Provocation SAMPLE (Book 3 of The Conquest Series)

Chapter Seven

Standing outside the duplex, Nate sighed in resignation. It was after 5 PM. After office hours. Leila should be here at any time.

He had called her office earlier that day, and her friend and PA, Jared, had answered. He’d made this appointment with him and gave his name. Jared had been silent for a moment before asking him exactly what he wanted. His suspicions about Nate were apparent, and he had all his feelers out.

The apartment was Nate’s answer. But that wasn’t really all he wanted.

Swearing Jared to silence about his true intentions, he told him that he was looking into getting his own place, but admittedly stated it was only one of the reasons he wanted to meet with Leila.

Apologize, asshole.

It had been his mantra since leaving his home forty-five minutes ago. He hadn’t started his job at KinTech yet, but for some reason, the wait to see the apartment and make his apologies to Leila felt like he had done his eight hours of work.

Jared had been reluctant to make the appointment for him, but Nate had insisted and must have sounded sincere enough that the PA went ahead and set up an appointment to see the place. He sounded reluctant, but then again, Jared had been there for some of his finer displays of…

Assholishness? Assholocity? Something along those lines…

Nate knew from Violet that Leila didn’t live too far from her office, and with traffic being heavy this time of day, it would probably take her somewhere between 5:30 to 5:45 to get home. It was only 5:20 when he’d pulled up to the duplex.

And he had taken one of his father’s cars to get here. He really needed to go out and purchase one of his own, perhaps this upcoming weekend. Mass transit getting to KinTech would be a b***h come Monday, though he would probably just hitch a ride with his father for the first couple of weeks until he purchased his own set of wheels.

On the outside, the duplex Leila owned seemed homey. Nothing flashy and nothing intricate, just a two-story single home that had been converted somewhere within the last twenty years to become a duplex. It was something that was quite popular nowadays with real estate being the fickle b***h it was in California. The fickle, greedy b***h.

The outside of the house appeared to have been painted with the surrounding houses in mind. It somehow surprised him with its light blue color scheme and the darker navy blue of the shutters that Leila would want to fit into her neighborhood at all. She had always struck Nate as someone who could—and would—be outrageous just for the sake of being seen as wild, untamed.

If that was the case, if Leila had really wanted to be free and contrary, she would have painted it orange or lime green. But no, it was light blue, Easter egg blue, reminding him of sky and fluffy clouds on a hot summer’s day.

The house was almost too domestic.

Though he supposed that could have been a smart idea, painting the house pastel blue. Who would want to rent a house in lime green or orange? A die-hard San Francisco Giants fan? A blind person? Or maybe just a color-blind individual who wore paisley with plaid together. Poor blokes.

Nate was still standing there and staring at the domicile when a voice rang out from the sidewalk.

“Nate? What the f**k—oh, don’t tell me!”

He spun around to look over in the direction of the driveway.

Leila. She looked furious as hell. At him. At the world. Probably at Jared too for keeping this a secret. Luckily, she seemed fond of her PA, and his testicles would probably remain firmly attached to his body.

Nate’s however...

“Leila,” Nate croaked out before clearing his throat. “I heard you had a place for rent, but I also wanted to speak with you.”

Leila blinked back at him, undecided. She could make a hell of a stink right out here in public and give the neighbors a show, or she could take it inside and retain some dignity.

Right. Dignity it was.

Damn it. She really had the urge to cut up a bit.

“Come inside,” she said, jerking her chin toward the door. “We can talk in the downstairs unit.” No way was she letting him into her personal space. Not this ass.

Her heels clicked noisily along the pavement before trudging up the steps, hurried and resounding amongst the relative quiet of the residential neighborhood.

Nate almost smiled as he saw her struggling with the keys to her apartment. They seemed to be lodged somewhere deep in her oversized tote bag. The flustered Leila before him had a pretty pink blush spreading across her cheeks.

Brushing her hair back, she thrust her small hand into the bag again, dug around, and retrieved a set of keys large enough to brain somebody with. Cold-c****d by a fistful of Schlages.

“How could you possibly lose a set of keys that large in your bag?” Nate asked, amused.

“It’s a large bag. I’ve got a lot of s**t. Now don’t hit your gargantuan ego on the doorframe on your way in,” she bit out, her gaze not even flickering to his.

Dropping her tote by the doorway of the downstairs apartment, Leila looked around. The painters had done a good job filling in the gouges made by nails in her walls from the previous tenant. She should have known not to rent to a recent graduate of Berkeley. Flighty as f**k and had no respect for other people’s belongings.

