Page 36 of Ugly Duckling
The garage door shut on the last word, and I stared in shocked silence as Gunner turned to me and said, “Are you okay?”
Was I?
I thought I was okay…
“I’m fine,” I said. “What was that about?”
“That is the asshole who likes to make my life here a living hell,” he muttered. “I moved here after I retired from baseball in hopes that I’d like the gated community. Privacy was really important to me. But Dick, the resident dick with the HOA, took it upon himself to amp up his dickishness when he found out I was moving in. Now he slaps me with fines because my flowers aren’t the right color for the year. Or he files noise complaints on me because my motorcycle is too loud. But he does have a no trespassing order on him when it comes to my place. He knows he’s not allowed to be on my property.”
“He sounds like a dick,” I said. “I got your salt.”
“Thanks,” he muttered, wincing when he took a step back. “Goddamn, I’m sore.”
I was slightly vindicated that he was as sore as I was.
Though, he deserved it after just deciding to go run a marathon without any training or prep work for it.
“Same,” I told him. “Moreso than I ever thought I would be.”
“Whatever we do tonight, we’re ordering in. I don’t want to leave the house again.” He paused. “Do you want to get into the hot tub?”
“I didn’t bring a suit.” I frowned.
“Wear the clothes you ran in earlier,” he suggested. “Or, wear nothing. It’s not like we’re not adults.”
Famous last words.
Six
Not friendly.
—T-shirt
GUNNER
The words had come out of my mouth twenty minutes ago, and I still couldn’t believe that I’d said them.
Yet we were headed to my hot tub with nothing on but towels.
Sutton had shaken her head, studied my face for a long moment, then said, “Fine. If you’re okay with that, so am I.”
My dick was so hard it hurt, and I was silently freaking out, wondering how the hell I was going to hide that from her as I got in naked.
The hot tub had automatic lights that didn’t go off, and there was no way to hide something as big as my dick from someone that I knew to be very observant.
We got outside and I lifted the lid.
The steam from the hot tub fogged my glasses, and Sutton’s sweet giggle from beside me had me glancing over at her.
“I didn’t think you’d still be wearing glasses,” she said. “I figured the big bad baseball player would fix his eyes with the bookoos of money he made when he signed that contract.”
I shrugged. “It was a lot of money. I invested it wisely, and now have even more. My business is thriving. I just have no desire to get Lasik. Have you ever walked into an eye place and noticed people not wearing glasses? Especially places that do Lasik? There’s no way that they don’t get it if it’s safe when they work there and could probably get a percentage off.”
She tilted her head in that cute way that I’d always thought was sexy as hell.
Her eyes, those huge, brown eyes that I’d always loved, went thoughtful. “I guess you’re right. I did watch a video on social media a few months back of a horrible Lasik procedure.”
“Exactly,” I said. “I just feel like if I was meant to have good eyesight, I’d have it.”
