Underground Secrets (The Underground #1) (7 page)

I turn my attention back to him, “Yes, yes I did. I’m sure what you did seemed like a nice gesture but it wasn’t. What the hell makes you think it is okay to follow me home and do that? In the brief encounter we had, what gave you the genius idea to stalk me and bring me some laundry soap?”

His smile never falters as I say that.

Not. One. Bit.

I look over at Gem, whose jaw has now dropped. She quickly recovers and turns her attention towards the hot-stalker-soap-guy to speak to him, “I apologize for that. Marlie can be a bit...”

“Feisty?”

“Exactly,” she agrees and then giggles like school girl. Good lord.

“I’m Gemma and you are?” she extends her hand to shake his.

“I’m Wesley Holden,” he accepts her hand and shakes it. “Wes for short. And I can see that she is. I like it.”

I laugh to myself because this man is a trip for sure and I can see it in Gemma’s eyes that she is effected by his male beauty. I’ve seen that look before. Good, she can have him. He lets go of her hand and turns back to me.

“Marlie.” He says my name as if trying to test it out. I’ll admit, for some reason my name does sound good rolling off of his tongue. “Look, I’m sorry if I came off a bit stalkerish…”

Bingo, buddy!

“And I apologize. I figured since you spilled the whole jug you probably just bought, I’d get you a new one.”

“That was kind of you, thanks. Bye now.” I get up and walk away. Gemma follows suit eventually.

“Oh my goodness girl, that was a little intense. On your part. What was that all about? You have got to tell me now!”

I stop abruptly, and turn to face her. I hold up my hand. “Don’t. Just don’t. Okay?

She gives me a sad look. I really need to work on not being short with people. Especially Gemma. With a sigh I tell her I will, but to wait until after work. No distractions for me while working. She understands and drops it for now.

About an hour after we return to work, my mind is a total cluster. So much for no distractions while working. I give up and decide to head home and take a breather.

“Hey guys, I’m just going to head out for a bit. I may or may not be back in today. I have a headache that’s not going away.” Walking towards the front door I hear Gemma snort and say, “right,” not believing a word I just said. Of course, she would know best. She is my best friend in the entire world. She knows every single thing about me, as I do her. I just roll my eyes and walk out. I round the corner and walk upstairs to my apartment. Low and behold as I get up the stairs, Wes, as I now know him, is standing at my door. What is the deal with this guy?

“Really? What do you want now?” I ask, clearly annoyed by his persistence.

“I think we got off to a bad start.”

“You think?” I say sarcastically.

He scratches his chin as if pondering the right words to choose. This is a wise, wise, choice. “Yeah, yeah, I do. Look, I know that our encounter was extremely odd, but ever since yesterday I can’t get you out of my head. I’ve been smiling like a fool.” He shakes his head and that smile returns to his perfectly created face. I should write a thank you card to his parents for creating such a masterpiece. “I don’t know what it is but I would like to ask you out on a date. I promise I won’t bite.”

Well, that’s different. I contemplate how I am going to let him down quickly, because
I am
going to let him down. He seems pretty genuine about his plea and he isn’t the only one with a feeling. It could be a line though, but why would he try this hard for one woman? He obviously is so damn dreamy that he could get any female by just snapping his fingers.

“Look, I don’t date. I really do appreciate the kind… gesture, but I can’t go out on a date with you.” The look of disappointment in his eyes is almost heartbreaking, but I also still see determination on his face.

“And what do I have to do to convince you?”

This guy. I roll my eyes and shake my head. I move to my door and he steps aside. I put the key in the lock, then I turn around to look at him.

“Nothing you say or do will convince me to go on a date, or whatever it is that you really want. I told you, I do not date.” I need to come up with an excuse why not because if I don’t I’m afraid that he won’t leave me alone. “My work is my life right now. I do not, nor do I care to take the time to spend it with a man outside of a friendship. I cannot stress this anymore than I already have. So please, please leave me be and do not show up on my doorstep again.” I can’t believe I am practically begging and pleading for this complete stranger to leave me be.