“This is the place! Hate it? Then let’s go,” she rushed out, trying to hurry him along with a serious lack of enthusiasm.

“How many bedrooms?” Nate asked, purposely ignoring Leila’s words. It was something to say. Something that wasn’t quite “sorry”. At least not yet.

“Two,” she said blinking at his lack of bite. “One’s really small, though. Couldn’t swing a cat in there without giving it a traumatic brain injury, I reckon.”

“Well, I’m only one person and I have no cats,” he told her and walked further into the space.

“Nate,” Leila called, voice low but without her usual grit. “What are you doing here?”

He looked back at her, his breath catching in his chest. She looked so utterly vulnerable and soft without her abundance of sass and oversized bag weighing her down. Her hair was still unkempt and strewn about her face from her earlier flustered state. Puzzlement on Leila made her look all of the 16-year-old girl he had once known and crushed on.

“I’m looking for a place to live that isn’t owned by my father,” he stated, slowly. “And I wanted to talk with you as well.”

She blinked again, disbelieving. “Was the hunt for an apartment just a ruse to get me to talk to you without smacking the teeth right out of your mouth?”

Smiling, Nate responded. “Only partially. I actually do want my own place, even if I have to share a wall with someone.”

Walking further into the room cautiously, Leila leaned up against the wall. “What do you have to say to me?” she asked, her brows sloping into a frown. “Did you wish to call me a w***e in the privacy of my own abode, or did you want to merely see if all the walls of my property were covered in semen?”

Closing his eyes on a slow blink, Nate let out a resigned sigh.

Bite the bullet, asshole.

“None of the above,” he confessed. “I actually just wanted to apologize to you.”

“Apologize?” she asked, brows quirking upward. “Did you smoke something on your way here? I hope you took an Uber and not your car. I would hate to have to console Violet if you wrap yourself around a telephone pole.”

“I’m completely serious and completely sober.” Nate took a step closer to her. “I realize my words hurt you the last time we spoke. It’s just...I saw you with Jared outside the bar that day.”

Leila’s face shut down again. “So that is what this is? Pity? You made me...you wanted to apologize because you realized you upset me? If I hadn’t been upset would you have thought to come to me to apologize?”

Nate didn’t know what to say to that. He wanted to tell her that yes, he would have realized his wrongdoings. Eventually. But he didn’t know. Seeing her cry had been like a kick in the gut to him. One that he had desperately needed.

“I mean it, Leila. I am sorry.”

“Listen, Nate,” she said, pushing herself off from the wall. “I don’t need your pity, and I don’t need your apologies. My heart’s not broken, and I don’t need some meaningless words to make me feel better.”

Leila dipped her hand into her bag and brought out a manila folder. She fished out a few forms that had been neatly stapled together, most likely by her assistant, and handed them over after she stalked up to him.

“If you are interested in the place, you can fill out these forms,” she told him, coldly. “Pending a background check, I think you’re good for the rent. It’s 1.5 months deposit and first month’s rent to start out with. You can slip the forms under my door when you’re done, if you like. Pets—if you had one—would be an extra $300 a month.”

With that, she strode quickly over to the door, picked her bag up again, and walked out. Before closing it, she threw back a look at him. One he couldn’t readily decipher.

She left him there in the empty lower apartment with some paperwork and a stunned look on his face.

>>

Nate didn’t follow Leila. At least not right away. He stood there, gaping after her. In one word, he was floored. Usually when one apologized, the other person was gracious enough to accept it, not toss it back at him. But maybe he was used to a different type of person. The Brits were on opposite ends of the spectrum from the feisty Leila. A lot milder. Magnanimous, even. Less fight and more tranquil, at least from his experience. He hadn’t expected this.

Perhaps words weren’t enough. Perhaps he should do something else, prove he was indeed sorry. But he couldn’t think of anything to do. Instead, he signed the documents without looking at the apartment and slipped up the stairs with them completely filled out. He even had a check with him, should she need it.

The rent was usual for the area. Leila didn’t try to price gouge, though the area was one of the nicer residential neighborhoods that he had seen. Moderate income families, many with children or older couples who had lived on the block for decades. It was the perfect place to buy a home and raise a family, maybe grandkids to play in the backyard someday. Leila had picked her location well.

Knocking reluctantly on the door of the upstairs unit, Nate knew Leila wouldn’t open for him easily, if at all.

