The Consequence of Seduction

I flipped the switch.

Nothing.

“You smell smoke?” Reid coughed and covered his mouth just as my tiny shih tzu barreled out of the bedroom and launched himself onto Reid’s leg.

Reid looked down at the small rat. “Friend of yours? Funny, I expected you to be more of a cat person.”

“Come here, Otis.”

“Otis?”

“Yeah.” I snuggled my dog close to my chest. “You know, from Milo and Otis?”

Reid’s eyes scanned my small one-bedroom apartment. I knew it wasn’t anything special. I didn’t have time to decorate, and even my sad pathetic coffee table was naked, not even a coaster decorating the thing. But I’d always been of the mind that a woman doesn’t need a coaster if all she drinks is wine.

“I know a Milo.”

“Right. Okay.” I dropped Otis onto the ground and went to another light switch. Nothing.

“Did you pay your power bill?” Reid asked, his tone completely serious.

My cheeks heated as I clenched my fists to keep from scratching his eyes out. “Yes. As I said before, my electricity went out this morning, but they promised it would be fixed within a few hours.”

A knock sounded at the door.

I ignored it.

Already knowing what it was.

More bad news.

Because after today, how could it really be anything good?

Reid pushed past me and opened the door.

“You can’t be here!” A stout man with a wiry mustache pushed into my apartment and clenched his fists at his sides like he was trying to keep his anger in check. “It’s been condemned.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” I held up my hands. “Over the electricity?”

He sighed, looking at me like I was a complete idiot, before addressing the other male in the room. “She your girlfriend?”

“Something like that.” Reid smirked. Hey, at least he semi claimed me, right? “Now, what’s going on here?”

The man held out his clipboard, handing it to Reid, a relative stranger. Never mind that it was my name on the lease. All that mattered was that there was a man to explain things to rather than a hysterical lady with poofy hair. “The electrical is so old we’ve had to condemn the oldest apartments on this side, the ones not renovated or part of phase one.”

My stomach sank. “I was told it was perfectly safe.”

“Lady, that smoke you smell? Could have been you or your little fur ball had some pathetic squirrel not sacrificed itself on a power line this morning. You need to pack your shit and stay with friends. If you need help moving, I can give you some numbers, but you can’t stay the night.”

“But—”

“Lady.” Seriously, if he called me lady one more time I was going to show him how much of a lady I could really be and slam his head in the doorway. “Stay with your boyfriend, I’m sure he won’t mind.”

“He would.” I gritted my teeth. “Believe me.”

The man left, slamming the door behind him.

And that’s when I felt the familiar sting of tears. Nothing in my day had gone right, and now I really was homeless. All I needed was a cart and an END OF THE WORLD sign.

CHAPTER TEN

REID

I wasn’t one of those guys—you know, the type that knew how to comfort other human beings well. I did the typical rough pat on the back and chin nudge. When I broke up with my last girlfriend, I patted her ass and said, “Good game.”

It may have been because I was breaking up with her while watching SportsCenter, but she cried. Hard. Then shrieked and asked why she even put up with me in the first place.

I wasn’t sure if it was a rhetorical question, so I ignored her.

Which just pissed her off more.

So tears—the kind I was about 99 percent sure were going to start flowing freely from Jordan’s eyes—freaked me out.

“Er.” I looked frantically around her sparse living room. Where was the wine? The chocolate? The cuddly teddy bear that I could chuck in her general direction to distract her enough so I could make a run for it?

“I’m homeless!” she wailed, wobbling on her legs. I took a tentative step backward and covered my nether region, in case she wanted to take out her bad day on the entire male gender, and not wanting to be the one she made an example out of.

“There, there.” I coughed into my right hand while the left kept its protective goalie-like stance. “It will be all right.”

She blinked her big brown eyes up at me. “If you pat my head, I won’t be responsible for my actions.”

Good thing she warned me, because I was just about to pat her head—like a dog—and possibly scratch behind her ear and ask if it made her feel better. I might be really good at flirting and getting a girl to fall for me, but I was shit at real emotions. I didn’t cry over women—they cried over me. Plain and simple.

“So.” I licked my lips. “It seems your hands are full here, so I’ll just . . . keep in touch? Maybe we can do lunch tomorrow?”

“Do. Lunch,” she repeated, her eyes widening into an expression that looked a hell of a lot like the beginnings of a toddler meltdown.

“Yeah.” I gulped. “Food always makes me feel better, so . . . you know, now you’ll have something to look forward to.”

Somehow I was making the situation worse, if the red on her cheeks was any indication.

“Reid, I have no home. I have to move out of my apartment while trying to keep your sorry ass out of a media firestorm, and you expect me to do all of that how? If I lose my job and my home—” She blanched. “Oh my gosh, I can’t, I can’t lose my job!”