Rule's Property (The House of Rule Book 2) (6 page)

Looking back, in retrospect, Courtney knew she'd probably gushed about him a little too much to Justine, but she couldn't have guessed what Nick's reaction would be when he found out.

He
'd shown up on her doorstep within twenty-four hours
. He'd flown almost a thousand miles across country, and shown up out of the blue. He'd had a ready excuse, something about checking out a piece of property not far away. He'd insisted on meeting not only her roommates, but also 'the kid you told my mother about.' Courtney had tried to argue about that, but Nick was inflexible.

He'd gotten his way and met her new boyfriend. Courtney could still remember how Nick's expression had frozen, how his muscles had grown rigid. All it had taken was a single ferocious look and a stern warning, and the boy had fled and never returned.

Courtney had been beyond livid.

But Nick had brushed off her anger as if it meant nothing and had taken her out to dinner where he'd grilled her for a couple of hours about her classes, her professors and her friends.

After he'd gone back to Missouri, it had taken several weeks, but she'd slowly gotten over her anger and gotten on with her life again. It was amazing, looking back now, that she hadn't recognized Nick's jealousy for what it had been. But she hadn't and her life had gone on. It took Courtney several more months before she found another guy who intrigued her enough to begin dating him.

And when she had, the same cycle went into play. Courtney had told Justine, Nick had shown up unexpectedly and her newest boyfriend was dispatched posthaste.

That was when she'd had her first doubts about everything she'd believed to be true about Nick when she'd left St. Louis. How could she not have doubts when he seemed prepared to fly halfway across the country just to get rid of her boyfriends?

It had been confusing; it had been
suspicious
, because those were the
only
times she heard from him. But after several more months passed by, she began to think it had all been her imagination and that the probability of Nick having deeper feelings for her were next to nil. But just to be on the safe side, when she began dating someone new, she didn't mention it to Justine.

But the problem was, nobody could compare to Nick Rule. Not a single kiss could compare to
the
kiss that was so instilled in her memory that she could conjure it up day or night. Nobody could make her knees tremble and there was absolutely nobody who she cared enough about to make her part with her virginity.

She wasn't purposely saving it for Nick;
she wasn't
.

But whatever the reason, the outcome was the same. Her interest in dating became less and less as the months went by, so she put it on the back burner and threw herself into her studies and having fun with her friends.

She began to love being a college student. She studied hard, partied harder and went to the beach whenever she could. She had the freedom to try things she'd never tried before. Tanning beds, thong underwear, shots of tequila.

Life was suddenly fun again. Her parents became a sentimental memory always in her heart,
but
finally,
life truly became fun again.

Everything went great for a while, except that the few recent trips she'd made to St. Louis hadn't been satisfactory to her. For one reason or another, when she went to visit, she and Nick were never at the house at the same time. And that bothered her. Was it by coincidence or his design?

One evening in the middle of the week, she was studying for a test, but no matter how much she tried, she couldn't seem to concentrate. By this time, she'd been in the second semester of her second year in Florida, close to graduating with her bachelor's degree.
So why was she suddenly homesick again?
And then it dawned on her. She realized it had been almost a year since she'd seen Nick. And when she realized that, she began missing him.
Missing him badly
.

Missing him so badly that she did a semi-evil thing.

Okay, a really evil thing
.

She literally couldn't drag her mind off Nick and of course, she thought back to when he'd flown to Florida to get rid of her boyfriends. Had the times he'd come to see her been just a coincidence or not? The more she deliberated the small amount of evidence at her disposal, the stronger the idea took root in her head again. Before long, she'd developed a hypothesis; he'd come to Florida for the
express
purpose of getting rid of her boyfriends,
not
to look at real estate, as he'd maintained. Crazy idea, maybe not so crazy, but the more she missed him, the more her reasoning seemed sound.

That's when she'd come up with the brilliant plan to test her hypothesis.
Evil, for sure
. Although she wasn't dating anyone at the time, and hadn't been for a long while, she did have several male friends and one of them was exceptionally brilliant and good-looking. Unable to stop herself, she'd picked up her cell and called Justine. They had a lovely, hour-long chat about everything under the sun.

Nick had shown up on Friday after her last class.

Her roommates had gone to Daytona Beach for the weekend, but Courtney hadn't been feeling up to joining them because she'd been suffering from cramps earlier in the day. That evening, her cramps were mostly under control, thanks to three ibuprofen and a heating pad. She was on the couch watching television in her shortie pajamas when the doorbell had pealed.

She'd glanced at the door and her heart had constricted and then started beating more rapidly.
No way
. It couldn't be him.

It couldn
't be true.

Slowly, she'd stood to her feet and walked to her door, thanking the good Lord that even though she'd been feeling bad, she'd gone to class that day, because that meant that her hair was clean and she was still wearing make-up.

She looked through the peephole and almost had a coronary.

Damn.
It had worked.

And that had been the day her life had changed
. That was the exact moment she'd known. She hadn't known exactly
what
she'd known, but she'd known for a fact that Nick was attracted to her. She'd known in that instant, as she'd looked through the peephole, as he'd stood on her doorstep, irritation plastered across his face, that Nick was jealous and possessive and that he didn't think of her as a little sister.