“Leila,” he called loudly, reassured that no one outside would hear him. He was well away from the front door. “I can hear you shuffling around in there. Let me in, please. I wasn’t done.”

He thought he heard her mutter something. Something along the lines of, well, I am, perhaps. Sighing, he leaned his head against her door and knocked again. He could feel the vibrations against his skull, and it made his head ache for a moment.

“Leila!” he called out, and was surprised when the door was suddenly gone. He hadn’t realized she had come closer to open it up for him.

After stumbling, Nate looked down at her feet and saw she was barefoot. No wonder he hadn’t heard her.

“What is it, Nate?” She crossed her arms over her chest and popped out a hip. That was never a good sign from a woman.

“I wasn’t done apologizing to you,” he told her lamely.

“Are you looking for forgiveness?” she asked. “Fine, I forgive you, now please go away. I want to start on supper, and Marie Callendar won’t microwave itself.”

“No, I wanted something more than that,” he told her. “A clean slate. All of this behind us. Starting over. Please.”

“I...I don’t know if I can do that,” she muttered, honesty laid bare on her features.

Whore.

That word haunted her again. And she resolved to not let it bother her. Not this time. It was just a word. Five letters.

Insignificant.

“Listen, put down the horribly over-salted microwave pre-packaged meal and let’s have dinner together,” Nate coaxed. “I promise I’ll be good. Won’t even bat an eyelash if you look at a guy while we’re eating.”

She frowned at him. “It would be tacky if I was eating dinner with one guy and eyeballing someone else,” she told him. “I believe in actually engaging in conversation during dinner and not eye-f*****g my next willing victim.”

“I wouldn’t mind, honestly.”

Yes, I actually would, but I’ll take what I can get. Just come with me. I can be a gentleman. That I can do. Promise.

Leila bit her lip, considering his proposition. A do-over. Dinner. With Nate? It seemed like an impossible task, but she would probably have to deal with him sometime in the near future. For Violet. At the wedding, most likely. She could do this for her best friend, right?

“O-okay,” she stuttered. “But I’ll pay for myself. I can afford it. No pity dinners.”

“Sure,” he agreed gladly.

Fat f*****g chance that she’s paying for herself, Nate thought as he patted the wallet in his back pocket. He could well afford to buy them both dinner, though he had to admire her independence. It was liberating after having been with Lorelei and paying for anything from dinner dates to a new set of towels for her washroom. The girl had known how to make her man pay through the nose for her.

Sodding old cow.

Biting back the bitter taste of bile in his throat, Nate forced himself not to think about his ex, though he wondered if she was still shacked up with the same guy. Probably hit it and quit it if he wasn’t wealthy enough for her.

Good riddance to the b***h. He hoped she choked on his load the next time she went down on him. Or got a shot in the eye. That might even be better.

Smiling at his grim thoughts, he stepped into Leila’s apartment, looking around while she went to put shoes on again.

The apartment was furnished well. Not the typical black leather he would have thought she would use. Instead, it was all microfiber and fluffy throw pillows. Something he could see himself furnishing his apartment with. He may have grown up with wealth, but the trappings of it had never mattered much to him. He supposed it would be different if he had grown up poor and always wanting more.

Still, he waited patiently by the door for Leila to get ready. When she finally came out from her bedroom down the hallway, he found she was wearing something different as well.

Looking her up and down, Leila must have read the question in his eyes. Instead of her office attire, she was wearing a pair of capris and sandals, low-heeled ones.

“What?” she asked, raising a brow at him. “You try walking around on stilts or uncomfortable dress shoes all day.”

Smiling, he felt his heartrate increase. “C’mon, let’s go,” he urged. “I’m starving here.”

>>

“You filled out the paperwork,” Leila noticed, sounding surprised. “Are you sure you could handle all the loud noises and calls to God coming from my apartment day and night?”

Nate looked over at her from his position behind the wheel of his father’s sleek BMW. He didn’t know if she was kidding or not, though the small smile on her lips made him think she was.

“I suppose I could take up my noise complaints with the landlord if...oh, wait—that would be you,” he joked, smiling. It was hard trying not to take a jab at her, but...well, he was trying. Trying damned hard.

He saw Leila smile from his peripheral vision and relaxed a bit, tension rolling off him like water off a duck’s back.

“I don’t bring my dates home,” she informed him, quietly peeking over to gauge his reaction. He seemed surprised.

“And why not?” he asked. Soiled sheets? Too intimate? The possibilities were endless.

