Big O Box Set

As soon as I open the door to my room, I’m hit by the smell of bacon and … is that pancakes? Whatever it is smells delicious, and my stomach rolls with hunger. The neighbors must be making breakfast.

I walk down the hallway. When I turn to go into the kitchen, I see a strange man standing in front of my stove, shirtless, his back to me. My breath freezes in my throat, legs refusing to move, shoes adhered to the floor. At first I think it’s Evan, and wonder if there’s a knife nearby so I can stab him in the back with it. But Evan isn’t that tall, he doesn’t cook, his hair isn’t that light of a color, and his back doesn’t look like that—not unless he somehow managed to exchange his pasty dad-bod for a golden God-bod. Somehow I doubt he could pull that off in the month that we’ve been separated. Whoever this man is standing in my kitchen has smooth tan skin over thick muscle.

My dog sits beside this stranger, waiting for food to drop. My heart is hammering in my chest. It’s hard to breathe. I don’t know what to do. Neither my dog nor the man has seen me yet. How could Hercules let a stranger into the apartment? That’s kind of the whole point of owning a Great Dane. They’re supposed to protect you from random strangers who break into your place.

I desperately look around for a weapon. All I find is an empty wine bottle on the coffee table. I pick it up by the neck and wield it like a sword. But hitting him with it means getting close. If I don’t knock him out right away, he could turn around and grab me. I decide to sneak toward the door instead. My keys are in the kitchen, and so is my phone and purse, so I can’t call 911, but if I can get out of the apartment without being seen, I could run to a neighbor and get help.

I take a step toward the door. The floor squeaks. Both the man and Hercules turn around and see me. I imagine I look like a deer caught in headlights. I blink. Without thinking, I throw the wine bottle at the guy’s head. I miss and it shatters on the cupboard next to him. His eyes grow wide and he ducks as glass shards rain down around him. When he stands back up and looks at me, he looks confused, and a little angry. Shit.

“What the hell?” he says, his eyes narrow, voice a deep rasp that is both frightening and hot at the same time. The thought of his sexy voice is both jolting and fleeting. How can I possibly be thinking something like that when he could very well be here to kill me, or worse … “You almost hit me!”

“I was trying to!” I yell at him.

I turn to run for the door, but Hercules is in the way and I trip over him and land on my knees. The sound my skin makes against the laminate floors is like clean Tupperware and feels like someone took a cheese grater to my knees. The pain hardly registers over my fear, but I know I’ll be feeling it later—or not, if this man decides to cut me up in tiny pieces. My scraped knees might end up being the least of my worries.

The man moves, to either help me up or block my way—I’m not sure. I glance at Hercules. Get him you traitorous mutt! But the damn dog just sits there, his tongue lolled out, wagging his tail like the big happy ray of sunshine that he is.

The man is close enough to touch now and my fear makes my vision blur. I hold out my hands as if that might keep him away. To my surprise he stops and just looks at me with an expression that’s hard to read. Is that concern? I don’t know. It’s hard to say. It could very well be the kind of look a serial killer gives his victim when deciding whether to strangle or stab.

“Who the hell are you and why are you in my apartment?” I demand, my voice failing to sound as confident as I was hoping.

“You’re joking, right?” he says.

There’s something about him that looks familiar, but I’m not sure why. I don’t know men who look like him. Everyone I know is terribly average. He looks like he could be an actor or a model.

“No, I’m not joking. I feel these are the appropriate questions to ask when a strange person breaks into your apartment.”

His smile comes as a surprise. What’s even more surprising is how appealing I find it. The white arch of his teeth is like a halo in his mouth and does lovely things to his face. The way the corners of his eyes crinkle gives him a friendly, open look.

He finds this funny? What kind of sick person is he? Oh God, what if he’s smiling as he imagines what I look like with my skin peeled off? I feel sick. Last night’s alcohol isn’t sitting well at all.

“Why are you smiling?” I ask—no, I demand. My voice is firmer this time, and the tremor that was there before is gone.

“You don’t remember last night, do you?” he says.

Last night? Shit, what happened last night?

“I don’t remember much about last …” My words trail off.

The answer backhands me in the face and I realize why this man looks so familiar.

“You’re Ram Bed Shaker,” I say. It sounds ridiculous to say out loud.

He must think so too. His smile is almost shy when he raises his arms. “An unfortunate nickname, but it is what it is. I’ve learned to embrace it.”

An unfortunate nickname, yes, but well deserved according to my friend Gina. After she told me about seeing Evan with that woman, and she heard how upset I was, she told me about a guy with the Instagram handle of Bed-Shaker, a well-endowed man with a reputation for being incredible in the sack, and a cure for a broken heart—or at least a distraction. I remember going through his Instagram photos and becoming hypnotized by his breathtaking good looks, and that smile … I’d gone weak in the knees.

I also remember that he’d saved a boy from drowning yesterday. It was all over the comments. A hero and a hottie? Double threat. I wanted him in the worst way. There was an instant animal attraction when I saw his photos, impossible to deny.

“A friend showed me your Instagram account and told me about your reputation, but why are you here?” I ask.

Oh my god, did Gin

a tell him about me? Did she give him my address?

“You texted me,” he says.

“What?” I don’t remember that part.

“Check your phone,” he says, that sly smile still on his face like he knows a secret that I don’t. Butterflies instantly rise in my chest. What the hell did I text him?

I look at my purse on the counter beside him with my phone in it. Since my memory is shit right now, I resign myself to the fact that I might be the reason he’s in my apartment. But that doesn’t mean I trust him any more than I would if he were a stranger who broke in.

I carefully make my way toward my purse. He’s standing in the way.

“My phone is in my purse,” I say, pointing at it.

Still with that cocky, beautiful smile. He looks at my open purse. “I see that.”

“I need to get by you.”

“Okay,” he says, but doesn’t move.

He knows I’m asking him to move in a roundabout way, but he’s playing with me and refuses to budge. Pressing my lips together, I push past him. Our bodies rub together and my arm, where our skin touches, feels as though it’s been set ablaze. I shiver. I’m utterly confused by my body’s reaction to him. I bump into people at the mall and grocery store all the time, but it never feels like that.

I grab my phone and step away as fast as I can. When I look at him, he’s staring at me with a strange look on his face, a mixture of curiosity and confusion. I wonder if he felt it too, that spark between us. I try to brush it off as static, but I’m not so sure that was it.

Unlocking my phone, I look at my texts. First I look at the texts Gina sent last night. She’d asked me if I wanted Ram’s number in case I was interested in his services. I told her I wasn’t, but she gave me his phone number just in case I changed my mind. I guess when I got drunk enough, I changed my mind. I roll my eyes. I’m the worst drunk person ever.

Next I check on my texts to Evan. Thank fuck and all that’s holy I didn’t text Evan too … oh God, no. No, no, no. Panic rips through me when I see that, no, I didn’t text Evan’s personal cell phone: I texted his work phone. With shaking hands, I open the text next to the company name and nearly scream when I see a picture of me in my pink bra and panties, the same ones I woke up in this morning. There’s no reply from Evan, but there’s a little icon in the corner saying it’s been read. Fuck. Fuck my life.