Page 5 of How to Flirt with a Hellhound
Fuck. He hadverylarge hands. Like his hand just totally wrapped mine up in it, and I was getting horny wondering if my hot neighbor, aka Dex, was that big everywhere. Because yes please.
And he totally did have tattoos peaking out from underneath his t-shirt. They looked like symbols of some sort. I realized I was just staring at him, our hands clasped together, and I pulled mine back.
“Do you mow your own lawn?” I blurted out.
Dammit. Ireallyneeded to get out more. I was so out of practice at having normal conversations.
“I do. Do you need yours mowed as well?” Dex asked, smiling a little.
Ohmygod. Yes please. I tried not to blush just thinking about it.
“Um, I usually hire someone,” I muttered. Because yeah, yard work was not my thing. Tools were not my thing, as evidenced by the fact that I’d almost brained myself with my own hammer.
Which reminded me that sexy, muscular guys were not usually my thing either, as much as I would like them to be. I was a writer who didn’t get enough exercise or sun and liked potato chips too much. And I was socially awkward. I mean, we’d just had a whole conversation about severing body parts.
“So how do you know so much about dismemberment?” I asked.
I almost facepalmed myself. Great pick up line, Toby. And if he was a serial killer, that probably wasn’t a good thing to ask either, although my brain seemed to have decided he wasn’t since he saved me from hammering myself.
This time Dex looked a little awkward. “Um, I have some experience in traumatic injuries,” he murmured.
Huh. That was weirdly vague.
“Like, you’re a doctor?” I asked.
“I have a lot of medical knowledge,” he answered, which wasn’t really an answer.
So he wasn’t a doctor, but he had medical knowledge and experience in “traumatic injuries”—maybe he reallywasa serial killer? Although Josh would still insist he was something normal like a nurse or an EMT.
Ohh, maybe he had been in the military and was one of those soldiers who worked in interrogation. That probably happened in real life and not just the movies, right? They’d totally cut off limbs and stuff, wouldn’t they?
“Are you in the service? Were you, like, an interrogator or something?” I asked, because my mouth didn’t always have a mute button.
Dex looked vaguely uncomfortable. “I, uh… I’ve served…”
“It’s ok,” I said, patting his arm. “You don’t have to talk about it. I’m sorry if my questions brought back bad memories.”
“It’s ok. I don’t mind questions,” he said, looking at my hand, which had stopped patting his arm and was now sort of rubbing it, because the man had some gorgeous forearms. I didn’t even know forearms were my thing, but his were lean and corded with muscle and hairy, and he felt really warm.
I forced myself to pull my hand away, chuckling nervously. “Good! I sometimes get lost in my head plotting, and some of my books are fluffy and sweet, but some are thrillers, and there’s the occasional bad guy. There’s also the occasional good guy who’s badass, because that’s so totally hot, so, yeah, dismemberment and stuff,” I finished lamely.
“Well, anytime you have any questions for your books, feel free to ask,” Dex said. “I’m happy to help.”
It almost looked like his eyes glowed for a second, but when I blinked, he was just my normal, although excessively hot, neighbor.
I chuckled nervously again. “Ok! Well, I’m gonna go write about hot men while I’m feeling inspired by you. I mean, your answers, of course. Yeah.”
With that I turned around, opened my door, gave an awkward little wave again, and shut the door behind me. My god, I really needed to get out and do more peopling. I was totally an embarrassment to myself.
I waited to hear his footsteps leave my porch, and after a moment I heard him going down the steps.
“You’re such an idiot, Toby,” I muttered to myself. “You should not be talking about cutting off body parts with the hot neighbor.”
I thought I heard a laugh, but when I peeked out the curtain at the front window, my neighbor was far enough away that there was no way he’d heard me.
I sighed and then headed over to the couch to grab my laptop, where I’d left it when I’d decided I needed to go and try to fix the numbers on the front of the house, which were attached a little crookedly. It was amazing the things I could accomplish when I was procrastinating. My house was clean, I’d done some laundry, and I’d even resorted to home improvement projects, all because I really needed to write my next chapter.
Hot Neighbor had definitely provided some inspiration, though, and I opened up my current work in progress and got writing. If the badass vampire love interest suddenly started to resemble my neighbor… Well, I was fairly confident Dex wouldn’t be reading my books. I started typing away, losing myself in my paranormal world.