“I had a few overly attached suitors that came calling after the fun had ended,” she replied. “Nothing serious, but I didn’t like the hangdog puppy-dog eyes they gave. Made me want to pity f**k them just to make it go away.”

“A pity f**k?” Nate laughed at that. “I can’t see you giving it up for someone on account that you felt bad for them.”

“What? I can be accommodating,” she told him, mouth twitching. “But only if they were memorable. The others I...well, let’s just say I owe a few cops a couple of favors.”

“Are you that memorable in bed, or were they the clingy type?” Nate asked, curious to know the answer.

First-hand.

What?

No.

“I’d like to think it was the former, but I think it would probably be a bit of both,” she told him, the first true smile breaking out on her face.

Dear, sweet Jesus. Why did that get him hard? He wondered idly which part of her was most memorable for the men. Her p***y? Her mouth? Another part of her anatomy?

Shifting in his seat, Nate changed the subject. “What are you in the mood for? Italian? Indian?” he asked. He was trying to think of his grumbling stomach and not with the throbbing appendage hidden beneath his trousers. Yeah, that was sort of happening. Not.

“To eat or...to eat?” she asked, her eyebrow arching suggestively at the end.

“Uhm, food-wise,” Nate said, again shuffling in his seat.

“Italian,” she said. “Love Italian.”

Nate didn’t know whether she was speaking of the food or otherwise.

“Great, I know just the place.” He wished he could adjust himself. Maybe in the parking lot when they got there.

Hopefully, she wouldn’t notice.

>>

The place they went to wasn’t anything fancy, just a mom and pop Italian dining experience owned by a large family with grown children who worked as servers and behind the bar. It gave off a familial feel instead of something ritzy and cold.

La Divina was the name on the storefront. Nate was wondering if they were fans of opera right before an aria came on quietly over speakers in the wall. Maria Callas. No wonder they had called the place that. They had named it after their favorite classical singer, apparently.

Casta Diva was playing low as they were being ushered to a booth near the back. The place was moderately crowded for a weekday. Mostly families or couples having a leisurely meal at a decent hour.

Walking after their female hostess, Nate had nodded toward a solitary booth in the corner, the one farthest away from other diners. “Excuse me, but would it be alright if we sit there?” Nate asked the hostess.

“Of course,” she told him, smiling delicately.

After being seated, the hostess brought them two iced waters and some menus, telling them their server would be with them shortly.

“Wine?” Nate asked, looking at the drink selection. The wine list wasn’t much, but everything on there was perfect for the type of dishes the place served.

“Pardon?” Leila asked, looking up from her own menu at him.

“Would you like to share a bottle of wine with me?” Nate asked, perusing the list. It was mostly reds with an odd smattering of whites, probably to go with the seafood dishes.

“Yeah, sure,” Leila said, gazing back at her menu.

After they had ordered, Nate surprised her with an unanticipated question. “How long does it take to do a background check?”

“Uhm, a few days,” she told him, tilting her head in confusion. What the hell?

“Good,” he said. “I don’t have any furnishings yet, so I’d like to be able to purchase them so I don’t have to sleep on the ground. That is, if I get the apartment.”

He tipped a wink at her, and her brows knitted together. This was a different Nate than the one she usually loathed. Playful. It was disarming. The man could be charming when he wanted to.

Who knew Nate could be anything other than an asshole?

“Cabernet is okay, right?”

Leila blinked back at him. ADHD much? His conversational skills lacked something. Focus, most likely.

“Yes, your choice was fine,” she assured him. “Why don’t you just use the furniture in your bedroom at your home now?”

“Leila, it’s all from when I was in high school,” Nate explained. “It reminds me of acne, nocturnal emissions, and fumbled romps in the sack.”

Leila smiled at his surprising self-deprecating manner. It was new and welcome. “Thinking that somehow bringing those items from your parent’s home will continue your constant s****l frustration in a new place?” she asked, a wicked smile on her face.

“Something like that,” he said, his jaw twitching. “Don’t need any bad mojo following me from my teen years.”

They talked, quite amiably, through an appetizer of calamari.

“So, I have to ask,” Leila said after finishing off another bite of deep-fried, seafoody goodness. “Why?”

“Why rent? Why move back to the States? Why what?” he questioned back. She needed to be more specific. 

“Why everything,” she explained. “Why apologize and why dinner?”

“I owe you an apology dinner at the very least. And the apology, the words, weren’t enough.”

Leila’s eyes narrowed. “I told you I was paying for myself.”

“Well, we’ll see.”

They were silent for a moment, both looking at the empty tray of appetizers they had practically swallowed whole.

