Hate Story

  Her eyes darted down to me, narrowing a little. “No. But I have heard of a BWM.”

  I rested my foot on the first step and kept smiling at her. “Well, that’s a start.”

  Most girls looked at my car and saw dollar signs. Nina looked at it and saw an eye-sore. I looked at it as a mode of transportation and an environmentally friendly one . . . that might have been insanely fast. I’d just purchased it in hopes Nina might eventually let me give her my other car so I could stop worrying about her taking the bus.

  “Well? Do you want the tour first or should we get you unpacked first?” She backed up as I climbed the stairs.

  When I reached the top, finding her standing in front of me with the front door open behind her, I knew there was no going back. Nina and I were living together from today on.

  That knowledge shouldn’t have made my blood rush the way it did.

  “The tour,” I answered.

  She nodded and spun around, moving through the door. “Then follow me.”

  This wasn’t the first time I’d seen her house, but I’d only seen the outside when I dropped her off after one of our dates. Our “dates,” I clarified for myself because they weren’t real ones, they were illusions. A web we were spinning.

  This was the first time I’d ever stepped inside though.

  Her home was located in Portland’s historical district, which seemed to have become where the wealthy of the city congregated. Nina’s house was one of the smaller ones in the neighborhood, but even the smallest, most decrepit home in this area sold for nothing short of half a million.

  I wondered what was so special to her about this place. Why she’d be more willing to marry a stranger and sacrifice a few years of her life than leave it. She could sell it no problem and make close to as much as I’d offered her. She could stop working the odd jobs and late hours. She could be free.

  But something told me she didn’t want to be free of this place—that maybe this was where she felt most free.

  The house had belonged to her grandmother before it was passed on to Nina after her death, but that was the extent of my knowledge. Of course there was more to the story, but I wouldn’t push her. I guessed Nina would tell me when she was ready. Or she wouldn’t and I’d have to leave the mystery behind the house a question mark.

  “So this is the living room, the dining room.” Nina lifted her arm as she indicated at rooms we passed, but it was clear she wanted this tour over quickly. She was apparently uncomfortable with me being there, no matter how much she’d told me otherwise.

  She was uncomfortable around me. I’d done my job of driving her away.

  I should have been patting myself on the back. Instead, I wanted to punch myself in the face.

  “Here’s the kitchen, obviously—oh and by the way, feel free to help yourself to whatever you want.” She did a quick spin, her eyes landing on mine for a moment before she spun away. “No need to use separate His and Hers cupboards or anything. Just help yourself to whatever of mine you want.”

  My molars ground when my mind went there—what I wanted to help myself to of hers.

  You’ve got a brain, Max. Use it for Christ’s sakes and stop letting your dick do the thinking for you.

  “Thank you. And same for me,” I said, following her down the hall. “Just feel free to help yourself to whatever of mine you want too.”

  I watched her for a sign of the same kinds of feelings that had been firing up and down my body when she said the same words to me. There was nothing. No raised skin. No quickened breathing. No nothing.

  She heard what I’d said and thought of food. I heard the same thing from her mouth and thought of fucking.

  She had no idea what kind of man she’d let into her life.

  “This is the guest bathroom right here, the guest bedroom here, and upstairs . . .” She paused at the bottom of a flight of stairs, staring up them with her brows drawn. “There’s just more bedrooms and bathrooms. A dusty attic stuffed with junk above that.”

  I came around behind her and looked up the stairs. The house was probably a hundred years old or more, but still in good shape. There was wear in places, areas hinting at repair in others, but I could already tell from my one-minute tour that this was a well-loved home.

  “And where is your bedroom?” I asked before clearing my throat.

  She worked her lower lip with her teeth for a second, her eyes pinging from me to the closed door we’d passed in the hall. She’d just moved toward the closed door, her hand moving for the handle, when we both heard something rolling up her driveway. Nina glanced at me with her eyebrows tied together.

  “Move-in time,” I said, staring at the sealed-up room as we headed for the front door. Closed. Shut. Off-limits.

  It wasn’t just her room that needed to stay that way.

  “A moving truck?” Nina exclaimed when she shot out onto the porch. “I thought you said you were only bringing a few things over from your apartment.”

  I came up behind her slowly. She was framed in the doorway perfectly, the light from outside highlighting her in such a way that it almost looked like she was glowing.

  “I was. Then I picked up a few new things just in case.”

  “Just in case of what?” Nina’s hands went to her hips as she watched the moving guys climb out of the cab and throw open the back door.

  “In case I wanted to barbecue.” I came up beside her and tipped my chin at the first item the movers were unloading. “In case I needed my own chair.”

  They heaved out the next thing, set it on the ground, and disappeared back inside the truck.

  I rubbed at the back of my head because I wasn’t sure how this next part was going to go over. “In case I needed a pool table.”

  She spun on me. “A pool table?!”

  I slid my hands into my slacks’ pockets and watched as the movers carried the first piece of it down the ramp. “Just in case.”

  “Just in case of what? You wanting to piss me off?”

  When the movers climbed the stairs with the top part of the pool table, I grabbed Nina and pulled her aside. I’d meant to grab her arms and pull her back, but instead, my hands found her waist.

