The lawn isn’t even real. Who the fuck puts fake grass on their tiny lawn?
“Where is he?” she asks, taking her seatbelt off and then adding, “Stay here.” She reaches for the door handle.
“No,” I reply, taking my own seatbelt off.
She freezes and shoots a warning glare at me. “Stay here, Doggo.”
“No,” I repeat, leaning toward her. “I’m at your back.”
Or her front if he turns out to be the dick I’m expecting him to be based on how his voice message sounded.
“I don’t think he’s even here. His car is gone. Where is he at almost four o’clock in the morning?” She gets out.
I follow her to the house. She uses the app on her phone to unlock the door and disarm the alarm on the place before she heads in, me on her heels. She flicks the light on just inside the entrance.
Everything is white. White furniture, white walls. Mostly white art on the walls.
“Stay here.” She heads for the staircase.
“Nobody’s here,” I tell her. “The guy that was here left at least a couple hours ago.”
“I know by the alarm history, he left at twelve twenty. But how do you know?”
“Can tell by the scent trail. Bathed heavily in mouthwash and cologne, by the way.”
She frowns, takes two steps onto the staircase straight ahead and dials a number.
A male voice answers hey on the second ring.
“Rick?” She heads up the stairs and I follow. “Where are you?”
Three bedrooms. Doors open. Unoccupied. My lip curls as I glare at the king size bed in the master bedroom. She slept there with him. The room is filled with both their scents. He put his hands on her in there. Not recently, but I still want to rip this guy apart just for having had the opportunity.
“I’m home. Why are you calling so late?” he answers. “Something up with Ivy? You two scrapping again?”
“You’re not home; Where are you?” She opens a drawer and grabs a stack of clothing from it, then stuffs it into a gym bag.
“I’m almost pulling in, I mean,” I hear the guy answer. “Just a minute.”
“Yeah. Kay.” She hangs up and then looks at me. “Go outside and wait.” She goes to the bathroom and grabs a hair dryer from the counter, then stuffs it into the bag.
“No,” I deny.
“You need to go, Mason!”
“No,” I repeat. “Say whatever you wanna say about who I am and what I’m doin’ here, but I’m going nowhere without you.”
She growls at me. And it’s adorable.
I cross my arms over my chest and lean against the wall.
“Oh fuck. The ring,” Amelia whispers, paling.
“What?” I ask.
“You threw it. Shit.” She covers her mouth for a second, then dashes down the stairs while zipping up the bag, so I follow, slipping past her when we get to the bottom to get between her and that’s when the guy comes in.
Immediately, I’m disgusted at the scent coming off him.
His hair is somewhere between blond and light brown, like me in that sense but fairer, around five foot eight, looks like a gym rat with arms and thighs like tree trunks. The guy has one of those douchebag corporate haircuts and not only is he wearing too much cologne, he’s just shoved at least half a dozen dissolving breath strips into his mouth. More than that scent, he smells like liquor and sex. A lot of the former, plenty of the latter.
When he spots me, he straightens, trying to make himself taller, pushing his chest out.
“Who’s this?” the guy demands.
“He smells like pussy, Amie. And it’s clearly not yours I’m smellin’ on him.”
I feel the air go electric. Amelia gasps. He wobbles, looking at me with shock on his stupid mug.
“Who the fuck’re you?” he slurs, trying to straighten up further.
“And he’s drunk. Drove home drunk? What a fuckin’ meathead,” I mutter. There’s no way this conversation with him is going to go well.
“I had only three beers o’er six hours,” he slurs, “an only drove six blocks. Who is this fuckin’ guy, Melia?”
“You’ve drank a helluva lot more than that,” I volley.
“Again, who the fuck are you?” He takes a step toward me, and I know he doesn’t like that he has to look up at me. He puffs himself up even more and when I don’t back down, don’t back off, he turns his ire to my woman.
“Amelia? Explain this to me. What is this?”
She dashes her hair out of her eyes and then her eyes bounce between us.
“You are drunk,” she says, “You’re… completely trashed.”
He shakes his head. “Am not.”
“You drove home drunk,” she accuses.
“Why the hell you believin’ this guy?” Spittle gathers in the corner of his mouth. “And who is he? Why is he in my house?”
“Get this over with, Amie. This conversation isn’t gonna be productive,” I mutter.