“As for the apology itself,” Nate said, lifting his head from his stare at the white ceramic tray. “I owed it to you. Not for my own mental health, but because you didn’t deserve what I said. None of it. It was a double standard and unfair of me to try to place higher expectations on you and other women, to be frank. I…I’ve always been under the impression that women were the fairer s*x, that they had certain presumptions thrust upon them that they needed to adhere to, and I was wrong. Just because someone has an active, healthy, s*x life doesn’t mean they are a w***e or easy. I…I’m the opposite of Russ. I don’t do the one-night stand thing. I’ve far too much respect for women—well, most women—to do that.”

Leila’s lips twitched. “I suppose I am a bit of a surprise,” Leila said, settling on an answer after a moment. “Most women aren’t as free-thinking as I am with who I get between the sheets with, I’ll admit.”

“Why is that?” Nate interrupted. All of the sudden, he needed to know why. Why she was the way she was. There had to be a reason, hadn’t there?

“It’s a long and quite personal story,” she told him. She shifted in her seat, her discomfort with the line of questioning apparent. “It’s not something I tell everyone, and if we’re starting over, I’d like to become friends first before pulling out all the skeletons in my closet.”

She gave him a sad half-smile, and Nate knew not to push her.

Baby steps, asshole, he told himself. Walk for now.

“Fair enough,” he said to her. “But I do hope you realize by now that my apologies are sincere. Each and every one of them. I can’t guarantee not to f**k up in the future, but I’m trying my hardest to keep that from happening.”

“I know you are,” Leila murmured. She saw that he was trying. He had stepped back from being a true asshole to just being an ass.

Progress.

>>

“Did your friend leave? Russ?” she asked him after they had received their entrees.

Nate was digging into a plate of pasta that looked like it could feed a small village in Africa, and Leila was trying to tackle a mound of noodles that was supposed to be lasagna but looked more like a tower. A leaning tower.

“Yeah, dropped him off at the airport,” Nate told her. “Had to make sure the fucker got on the right plane. It wouldn’t surprise me if he switched flights if he saw a tempting enough female. I don’t need a call from customs saying that he’s trying to board a flight abroad to follow his dick.”

Leila almost snarfed wine through her nose, knowing what Nate said was probably one hundred percent true. Russ would just try to squeeze past customs to get at a lovely bit of lady action, and damn the authorities.

“How did you end up with such a playboy for a friend?” She had to ask. Russ was Nate’s opposite in so many ways it was nearly mind-boggling.

“We were roommates freshman year of college,” Nate said with a sigh. “He got more tail in his first week than I did my whole first semester.”

Leila broke out in laughter. “That had to make sleeping arrangements interesting,” she needled. “He didn’t offer you his sloppy seconds, did he?”

“God, no!” Nate exclaimed. “His beer goggles needed some serious readjustment at the time. Some of the girls were complete dogs.”

“Did you have to throw a bone out the door to get them to leave?” She snickered.

“Nah. Russ was always great with getting them out the door so I could get a decent night’s rest,” Nate told her, forking up some more noodles. “Left them with a kiss and a fake phone number usually.”

“Hmm, well that’s not surprising, actually,” Leila commented before glancing back over at Nate with a knowing smile. “Was it your phone number he gave out?”

“Uhm…well, sometimes,” he admitted.

“Oh Lord! That man’s a hoot!” Leila practically cackled with glee. Maybe she should try that, only give her dates another gentleman’s number when they asked. It would scare the hell out of Jared or Carl. Although Jared would have probably appreciated the thought—right until he realized the man on the other end of the line preferred p***y to c**k.

“Don’t let him know that,” Nate told her, smirking. “He’ll start doing it again. I don’t need the booty calls at 3 AM to start back up, thank you very much.”

“And you never even once tried to get with a girl he’d had s*x with first?” Leila found that almost unbelievable.

“Well, there was one girl I was sort of hard up for that Russ f****d,” Nate told her. “After he’d had her, I didn’t know what STDs he might have given her, so I forgot about her. I don’t need a lifetime supply of herpes.”

“Hmm, that does put a cramp one’s s*x life,” Leila said, smiling wickedly.

Nate blanched. “You...” His voice trailed off.

“Noooo!” She giggled heartily at his wide eyes. “But you should have seen your face!”

Thank God, he thought.

Well, not that it mattered.

Yet.

