, popping popcorn for this new dirty movie.
She quickly finished up in the bathroom, trying to get away from the source of the images, but by the time she’d slipped under the covers of her bed, her skin was hot all over. The mental movie of Hill was there and not going away. And though fantasizing about the neighbor was a terrible idea, visions of him in the shower were a helluva lot better than the horrid memories that had taken over earlier. Maybe there was no harm in her little fantasy reel after all. There was nothing safer than fantasy. It was what had gotten her through all these years without a physical relationship.
It’s not like her new neighbor would ever know.
The dirty thoughts were safely locked in her brain, and whenever she ran into him again, she would just have to employ her poker face. She had a good one. No, of course I’ve never pictured you naked.
She closed her eyes and listened to the water run, letting her imagination take over from there.
She forgot to take that sleeping pill.
Chapter Two
Hill Dawson groaned as he let the water run over him, feeling like an idiot for nearly busting down his new tenant’s door over a damn movie. He’d been doing his nightly exercises, hoping they’d tire him out enough to actually get some sleep, when he’d heard the screaming. His instincts had kicked in, and he hadn’t even considered that the noise was something innocuous—like a neighbor playing her scary movie too loudly.
All he could think of was the petite redhead, whom he’d only gotten a few glimpses of over the past few weeks, getting attacked. He’d imagined her trying to fight off an intruder or a violent boyfriend, losing the battle. So he’d rushed over like it was the old days, ready to bust down a door and save the day. He’d almost hoped that there would be a day to save. Something to give him that old rush of feeling like a hero to someone—even if only for a few minutes. Which was fucking bent. But anything to penetrate the numbness would’ve been welcome.
Instead, he’d ended up scaring the hell out of his new tenant—though she didn’t know he was the landlord—and lying to her about his firefighter status. He’d conveniently left out the former part of that title. Great job, asshole. Nothing like starting off a meet and greet with a lie.
But he’d wanted to calm her, to make her feel like he could help. When Andi had first opened the door, pink pepper spray in hand, she’d been trying to look tough—chin jutted out, blue eyes glinting in the porch light—but he’d seen the fear underneath that thin layer of bravado. Her body had been trembling and her face pale. She’d looked so…vulnerable.
Seeing her like that had hit him square in the gut. He’d wanted to pull her to him and hug her. What the hell had that been about? He didn’t hug strangers.
The urge had been weird and completely inappropriate. There was a difference between wanting to protect a citizen from danger and what he’d felt in that moment. That urge had been anything but professional.
Luckily, his training had gone on autopilot when he’d seen her pepper spray—the training that said to speak to her in a calm voice, to be professional, to assure her he was there to help—and he’d kept his hands and hugs to himself. Thank God.
He’d never gotten an up close look at Andi before tonight, and he hadn’t realized how young she was. Or how beautiful. Big blue eyes with smudged black liner, a little silver ring in her nose, and a body that would’ve seemed boyish if not for the small, pert breasts he’d forced himself to look away from when he’d realized she was only wearing a thin tank top and the shadows of what was beneath could be seen in the porch light.
He had no business looking at her that way or allowing the surge of heat that had moved through him. At thirty-one, he probably looked like an old man to her for one, and two, he didn’t do that anymore. No flirting. No charming his way into a fun hookup. Those days were long past him. He wasn’t anyone’s good time. He was a goddamned charity case at best, a pity fuck at worst. He’d learned that the hard way when one of his buddies had tried to set him up on a date after his accident and the breakup with his former fiancée. The woman had let it slip on the date that she was doing it as a favor to his friend. He wasn’t interested in repeating that particular lesson in humiliation.
Not that someone like Andi would’ve been interested anyway. She looked like the type who dated skateboarders or vegans with full-sleeve tattoos or drummers in punk bands. Not disabled firefighters who’d been put out to pasture.
Hill grabbed the metal bar attached to the shower wall and eased down onto the bench he’d installed. He dipped his head and let the water run over him, his eyes stinging with the shampoo. Tomorrow, he’d go back to keeping to himself. He and Andi now had an agreement not to disturb each other. Perfect.
He didn’t need a chatty neighbor, especially one that made him think about things he shouldn’t, made him crave things he couldn’t have. He’d let himself slip a little tonight, getting caught up for a moment and joking with her when she’d made a clever reference to a David Allan Coe song his aunt used to love. But he couldn’t open up that kind of door with someone like Andi, even in a neighborly way.
He’d bought this duplex for the quiet, to start fresh somewhere, and to get a little rental income to add to his firefighter pension while he figured out what the hell he was supposed to do with the rest of his life. He didn’t want to be friends with his tenant. That was why he had a management company handle the rental logistics. He wanted to be anonymous in this new place, left alone. Andi looked like the type who would organize the neighborhood watch and throw block parties. No, thanks.