  My fingers sank into her like her body was almost welcoming me. Nina was soft, not all muscled or bony, and something primal inside me wanted to feel that softness pillow mine while I worked her body . . .

  Goddamn it, Max. Two fucking minutes. Give me two minutes where you’re not thinking about Nina like that.

  “Well, I do that no matter what I do. At least this way, I can play pool while you’re yelling at me.”

  When I didn’t let go of her waist right away, she wiggled away from me. “Where do you think you’re going to put that thing?”

  “I don’t know. Where would you like me to put it?”

  Her face was a little red from being flustered. “How about up your ass?”

  Too late. My head’s already taken residence up there. “I don’t think it would fit. Sorry.”

  Her green eyes did that melting thing they liked to do when she was pissed at me. Which was pretty much how we spent half of our time together. “I bet I could make it.”

  I lifted my hands, conceding that because I had no doubt she could. Something about Nina Burton led a person to believe she could do anything she put her mind to.

  “You’re not planning on sticking up a bunch of posters of bikini-clad girls, are you? Hanging a few neon beer signs?”

  I nodded at the movers as they trudged out of the house. I didn’t know where they’d set the pool table top, but unless it was in the back alley, I knew Nina wouldn’t like it. I guessed I should have run stuff by her before going crazy.

  “Of course not,” I answered her. “You don’t mind the occasional blow-up doll though, do you? Given my social agenda is taking a hiatus for the next few years, I’m going to need the sweet release only a latex doll named Sheena can provide.”

  She sighed and shoved my chest as she pas
sed me to head down the stairs. “Please. Latex dolls have been your social agenda your whole life. You’re not fooling me, Maximilian Sturm.”

  I chuckled as she bounced down the stairs, but silently I hoped that wasn’t the case. If I wasn’t fooling her, I was in trouble. If she really knew what I thought when I looked at her, I was fucked.

  It wasn’t just her body that lured me in—it was everything that made up the whole of Nina. Her sharp wit. Her inclination to compassion, which was especially pronounced when she thought no one was looking. The way she was so honest about some things and so closed off about others. The way she didn’t feel the need to apologize for the person she was, and the way she didn’t look at me like I was used to women looking at me—like I was something to defeat. Something to conquer. Something to claim.

  I’d gotten so lost in my damn thoughts again that at first, I didn’t notice Nina trudging down the ramp, carrying a box that was half her size. I leapt down the stairs in two steps and bounded across the yard in her direction.

  “Don’t even think about it,” she warned before my hands got close to the box. “Go grab your own. I’ve got this.”

  “Nina—” This was the box marked books, the heaviest damn box I’d packed.

  “Don’t think just because my arms are occupied I can’t still kick your ass if you lay a finger on this box, you hear me?” She kept striding toward the porch, but her breathing was a little strained. “Besides, I wouldn’t want you to get a wrinkle in that pretty suit of yours.” With that, she started up the stairs.

  I followed her, ready to catch her if she tripped or lost her step, but she made it and disappeared inside the house. My jaw ground together, and I growled in frustration. One minute I wanted her to hate me, the next minute I wanted the opposite. Even when I’d tried just being friends, that never lasted for long.

  I thought it was impossible to just be friends with the woman you wanted so much more from.

  “You must be Max.” A guy around my age was crossing into Nina’s yard, his eyes roaming from me to the moving van to the Tesla.

  “I must be.” My voice came out cooler than I’d intended. That might have had something to do with the way he was looking inside Nina’s front door.

  “Yeah, I recognize you from the pictures.” When my brows knitted together, he added, “You know, the ones Nina’s been posting online?”

  My fingers curled into my palms. “You’re a friend.”

  The guy threw his thumb over his shoulder at the house next door. “Friend and neighbor.”

  “Nice to meet you,” I said when I more meant the opposite. I held out my hand to shake his when I would have rather ripped his arm off and beat him over the head with it.

  Whoa, Max. What the hell?

  I wasn’t sure where the jealous streak cropped up from, but I needed to get it in check before I put my new neighbor in the hospital.

  But I could tell this guy had a thing for Nina. It was the way he’d said her name. The way he kept looking at her front door like he couldn’t wait to see her. The way he was doing the same arm-ripping-off musing about me.

  He liked her. And I didn’t like that he liked her. At all.

  “I’m Nathan, by the way. I moved in a few years ago and have tried to keep an eye on Nina and her grandma. Well, just Nina now.”

  Yeah, I fucking bet you’ve been keeping an eye on her.

  “I work at the hospital. I’m an internist,” Nathan continued.

  I wondered how many rounds we’d have to go before whipping out our dicks and comparing sizes.

  I’d win.

  “You do something with stocks, right?” he said, shifting when I stood a little straighter, making sure he got good and up close with how I towered above him. “What exactly is it you do?”

  I folded my hands into my pockets. “Make money.”

  His eyes dropped to my watch and his brows rose.

  “Lots of it,” I added.

  I thought he was starting to get it—the back-off-or-I’ll-kick-your-ass warning—but he clearly had a thing for Nina I’d have to remedy somehow. It would have been helpful to know about Infatuated Neighbor so I could have worked out a plan for getting him to back off. We didn’t need someone extra-observant living right next door.

