Page 4 of I'm Your Guy
“No,” Mr. Hottie whispers. “No, no, no…”
“Hey, officer?” I try. “You a Cougars fan?”
His chin snaps upward. “Sure. Why?” His gaze zeroes in on my face. “Oh, shiiit,” he says as he recognizes me.
“Yeah, I’m running kind of late. I asked my assistant to park here and wait for me, but I didn’t give him enough change for the meter. The fault is mine.” I pull an envelope out of my pocket. Inside are a pair of comp tickets to an upcoming game. I was going to hand them over to the PR department for charity, but they can have the next pair instead. “Take this, just as a friendly gesture. And then do whatever you need to make this right.”
For a long second, I don’t think he’ll take the bait. But then he slowly reaches for the envelope, nudges it open, and exhales. “Row C. Whoa.”
“Enjoy ’em,” I say. “Now what else do we have to do to get right with the City of Denver?”
He looks down at the beat-up car as if he’s never seen it before. “Move the vehicle, gentlemen,” he says briskly. “Be on your way.” He turns and walks off down the street, shoving the envelope in his pocket as he goes.
That settled, I turn toward the designer again. “Do you have a business card?”
TWO
Carter
What just happened? This thirst trap in an Italian suit just saved my ass. But how?
“Did you just bribe a cop?” I ask in a strangled voice.
“I incentivized him,” the man says with a cocky tilt of his chin.
“Um…” Isn’t that illegal?
I keep my mouth shut, because this man could break me in half. He’s tall and broad, with so many muscles that even the finest imported wool can’t hide them. He has dark hair, a Mediterranean skin tone, and the kind of perma-scruff that only some men can pull off.
The kind of scruff that would give me beard burn in fun and interesting places.
He points at my car with a broad hand, and I can’t help but notice its roughness. He has hands like a construction worker’s, and yet he’s wearing shoes that probably cost more than my past-due rent.
“You’ve really got to move your car now,” he barks. “And I have somewhere to be. But first give me a business card. I need furniture, and I need it soon.”
I blink. This has been a disastrous day, and I can barely function right now. But I have business cards in the cup holder, and I snap to attention. “Right. One sec.” I open my car door and grab a card. “Here. Call me if you’re serious about furnishing your house.”
“Serious as cancer,” he growls. “Thanks.” He strides away, all dark-blue suit and attitude.
I watch him go, and the view from the back is just as fine as the front. In my line of work, I’ve gotten used to dealing with the rich and the beautiful. His entitled attitude is pretty familiar, with one big exception—he just did me a huge favor.
My bank account contains exactly twenty-seven dollars. I literally cannot afford to pay for a parking ticket, let alone the whopping fine you get when your car is impounded. The wolves are howling at my door.
Yet Mr. Italian Suit just chased one of them off with his dark brown eyes and a cash bribe. No, wait. It wasn’t cash. Tickets to a game, maybe? I don’t follow sportsball, so I didn’t catch which one.
It doesn’t matter, anyway. I just hope the guy calls me. The holidays are approaching, which means the design business goes into a lull. I’m going to be eating a lot of ramen until after New Year’s. If I can afford to eat at all.
I climb into my car and start the engine. It’s a short drive back to my apartment building near the University of Denver. When I turn onto my street, I slow to a crawl and check for the landlord’s presence.
Yikes—he’s right out front, organizing the recycling bins. I quickly pull into an on-street parking space and cut the engine.
I’m late on the rent. Really late, and it’s the second time this has happened. Mr. Jones is on my case, and he has a quick trigger finger for those Ten-Day Demand forms that landlords use to threaten eviction. If I don’t catch a break soon, I know he’ll come for me.
Sitting here hiding from my landlord in my car, it’s hard to feel optimistic. A year ago, I had a boyfriend who loved me, and we were co-owners of a growing design business. I thought all my dreams were coming true—that our business would expand and my student loans would continue to shrink.
But I let my guard down, and I made bad choices. I trusted the wrong people. And when our design business hit the skids, our relationship collapsed like a paper lantern in a rainstorm. Six weeks ago, I came home to find Macklin packing his clothes into a suitcase.
“Where are you going?” I’d demanded. But in my gut, I already knew he was bailing out.
