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SHE IS LIKE A NERVOUS bunny rabbit. Little Megan Jennings dresses like she’s going to church. She’s buttoned up to her neck and covered with a cardigan and sensible shoes. Like maybe she’s sixty. At the same time, she has this innocence I don’t come across much in the women I meet. It goes beyond her makeup-free face and little clip holding her bangs to the side, the rest gathered into a low ponytail. If I hadn’t been told she was going to college, I’d have assumed she was younger. Her glasses take up half her face, but I can still see the cute freckles dotting her cheeks.
Everything about her is packaged to keep a man from looking twice.
But something about that makes me keep looking.
For a moment there, when I thought something was going on in the house and she was scared, I was ready to do whatever needed to be done to make her safe. That’s not my standard operating procedure. Maybe it’s because she’s so small. Maybe it’s because I can’t really get behind the idea that her old man was fine with me coming over when she’s alone, defenseless. Hell, he even told me he was gone for a week. What kind of father tells a man like me, a man he doesn’t even know, that his house and daughter are unprotected and for how long?
A stupid one. That’s what kind.
I’m not the kind of guy you leave in your house alone. But I’m really not the kind of guy you leave unsupervised in your house with your daughter.
He probably thinks, like she obviously does, that her appearance is some kind of deterrent. That it makes her less desirable. Invisible.
But they are both wrong.
Her clothes make me wonder what she looks like under them. Her hair makes me want to take it out of its band and spread it out on my pillow while she’s wearing nothing but those damned glasses and I’m pumping her deep. The racing pulse in her throat makes me want to chase her harder—she is prey to me. I am a wolf.
But I’m also a businessman. I’m not going to screw my client’s daughter just because I can.
And she’s too fucking innocent. I should leave her be.
But I can think about fucking the innocence right out of her all I want. And I intend to. Later. After my work is done.
I just can’t ever act on it.
She shows me upstairs. We pass her room, and I catch a glance of the pink walls. The pretty lace bedspread. A poster on the wall of the Periodic Table of Elements.
I can’t stop the smile on my face. I’ve never thought the words “cute” and “nerdy” about someone I wanted to fuck before. Nothing about her is my type.
“I won’t be too long,” I tell her when she directs me to the office down the hall from her sweet bedroom. “Just taking some measurements today. So I’ll be out of your hair and you can invite your boyfriend over and take advantage of having the house to yourself this week.”
Her blush paints her face instantly. Fuck. I want to see how low that pretty pink goes.
She pushes her glasses up her nose. “I don’t have a boyfriend.”
I don’t know why that relieves me. I can picture exactly what kind of guy she’d date. Some kind of fucking computer genius—the kind that get beat up in high school and end up owning the mansion and a private jet by the time they are thirty. He’d be tall, too skinny, and awkward. But he’d treat her nice and take care of her. And she deserves to have it all.
And I fucking hate this guy I made up.
It’s been too long since I got laid if I’m obsessing about this bookworm and her boyfriend, real or not.
It’s been two years since I got serious about my business, and I haven’t been with anyone since. I got tired of the old crowd. Spending every night at the bar, sleeping with chicks I wouldn’t talk to sober, and getting in bar fights over stupid shit just didn’t do it for me anymore. Getting arrested for being drunk and disorderly hit the final nail. I wanted something else for myself. A better life than the one my old man has. And that’s the direction I saw myself going while I sat in the drunk tank—a one way ticket to Loserville.
My dad drinks like it’s his second job only because smoking Marlboros is his first. He hit me until I was big enough to hit back. That’s when my ma left him, too. I help her out because she’s my mother—but I don’t think she trusts that I won’t end up like her ex. She doesn’t trust anyone.
But I can guaran-fucking-tee I won’t hit women or kids like he did. I won’t be my old man.
These days, I work, work out, and work on my house. That’s about it. My custom woodworking business has taken off in the last year—rich guys like my quality and they appreciate me coming in on time and not fucking up their nice houses. My body appreciates the tension releasing exercise of lifting weights since I stopped getting laid. And my house is the thing I’m most proud of. I built it with my own hands, man. It’s not a mansion, but it’s mine.
Taking woodshop in middle school gave me an outlet. I’ve always been good at woodworking. Nobody could have predicted how much I would love it though. It’s not a job to me, it’s my life.
But judging my reaction to this sweet little nerd, it might be time to do something about my self-imposed celibacy.
“So, Meg, why don’t you have a boyfriend?” I ask as she’s opening the door to her father’s study.
Megan’s face falls, and she looks down at her shoes. Shit. I made her feel bad.
A look of determination crosses over her features, and she brings her gaze back up. Not directly into my eyes, but at least it’s not down.
But I want her to look into my eyes. I don’t know why.
“I’m just not the kind of girl guys go for,” she finally says.
Out of nowhere, a surge of primal lust surprises the hell out of me. I want to push her against the wall, yank her skirt up, and show her, balls deep, why she’s wrong. I want to fuck her into feeling confident. I don’t even remember the name of the last girl I wet my cock on...but I want to use my dick to take care of this girl right here in front of me.
Makes no sense.
“Baby, I don’t know who told you that, but you’ve just been around the wrong guys if you believe it.”
Megan shrugs. “I don’t have time for dating anyway. With school and practice, I’m too busy.”
“You play an instrument?”
She looks down again, shaking her head quickly. She’s embarrassed. I’d like to fuck that right out of her, too. She should never be ashamed.
We’re in the study now. I should be taking final measurements and getting to work. “What are you practicing?”
“You’ll think it’s weird.”
“Do you think it’s weird?”
She scrunches her forehead in concentration. The cutest damn thing. “No.”
“Then own it, baby. What are you practicing? What keeps you too busy for dating guys who aren’t good enough for you anyway?”
She has a dimple. Fuck. I didn’t see it before. Maybe because it’s the first time I’ve seen her smile. It fucking undoes me.
“I’m in the Jeopardy! contestant pool. My year waiting period was up last month. They’ll contact me in the next five months if I make it to the show.”
That is...the nerdiest thing I’ve ever heard. She’s like the queen of nerds. And damn if my dick isn’t rock hard. I want her bad. I’ve never wanted a woman more. I feel like I walked into this house and my world flipped or something.
“That’s amazing,” I tell her. I leave off the part about what I want to do to her body right now. About how I want her to tell me about balancing chemical equations while I pump into her and make her come.
“You don’t think that’s nerdy?”
It takes me a minute to get back on track with the conversation. I’m too busy trying to adjust my dick without being obvious. What did she just ask me?
Oh, yeah. Nerdy. “No, I definitely think that’s nerdy. But that’s cool. You shouldn’t ever be ashamed of being smart.”
That dimple winks at me again. “I’m not ashamed of being smart. It’s just...most people...especially guys...they don’t think it’s all that great. I don’t have much in common with very many people.”
“Why don’t you hang out with other smart people then?”
“I think I’m just too closed off.” She pushes her glasses up again. “Though I’m rambling enough to you. Sorry. I’ll let you get to work.”
She starts to go out, but I put my hand on her shoulder as she passes me. “Don’t settle for just anyone.” I don’t know why I’m telling her this. “There’s a guy out there who will be turned on by your brain. You’ll find him.”
She swallows hard. “I wouldn’t know what to do with him if I found him,” she says and darts out of the room.