Nate ended up stealing the check before it even made it to the table. He had gone to find their server and waited patiently for them to finish printing out a receipt. When he got back to the table after “using the men’s room”, he told Leila they were squared away and gently grabbed her by the arm to escort her from the place.

“At least let me get the tip,” she tried to coax, walking with Nate reluctantly to the front of the restaurant.

“Already taken care of,” he informed her, hurrying her through the door like they had robbed the place blind instead of paid for their food like the law-abiding citizens they were. He wouldn’t have been surprised if she would try to go back and put more money—any denomination really—on the top of the table. And he had tipped the server well enough.

“Geez, are you sure you paid and we aren’t going to be 86ed from that restaurant forever for dining and dashing?” she asked as she was hustled toward his father’s BMW.

“Positive,” he told her. “My wallet is noticeably lighter now.”

Leila rolled her eyes and stared straight ahead. The restaurant they had gone to was about a ten-minute ride from her house, and they both sat in comfortable silence, the radio on very low in the background.

“Would you actually like to tour the apartment you might be renting?” Leila teased when they pulled up to the duplex.

“How do you know I didn’t take my own personal tour of the place when you left me down there before?”

“Nate, you didn’t even have time to read the agreement and sign, much less take a tour,” Leila chided. “Either you can see through walls—which is a disturbing thought to say the least—or you simply signed on the dotted line and came barreling up my stairs an—”

“I don’t barrel!”

“Okay, lead-foot,” she told him with a scoff.

“Fine, I’ll tour the place,” he conceded, parking the car in front and getting out.

When they walked into the downstairs unit, Leila flipped the light switch at the entrance to the unit.

“Electricity already turned on?” he asked.

“It comes with the rent,” she told him with a shrug. “It was more of a pain in the ass than it was worth to have PG&E fit us with two meters.”

“I see.” He walked further into the room.

She showed him the master bedroom, the bathroom, and the medium-sized kitchen. She saved the smallest room for last.

“Lots of people use the smaller room for a computer room or study,” she told him, flicking on the light switch.

Nothing. No light. Not even a flicker.

“Damn it,” she muttered.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“f*****g raggedy-ass electricians,” she grumbled. “They were supposed to have fixed this last week.”

She took a few more steps into the room and stumbled, almost tripping over an errant box that the last tenants must have accidentally left behind.

Leila would have face-planted onto the floor had it not been for a steadying pair of strong arms. Nate’s arms, to be exact. They were curled around her middle, and she was soon pressed into a firm chest and torso. Never having been that close to him before, it made her remember the fast and heady crush she’d on him almost ten years ago. The one that had faded as fast as twilight into darkness.

Or at least should have.

“Thanks,” she said to him, her voice shaky. “Assholes can’t fix a light and my previous tenants are as flaky as they come.”

Nathan grunted, his hands still gripping her waist.

The air around them was suddenly cloying and dense as Leila fought to catch her breath.

Nate’s breathing was heavy as well, possibly from trying to keep the woman upright.

“Uhm, Nate?”

“Y-yeah?”

“You can let go of me now.”            

>>

“Oh...sorry.”

Nate’s voice sounded a bit choked, but he withdrew his hands immediately and stepped away from Leila.

“No problem, and thanks,” she said to him, grateful for the help in keeping from face-planting onto the hardwood floor of the second bedroom.

After an awkward moment filled with some feet shuffling and throats clearing, Leila got her cell phone out and used the flashlight function on it so Nate could see the room. Sort of. The flashlight wasn’t all that great, but it served her well enough to know that she needed to do a serious overhaul of the room—and not just because of the electricity. It looked like the previous tenants had used the room for storage, and there were cobwebs in the corners and some forgotten items that were left scattered about the room.

“Uhm, I’ll have a cleaning service come in to get rid of the stuff in the corners,” Leila said, her mouth twitching. No way in hell was she getting cobwebs all over her. Cobwebs meant spiders. Spiders were part of nature. And nature...nature was not a good friend to Leila. Nature meant sunburn and mosquito bites and poison ivy.

“No sweat if you don’t,” Nate told her lightly. “I’m not afraid of a few cobwebs and dust. It reminds me of the summer I spent with Grand-mère and Grand-père in Arbois.”

“That was…when was that again?” Leila asked, only vaguely remembering the year Violet and Nate spent the entire summer in France.

“I was 16—no, 17, I think,” Nate told her, finally heading out of the room into the more lit quarters of the living room. “The cellars they aged the wine in were full of spiders and other creepy crawlies. Violet hated it. I remember hiding from her in the cellars. On purpose, of course. When Grand-mère told her to come find me, I thought she was going to piss herself she was so scared to come in. Threw a few stray corks in her direction. I think she jumped a mile.”

