Page 17 of Situationship
By the third knock, the Siamese sisters he’d rescued when their owner dropped them off at the clinic for shots and never came back sat on the bed staring at him. One perched on his chest, the other on his pillow.
“Purr, purr, yowl, trill,”Purrsnickety said.
“Chirp, trill, chirp,”Purrito replied.
“Purr, purr, yowl, trill.”
And so the sisters went on, chatting back and forth like a bunch of old biddies, gossiping about the delusional man who thought his life was his own.
“Fuck,” he grumbled. The ladies hopped down and snaked through his legs, nearly taking him out twice, as he padded downstairs toward the kitchen.
A fourth knock sounded, and he decided he was going to kill his brother. And take his time about it. “I fed your food to the cats, flushed your doughnuts, and drank your beer, so go away.”
And that was how he found himself looking at Teagan through the window while she looked back. Even with her light blond hair piled into a messy bun on top of her head and covered in flour, she was beautiful. He wasn’t ready for beautiful at this hour—especially when there was a ninety-nine-percent chance Beautiful wasn’t wearing a bra.
All day long he was confronted with pretty, single women looking to land the successful single dad. Colin wasn’t looking to be landed. His marriage had been a mistake—one he would not make again. He’d known exactly who Amanda was when he’d proposed, so it wasn’t a big shock when she bailed.
He’d spent three years with his ex, two of them shit, but he’d do it all over again. They had brought him his daughter, Maddison, and she was his world. Had been since the day she was born. Which was the reason he’d gone to exorbitant lengths to mollify his ex. He knew when Amanda walked, she never looked back. Not even for Maddie.
She’d left him behind with a fear of failing again when it came to love.
For a time, he’d loved his ex. Couldn’t get enough of her. She was bold and captivating; being with her was like surfing in the middle of a lightning storm. Her unpredictability and worldly sophistication lured him in. Problem was that those traits weren’t applicable to parenting.
Not that either of them had been looking to start a family. His dad had just passed when they’d met and they were barely six months into dating when she got pregnant. The second those double pink lines appeared, Colin was committed. After hearing her heartbeat for the first time, he was in love—his little girl had him wrapped around her tiny finger.
Now he had less than five months left before Maddison set off for college. Distractions weren’t an option. With prom, graduation, college tours, dorm selection, and registration, his plate was overflowing. He didn’t have the capacity to deal with the box Teagan had slapped shut all those years back. He’d put a lock on it with a giantDO NOT OPENseal. Her moving back home didn’t change that. While Teagan had once been the best thing that ever happened to him, she had also, up until his parents died, been the worst.
When he didn’t move to open the door, she stepped back. “I’m sorry,” she said through the glass. “I shouldn’t have bothered you.”
She turned to leave, and war waged inside him: Let her go and head back to bed—the odds of his falling back to sleep were one in never-going-to-happen—or find out why she was there.
Curiosity won out.
He opened the door. “I thought you were Ethan.”
“I thought you’d be awake.”
“It’s five in the morning.”
“Right. I knew you’d gotten home just a little while ago, so I thought . . .”
“You’re keeping tabs on me, Bianchi?” he asked, clueless as to why he’d used her nickname or, more concerning, why his heart raced with anticipation over her answer.
It was likely heartburn from the breakfast burrito he’d picked up on his way home.
“No. I just need to ask a favor.”
In a snap of the fingers, his heartburn vanished. “Is something wrong?”
“Yes, everything’s wrong. I’d like to borrow your ovens. Actually, I need to borrow your oven and—” She looked down and her eyes squeezed shut. “You’re in your underwear.”
Like she was one to talk. She had a killer body, her feet were bare, her toes painted a bright blue. And that wasn’t the only thing that was bare. She was in a pair of teeny-tiny, silky, patriotic-themed pajama shorts and a faded NSYNC T-shirt, withJUSTINscrawled across her chest. The bottom curve of the J and N were stretched so tightly, there could be no question about her current bra of choice.
God bless America, the answer was a resounding none.
She must have gotten in a good peek too because she was blushing. A reaction that was as fascinating as her asking him for a favor. She had other neighbors she could have bothered—but she’d chosen to bother him. Why?
“I repeat, it’s five a.m.”