His smile falters and with a sigh, he bows his head and walks away. I should be ecstatic that it was that easy. So why do I feel so bad? Or maybe it’s not guilt that I feel, but that this all just feels… feels, shit… I don’t even know how to describe it except as weird and bizarre. It doesn’t matter now, it’s over with and I don’t have to worry about Mr. Green eyes and Tats stalking me or buying me soap and leaving it on my door step. Maybe if I didn’t have such a fucked up past, and a fucked up, “summer job” as I like to call it, then maybe I would have given the good looking son-of-gun a chance.

I open my apartment door and shut and lock it. I lean my head back against the door and close my eyes. That was ridiculous.

After a minute, I drop my keys on the small table next to the door, dig my phone from my purse and head straight to my room. I grab my headphones, plug them into my phone and go through my songs. Ah, a little music for a quick pick me up. I throw myself onto my bed and escape from all thoughts with music for a little while. My life may seem all peaches to the outside world but it’s not and it’s far from it. I just hope I have the strength to get through this damn summer.

FOUR

T
HE REST OF WEEK GOES BY
smoothly besides being busy as hell. No sexy-soap-stalking-guy to be heard of. Thank goodness. It’s now seven o’clock Friday evening and I just got home from the office after putting in extra time like I have been all week. I spent most of my morning doing a video conference call with a very picky actor wanting something “special” and “unique” for his flavor of the month he claims is the love of his life. Funny thing is, I have dealt with this guy for almost a year now and it’s the same sad story over and over again. Seriously, I have heard him say this four times since we’ve met. I’ve even flown out to L.A. to meet him and his said “flavor” to get the perfect sizing.

I walk into the door, drop my keys and purse onto the small table next to my front door, then whip off my heels and watch one fly down the hall and one hit the kitchen base cabinets. Yeah, that’s how badly I wanted those suckers off. Next to come, is my off-white silk blouse and red pencil skirt. I strip them off as soon as I know my expensive heels, who probably deserved better treatment then that, have landed safely. And yes, I stripped that it all off right at the door. I don’t care, all I want is a nice big glass of wine, or the whole bottle, and to veg the hell out on my couch for the whole weekend. I walk straight for my fridge to get out my wine and see a case of Bud Light bottles sitting top shelf calling my, no,
screaming
my name!

“Well, don’t you look like you’re ready to work a pole?” I turn around and see Gemma leaning against the wall, arms crossed, with a big ass smirk on her face. I look away from her to look down at what’s remaining of my clothing. White lacy bra with matching underwear, complete with pantyhose and garters. I look back up at her, shrug my shoulders, and resume my beer hunt. I grab one, pop off the cap and start to chug. I finish that bottle and go for the next. Gemma is still standing there grinning, so I offer her one as well. She accepts and reaches into a nearby laundry basket and grabs me a t-shirt and shorts.

After I am more properly dressed, we both walk over to the couch. I plop down and take a good swig out of the sweet, sweet, bottle of beer. I rest my head on the back of the couch and close my eyes.

“Bad day, huh?” Gemma asks, leaning her head onto my shoulder and catching up quickly on the drinking.

“Not really, just a long week that I am glad is over.” I have worked my ass off this week, so I can surprise my dad and brother with a visit home in two weeks.

“Well, I’m probably about to make it worse or better. Do you want the good news or that bad first?”

Shit, I know what the bad is going to be. I have avoided this little talk all week. She knows it too. She has let it slide, so I can get this week over, all to ask me about it tonight. But I have no idea what the good news is. I lift my head back up and look at her. “Hit me with the good news because I already know what the bad is. So let me finish this beer and then get another before you start with the bad okay?”

“Fair enough. Well, the good news is that yesterday someone bought almost one hundred grand worth of your pieces. I believe six in total. One ring, two bracelets, and three necklaces. Pretty impressive if you ask me.” She says this as if it’s no big deal when it’s totally a big freaking deal! We’ve never made that big of a sale from one buyer at once. I nearly spit beer in her face. Note to self, when she says she has good news, do not have anything in mouth. I mean, holy shit!

“Wow! Why didn’t you tell me this last night? And who the hell bought that much jewelry?”

“Must’ve slipped my mind I guess and I have no clue. It just said H. Securities. It was bought online around three in the morning, Thursday.” She has got to be kidding.

“How could something like that slip your… wait a minute, hold on. There is no way something that huge for us and the company would’ve simply just
slipped your mind
, Gem. You held out on purpose you evil little witch, didn’t you?” I sit up to give her a good look. I’ll know if she’s lying. She just shrugs her shoulders nonchalantly while looking at her nails.