Leila cracked up and looked at Nate.

“I think the only thing that aged that summer better than the wine was my little sister,” Nate said with a wry smirk. He looked like he was trying hard not to burst into laughter, and he pulled out the wallet from his back pocket.

“I think you need a copy of my social security card and my driver’s license in order to do the background check,” Nate said to her, trying to wriggle the two documents from the stuffed bifold leather wallet.

“You know what? I think I can trust you,” Leila allowed, surprising herself. “After all, I’ll know where you live.”

Nate laughed that time and responded. “I have a check with me, ready to be made out to you, if you like,” Nate said, unfolding it from his billfold.

“Musical instruments?” Leila looked at the pattern on the check and watched as Nate’s cheeks stained a rosy pink.

“Uh, yeah. I learned how to play the guitar when I moved to London,” he said, surprising her yet again. “An ex-girlfriend of mine dug musicians, so I took some classes. Ended up liking it quite a bit.” He seemed amused at himself at that turn of events.

“What happened to the girlfriend? Did you waste all that money on lessons for nothing?

“We...it didn’t work out,” he told her, face stiff and jaw tight. “It rarely does where I’m concerned.”

Nate took a moment and pulled a pen out from his shirt pocket, his face an emotionless mask.

Leila looked over at him, scrutinizing his features as he filled out the blank check. Under his blank stare, he looked flushed with his facial muscles rigid, and his writing seemed to suffer due to that. Once he was done filling out the check, he handed it over to Leila, who took it and placed it in her pocket without looking at it.

“I’ll make you a copy of the lease right now,” she told him. “Come on.”

“You don’t have to do that—”

“Nonsense,” she told him. “The printer is already turned on and ready to go, and that way you can actually read the rental agreement when you get home.”

“The first is a Monday,” Nate said slowly. “Would it be okay if I moved my stuff in on the weekend before that? It probably wouldn’t go over too well if I take a day off after only one week of work.”

“Not a problem,” Leila told him. “Just keep the noise down to a dull roar and don’t move anything around past 10 PM. The neighbors will have a s**t-fit if you do. They already aren’t happy with me after I let that college grad rent the place for a while. Music fit to wake the dead until 2 AM sometimes.”

They were at the door to Leila’s upstairs apartment, and she opened it for both of them before walking down the hall into her own rarely-used home office.

Nate followed along slowly, taking in the sparse decorations and neat decor.

Leila popped each page, one by one, into her small printer-copier-scanner after initialing and signing the bottom of each leaf of paper. After that, she stapled Nate’s copies together and handed them over to him.

“Thanks. He was smiling again, all embarrassment or discomfort from earlier seemingly gone.

After a few more minutes of chatting about the move, Nate was ready to leave. Leila saw him to the front door before she watched him get into his father’s borrowed car and leave.

Slowly, she walked back up to her apartment and thought meticulously. She hadn’t woken up that morning thinking that Nate could become a friend instead of an enemy. If it hadn’t been for Violet, she doubted she would have given him the second chance.

And all those thoughts were taxing. Taxing indeed.

>>

“Jare, please take the listing for the bottom half of the duplex off the market,” Leila ordered him while walking into the office the next day.

“Sure,” Jared started to say automatically. He must not have taken in what she had said immediately, because once he realized the meaning behind the words, he got up from his desk and followed Leila into her spacious and obscenely large office.

“Sugar bear, you didn’t!” Jared exclaimed with a faux-scandalized note to his voice.

“Do what, you flaming ‘mo?” she tossed back as she set her oversized tote next to her desk by her feet.

“You didn’t rent that bottom half of your duplex to that despicably gorgeous yet completely slap-worthy dish that is your best friend’s brother, did you?”

“Okay, I didn’t,” Leila replied, only half-listening to the drivel he was spouting.

“You liar!”

“Okay, I’m a liar.”

“b***h!”

“c**k jockey.”

“Hag!”

“Ha! You act like that’s a bad f*****g thing,” Leila said as she started up her work laptop and looked over at Jared. “I’m a fag hag and proud of it. Who else could keep you and your tutu in line?”

“I object!” Jared cried, his mouth aquiver with feigned outrage.

“Sustained,” Leila replied, now getting bored with the game they were playing.

“He’s a throwback!”

“He apologized,” Leila told him.

“Not enough,” Jared surmised, arching a brow.