She'd opened the door, forgetting all about her flimsy pajamas, only trying to contain the violent beating of her heart. "Hey," she'd said, trying for a look of pleasant surprise as her eyes drank him in, so happy to see him that she'd wanted to fling herself at him.
Stunned beyond belief at her new understanding of him.

Nick gave her no response; he made no attempt to embrace her. All she saw was six-feet-two inches of pissed-off male on her doorstep. He stood stock-still, his hands braced above his head on the doorframe. He wore extremely casual clothing, and his t-shirt was tight. It molded to his stomach, showing his washboard abs underneath. His biceps were pronounced as he flexed his hands, gripping the wood above him. "You going to let me in?" he asked, narrowing his eyes on her.

Fighting butterflies and at a loss for words, stunned that Nick
did
have feelings for her after all, she nodded her head and pushed the door all the way opened.

He walked inside and glanced around at the empty apartment with a suspicious glint. "Where are your friends?"

"They went to the beach for the weekend," she answered neutrally.

He took another step forward and slammed the door shut, sliding the deadbolt into place with a resounding
click
. "Which beach?"

Swallowing hard, her blood beating so quickly that her brain was spinning, she managed to answer, "Daytona."

"Why aren't you with them?" he asked, leaning against the door and crossing one foot over the other in a falsely lazy fashion.

Not wanting to blurt out that she would have been if she hadn't had the cramps, she was silent for a moment too long.

"Is it because you don't have enough money?" he drawled in a tone that suggested he didn't believe that was the real reason.

Trying with all her might to follow the conversation because she was still so floored that he was actually standing here in her apartment, she mumbled, "No, I've got enough."

"Are you sure? I can boost your allowance if you need more," he said in a neutral tone that somehow managed to sound as if he were baiting her.

Her mind was racing. It had
worked
. He was here.
He was here
.
He. Was. Here
.
Dear God
. "No, I'm good. I just didn't feel like going."
That kiss
.
Oh, my God
. That kiss on her eighteenth birthday. He'd
meant it
. It had been
for her
. She took a deep breath and then another. She would
not
hyperventilate.

"Didn't feel like going," he repeated flatly, as if he didn't believe her. "With your girlfriends. To the beach. You expect me to believe that?"

Her eyes flared as her heart continued to beat in triple time. "It's the truth."

His lips curled into a snarl.
"Where is he?"

Oh, my God. Oh.
My
. God.
Seriously,
he was really jealous
. "Where is who?" she asked as evenly as possible.

"The new boyfriend," he bit out, his anger conveying itself blatantly.

Her muscles tensed as she realized just how pissed he was.
And that she had misled him in an effort to get him here.
"I don't have a new boyfriend," she quickly denied.

His arms crossed over his chest.
"Courtney,"
he exhaled her name on a breath. "It's been a long day. It was a tedious flight. I want the truth."

She lifted her chin as a slow, insidious feeling of equality hit her.
They were even
. He cared about her, too. My God, it was literally too much to take in.
Where should they go on their honeymoon?
Was she thinking too far ahead? Stop it, Courtney.
"I don't know what you're talking about."

He clenched his mouth in irritation. "You told my mother you have a new boyfriend."

She shook her head in denial. "I did not. When was this?"
And she hadn't, not really
. She'd only talked about her friend a little too much.

Nick's gaze intensified. "Earlier this week," as he said the words, his gaze dropped down to her bare feet, where he seemed to study her pink toenails before moving up and settling on her legs in a way that caused wet heat to land between her thighs.

"Is that why you're here?" She asked softly and innocently.
Maybe too innocently
.

At her question, or maybe it was her tone, his eyes lifted to hers and he stilled completely--and it was clear to her at that point that he'd suddenly realized something more was going on here.

He watched her intently for long moments, his eyes narrowing as a subtle tension invaded his frame. "What are you trying to do to me, babe?" he asked in a low voice.

Courtney dragged her bottom lip through her teeth and shook her head, her heart pounding.
Babe? Christ, had he just called her 'babe'?
"Nothing," she whispered, her eyes holding his, her pulse escalating by the second.

He watched her in silence for a moment and then he seemed to almost visibly shake himself. "Are you lying to me? You told my mother you have a boyfriend," he repeated in accusation, looking confused, looking for once as if he didn't have a complete handle on everything.

"No, I may have mentioned something about one of my friends, but he's in no way a boyfriend."

"Are you telling me that she took it the wrong way?" he asked in disbelief.

"I guess," she prevaricated.

He shook his head sternly, obviously not believing her. "Let me get this straight. You
purposely
made her think you have a new boyfriend."

"No--"

"Yes, you did," he said quietly yet firmly. "Why would you do that?"

She shook her head again, not ready to admit the truth and not knowing how to say what she felt.

"Why?" he questioned again, more succinctly this time, wanting an answer to his question.

With the blood rushing too quickly through her veins, Courtney held his beautiful brown eyes. Looking at him through her lashes, she confessed in a whisper, "Because I missed you."

At her admission, he froze, standing eerily still for a second. Then his eyes closed and he dropped back against the sheetrock, the wall supporting him as he leaned against it.

When he opened his eyes, she didn't know what to say. Or what to do, or how to act, or how to stop the wild bloom of color on her face that was giving her feelings away even more. His brows furrowed and he studied her for a few drawn out seconds before his gaze swept down her body again and for the first time, she remembered the pajamas she was wearing.
"Courtney
. We have a problem, babe."