“I knew it!”

She sits up to face me as well and now we’re knee to knee.

“Well, you’ve avoided talking to me about that guy all week and I had good news, so I wanted to give it to you before we talked about what went down Sunday and Monday. I figured you’d be more up to talk about it if you were in a good mood. That way I wouldn’t have to pry it out of you piece by piece, like I feel like I always have to do anymore. I’m your best friend, Marlie Edwards. I won’t judge, you know that. Besides, you need to loosen up more. Not all men are going to be like…”

“Stop. Don’t say his name Gemma. Please don’t. I’ll tell you what happened. You just can’t mention him.” My palms are getting sweaty just thinking about it. I stand up and pace the length of the couch. I stop to look at her, then pace again. I’m trying my hardest to not freak out. I stop, take another deep breath and look at her silently asking if she has gotten my point.

She agrees with a nod. I slowly inhale and blow out a long, shaky breath, trying to calm my near panic attack. I just have to think about the good news; the fact that someone just spent a ton of money on my jewelry.
Mine
. It’s so crazy, I am filled with happiness almost instantly just thinking about it. I sit back down on the couch and prepare to recap this stupid little story that shouldn’t - doesn’t matter.

“Okay, okay,” I say and tell her everything that had happened. Halfway through I may have accidently called him Green eyes and Tats.

“Who?” I watch for the nickname to click in her head and… ta-da! She gets it. “Did you just call him ‘Green eyes and Tats’?”

“Yeah, I did. Don’t laugh or anything. I swear it, Gemma, or I’ll quit the story.” Her lips thin into a tight line and once again she nods.

Good choice my friend
. I finish telling her everything that happened the first day and watch as she soaks it all in.

“Okay, I can see why you were a little defensive at lunch when you saw him again.” Good, she’s getting it.

“Yeah, he seemed pretty confident.” She doesn’t know that he was waiting at the apartment door when I left early after lunch. Might as well tell her that too. “That’s not all.”

“Do tell!” Okay, she’s getting a little too excited.

“That’s all that happened that day. Monday you know what happened up until lunch. He must’ve followed me home and dropped off that soap Sunday. You know, you were there.”

“Yeah, I know. But I need you to hurry up to what happened after. I am dying of suspense over here!” She throws herself back on the couch and places her forearm across her forehead. Sheesh, ever the flare for dramatics this woman.

“After lunch I couldn’t really think straight and I decided to come home. Well, when I got here he was sitting by our door.”

Her jaw is now dropped. Literally dropped. I close it for her.

“What the…” she begins but I cut her off before she could say what I assume is, “What the fuck was he doing there?”

“Yeah and I confronted him again. He said he had a ‘feeling’ and couldn’t stop thinking about me. Wanted to ask me on a date. Of course I turned him down. Told him the same thing I tell any guy. I don’t date.” I shrug my shoulders. “Then he left.” It actually feels good that I told her. Not that it’s a big deal or anything. Because it isn’t.

“Wow. I mean wow, like
wow, wow
. I don’t know what to say. Sounds like he was ‘feeling’ you,” she says and laughs at her own little joke, then she becomes serious, “I know why you don’t date men, but sometimes I wish you would, just as a casual thing,” she states giving me a sympathetic look.

“I know, but I just… can’t. I need more time.”

She sighs while tilting her head to the side and says, “Marlie, sweetie, two years is plenty of time.” I try to stop her before this conversation goes where I absolutely do not want it to go, but as I open my mouth to object, she holds her hand up. “Uh-uh”. I snap my mouth shut. Fuck it. I’ll just listen and then forget she said anything. Easier said than done, though.

She grabs one of my hands and stares at me for a minute before she speaks. She always does that when she wants the words to come out perfectly.

“Look, you’re my best friend. More than that, you’re like a sister to me. You
are
my sister. I want you to be happy. You act like you’re happy, but you’re not. I see it every day. You put on this big front for everyone, that life is
peachy keen
for you. But I know you. I know you’re not. The minute you have alone time to think, you get lost in your head and focus on your issues and past. After that you seem to shut down and withdraw. I want you to be one hundred percent happy. Not this fake happy that you put on for everyone.