Leila sighed. “Maybe not, but I would rather get along with him for the sake of Vi’s wedding next month than have bad blood at what should be a fantastic celebration,” Leila told him. “Plus, he was actually pleasant for once. I know, I know—it was a shock to me, too.”

“Pleasant? Did he have a brain transplant since the last time we saw him?” Jared looked suspicious. “I find this hard to believe, princess. Hard as hell to believe unless...”

Jared’s voice faded out, and Leila could almost hear the cogs turning in his mind. “I know I’m going to regret asking this, but unless what?” Leila questioned, wanting to cringe after speaking.

“Well, it’s obvious,” Jared told her, looking sly. “He has either fallen in love with you and wants to win your hand, or the pod people have come and brought a handsome stranger in to replace him.”

“Jare—”

“Or maybe the mother ship brought in a replacement after the old one broke.” Jared looked deep in thought again. Never a good sign.

“Jared—”

“Ooh! It could be a tumor!” Jared exclaimed, having a sudden Eureka! moment. “I hear people sometimes act completely sideways after they get a brain tumor. It all makes sense now...”

“Honestly—”

“If this is a clone thing, can I get a copy?” Jared begged, ignoring the huge eyeroll Leila gave him. “Maybe you could make a mute clone—no wait, I need him screaming my name after I lube him up and f**k his tight little a—”

“Jared!”

“Yes, my queen?”

“I pay you to work, not make ridiculous conjectures, so vamoose,” Leila told him, shooing him out the door of her office, much to his loud protests.

“Spoilsport,” Jared retorted, blowing a raspberry before closing the office door.

>>

“Miss?” the doctor asked, shaking the girl from her daze. “Have you made up your mind about what you want to do?”

“Do?” she asked. For the briefest of moments she seemed puzzled.

“Yes. Do—about the baby,” the doctor reminded her.       

Good Lord, you would think a few days would have allowed the reality of her predicament to sink in.

“Uhm, yes,” she told the doctor. For the first time, she looked resolute, determined. “I’m going to keep it.”

“Miss, are you sure?” the doctor asked. “There are some wonderful people out there that can give this baby two loving parents.”

“My baby will have two loving parents,” the woman informed him stonily before breaking into a slow, giddy smile. “I just haven’t told the father we’re expecting. Yet.”

Something was wrong with the woman. The doctor blinked slowly as a chill ran down his spine. What kind of woman would come into the clinic numerous times without the father of her unborn child and claim this baby would be loved by two biological parents? It was odd, and Atticus Modine, Ob/Gyn, knew there was something severely wrong with the situation.

The female must have picked up on something in the doctor’s demeanor, because she immediately started to explain. “I just wanted to make sure that I was absolutely, positively sure that I was pregnant before I told him,” she lied, her tone smooth as butter. “And it’s his birthday pretty soon so I wanted to get a little birthday package set up for him. The sonogram, the test...it’ll be the perfect gift when we go out for his celebration.”

The doctor forced a smile onto his face and walked over to his desk before grabbing a pen and his pad of paper. Ripping off the top sheet, he gave the girl a prescription for supplements and another sheet of paper with a list of foods to avoid.

On the way out, the girl was given a pamphlet on what to expect during her pregnancy. She smiled the whole time until the moment she walked out onto the bustling city street. Her face crumpled, then became flat in effect. Her hands dropped all the items except for the prescription, which she had popped into her handbag along with her cell phone. On the way to the bus stop, she stopped off at a coffee shop and grabbed a latte and a croissant. She nibbled on the latter idly, hoping it was light enough for her nauseated stomach. The latte—that was merely out of habit, though it was a bad choice for a morning beverage since she was up the duff.

Taking a small sip, she grimaced but swallowed anyway. It may have been a staple in her daily routine before this, but the baby growing in her belly was unappreciative of said routine.

Vomiting into a bush near the corner of Harley and Weymouth streets, she tossed her drink in a bin before crossing to catch the bus.

There was an elderly woman sitting at the bench, reading a magazine and humming quietly. The woman’s mobile then rang softly, an electronic version of Pachelbel’s Canon in D, and she answered it.

The girl tried not to listen in on her conversation, but the old woman must have been deaf and continued speaking loudly.

“...in hospital—that’s right,” the older woman said. “Twins, imagine that? He’s convinced they’re not his. Not a set of twins in the family for generations, both sides!”

Sighing, the girl understood. She had a feeling she was going to have a hard time telling the father of her child that she was pregnant. A harder time, even, to convince him it was his.