  “So what’s all this for?” Nathan tipped his chin at the moving van.

  My inner demon grinned. “I’m moving in.”

  Nathan looked like he’d just choked on something. “Whoa, you guys are moving in together? Didn’t you, like, just meet?” His eyes fell back on my car, like money was the missing puzzle piece that would explain everything.

  I hated that, in a way, he was right. It made me want to grind all five foot eight of his hipster, internist bravado into the grass beneath my Louboutins.

  “We met eight weeks ago,” I said.

  “And Nina’s letting some guy who was a stranger eight weeks and one day ago move in with her?” Nathan slid closer to the front door.

  “If you’ve got something to say, why don’t you just say it?” I matched his every step with one of my own.

  “I’m saying, don’t you think things are moving a little fast? Maybe?” he added when my eyes narrowed.

  “Well, since I hired the moving company that’s presently moving me in, I think you can surmise my answer to that question.”

  Right then, the movers passed us with the new barbecue.

  Nathan was proverbially scratching his head, looking at me, backing away from me. “You don’t really seem like Nina’s type. Like, at all.”

  “Yeah? And what’s her type?” This guy did not know when to back down. Part of me admired that. The other part wanted to make him back down.

  “I don’t know.” Nathan shrugged. “Just not you.”

  There was no unkindness in his voice. He wasn’t trying to piss me off, but to state a fact. I already knew I wasn’t Nina’s type though, and him bringing it up like it was obvious to the whole world pissed me off that much more.

  Nice, Max. Way to make a good first impression with the neighbor. Way to fly under the radar. Why don’t you just lose your shit on the neighborly doctor, so everyone watches your every move from now on?

  “Well, that’s what happens when you fall in love.” Nina’s voice rolled down toward us from where the top of the stairs. She was looking down at me like I was a child. Which, okay, she had a point—this time.

  Before Nathan looked up, she wiped the look off and bounced down the stairs. Her face lit up as she beamed at me. It was an act—mine wasn’t. When she came up beside me, her arm went around my back and she lifted up on her toes to kiss my cheek.

  My heart fired to life from a simple, fake kiss on the cheek. Damn. I needed to dig this woman out from where she’d taken residence beneath my skin before things got even more complicated.

  “You met our neighbor, honey?”

  Wow. Pulling out the terms of endearment too? If Nina was touching and kissing and cooing at me, that must have been because Nathan really did have it as bad for her as I’d guessed.

  “We met,” Nathan and I answered in a clipped tone.

  “Nathan was just telling me why I wasn’t your type.” I returned her smile, sliding my arm around her and letting my hand form around her waist. It was the first time we’d touched like this, and my body was stirring in ways it shouldn’t have been. “Liebling.”

  Her brows came together for one moment before she ironed them out. “Well, I’m glad you’ve met, but if you boys will excuse me, I’ve got a moving truck to unload.” Her arm fell away and she stepped out of mine. Something seized in my chest when she left.

  Nathan was watching her like I was, and technically he shouldn’t have been looking at her like that with us “being in love” and me moving in. Given our real situation though, I guessed he had as much right to admire her as the next guy did.

  Telling myself that didn’t dim my desire to kick his ass into the next neighborhood though.

  “That’s
why I hired a moving company,” I called after Nina. “To help move me in.”

  “Exactly”—Nina spun around, continuing to back away—“to help. Not do it all on their own.”

  Shaking my head at her with that smile still in place, I slid out of my jacket and hung it over the handrail. I started rolling up my sleeves as I followed her.

  “Thank you for looking after her, Nathan,” I said, leaving him standing at the bottom of her stairs with his dick in his hands. “But that’s my job now.”

  Eight weeks and one day down. Two years and eight and a half months to go. Which meant I hadn’t even made it to the five-percent-done mark.

  That was what I’d spent half the night thinking about. These first eight weeks had been complicated in ways I hadn’t expected—and that was before Max moved in. Moving in together always added complications, even if it was just in keeping to some carefully crafted plan.

  How could I make it through another two-plus years if the past eight weeks were any indication of what was to come? I didn’t have any answers to that question, but I had to conjure up some—fast. I’d made Max a promise and knew he was counting on me. I wouldn’t back out on him, especially because I was having a difficult time working out my feelings when it came to him.

  There were moments I wanted to kick his feet out from beneath him and spill him over the side of that pillar he stood on. There were moments I wanted to share everything about myself over a cup of coffee and a game of checkers. Those weren’t the moments that were messing with me though.

  The moments that were screwing with me were the ones when he looked at me a certain way, like he was inviting me closer. Those looks that seemed to have a direct connection to my body and seemed capable of forcing it closer.

  He didn’t feel anything for me—he’d made that astoundingly clear—but that didn’t do anything to dull the occasional times I did feel something for him. What exactly it was, I didn’t know. I couldn’t put a name to it.

  It wasn’t infatuation. Not obsession. It wasn’t lust either.

  It was something that ran deeper. Something that dug in and got comfortable, only reminding me of its presence at the most inconvenient of times.