Wallbanger (Cocktail 1)

I was quiet as I studied my hands and watched him rake his through his already messed-up hair.

“Hey, you know what? You’re right. Who am I to say what’s right or wrong for anyone else. If it works for you, great. Hit it. Mazel tov. I’m just surprised Jillian would want to set you up with me. She knows I’m a pretty traditional girl, that’s all,” I explained.

He grinned and turned the force of his blue eyes on me.

“As it happens, she doesn’t know everything about me. I keep my private life private—with the exception of my neighbor with the thin walls and the devastating lingerie,” he said in a low voice that could melt, well, anything.

My brain was most certainly among those things, seeing as I suddenly felt it oozing out of my ears and on down to my collar.

“Except for her,” I muttered, thoroughly scrambled.

He let out a dark laugh and opened his door. He kept his eyes on mine as he strode around the car and opened my door.

I climbed down, taking the hand he offered me, and almost not noticing that he traced a tiny circle on the inside of my left hand with his right thumb. Almost didn’t notice it, my ass. It made my skin pebble and Lower Caroline sit up straight. Nerves? Shooting like fireworks all over the place.

We walked inside the building, and he once again opened the door for me. He really was charming, I had to give him that.

“So how do you know Benjamin and Jillian?” I asked, walking up the stairs ahead of him. I knew for certain he was checking out my legs, and why wouldn’t he? I had great stems, currently flattered by my flouncy little dress.

“Benjamin’s been a friend of my family’s for years. I’ve known him practically my whole life. He also manages my investments,” Simon answered as we rounded the first floor and started on the second.

I looked over my shoulder and confirmed him peeking at my legs. Ha! Caught him. “Oooh, your investments. Have a few savings bonds left over from birthdays there, moneybags?” I teased.

He chuckled. “Yeah, something like that.”

We continued up the stairs.

“It’s curious, don’t you think?” I offered.

“Curious?” he asked, his voice slipping over me like warm honey.

“Well, I mean, Benjamin and Jillian both knowing us, us meeting at a party like this, and you being the one that’s been keeping me nocturnally amused all these weeks. Small world, I suppose?” We rounded the top stair, and I got my keys out.

“San Francisco’s a big city, but it can feel like a small town in some ways,” he offered. “But yes, it’s curious. Intriguing even. Who knew that the nice designer Jillian wanted to set me up with was actually Pink Nightie Girl? Had I known, I might have taken her up on it,” he replied, that damnable grin back on his beautiful face.

Dammit, why couldn’t he have stayed an asshole?

“Yes, but Pink Nightie Girl would have said no. After all, thin walls and all…” I winked, making a fist and thumping on the wall next to my door. I could hear Clive prattling around behind the door, and I needed to get inside before he began to wail.

“Ah yes, thin walls. Hmmm…Well, good night, Caroline. Truce is still on, right?” he asked, turning toward his door.

“Truce is still on, unless you do something to make me mad again.” I laughed, leaning in the doorway.

“Oh, count on that. And Caroline? Speaking of thin walls?” he said, as he opened his door and looked back at me. He leaned in his own doorway, thumping his fist on the wall.

“Yes?” I asked, a little too dreamily for my own good.

The smirk reappeared and he said, “Sweet dreams.”

He thumped the wall one more time, winked, and went inside.

Huh. Sweet dreams and thin walls. Sweet dreams and thin walls…

Mother of pearl. He’d heard me.

Chapter Seven

POKE.

“Grrr.”

Poke. Knead, knead. Poke.

“Enough.”

Knead, knead, knead. Head butt.

“I realize you don’t know how to read a calendar, but you should know when it’s Sunday. Seriously, Clive.”

Hard head butt.

I rolled over, away from Clive’s head butts and persistent poking, and pulled the covers over my head. Flashes of the night before kept appearing. Simon in Jillian’s kitchen with the intro heard round the world. His friends calling me Pink Nightie Girl. Benjamin putting two and two together when he learned I was the Pink Nightie Girl. Kissing Simon. Mmm, kissing Simon.

No, no kissing the Simon! I snuggled deeper under the covers.

Sweet dreams and thin walls…Sheer mortification washed over me as I remembered his parting words. I burrowed farther under the covers. My heart beat faster, thinking about how embarrassed I’d been. Heart, pay no attention to that girl below the covers.

Last night had been decidedly dream free, but to make sure no one (Simon) could hear me screaming in passion, I’d slept with the TV on. The revelation that Simon had heard me dreaming of him had thrown me for such a loop that I flipped endlessly through the channels, trying to find something that would not sound like me having my own version of the Simon Wet Dream. I ended up on the all-infomercial channel, which, of course, kept me up later that I’d planned. Everything they sold was fascinating. I had to pry the cell phone out of my own hand at three thirty a.m. when I almost ordered the Slap Chop—to say nothing of the half hour I will never get back after watching Bowser try to sell me the Time Life collection of songs from the fifties.

All this was in addition to listening to the sounds of Tommy Dorsey coming through the wall. They made me smile. I can’t lie.

I stretched lazily under the sheet, stifling a giggle as I watched the shadow of Clive stalking me, trying to figure out a way in. He tried every angle as I deflected his advances. Finally, he resumed his poke-poke-knead approach, and I popped my head back up to laugh at him.

I could handle this thing with Simon. I didn’t have to be totally embarrassed. Sure, my O was gone, maybe for forever. Sure, I’d been ha**g s*x dreams about my overly attractive and overly confident neighbor. And sure, said neighbor had heard these dreams and commented on them, getting the last word in an already extremely bizarre evening.

But I could handle this. Of course I could. I’d just acknowledge it before he could—take the wind out of his sails, as it were. He didn’t always have to have the last word. I could recover from this and keep our ridiculous little truce going.

I’m totally screwed.

Just then I heard the alarm go off next door, and I froze. Then I recovered and slipped back under the covers, leaving just my eyes peeping over.

Wait, why was I hiding? He couldn’t see me.

I heard him slap at the alarm clock, and his feet hit the floor. Why was he up so early? When all was quiet, you truly could hear through these walls. How the hell did I not realize before that if I could hear him, he could obviously hear me. I felt my face color as I thought of my dreams again, but then I got control. This was further aided by Clive head butting the small of my back in an attempt to physically push me from the bed to give him his breakfast.

“Okay, okay, let’s get up. God, you’re such a little jerk sometimes, Clive.”

He fired back a reply over his cat shoulder as he stalked toward the kitchen.

After getting Mr. Clive fed and running myself through the shower, I headed out to meet the girls for brunch. I was leaving the building while looking at my phone, answering a text from Mimi, when I collided with a wet, hot wall of Simon.

“Whoa,” I cried as I teetered backward. His arm shot out and caught me just before I went from flustered to flat-out wrong and on my bottom.

“Where are you running off to this morning?” he asked, as I took him in. Sweaty white T-shirt, black running shorts, damp curly hair, iPod, and a grin.

“You’re sweaty,” I word-vomited.

“I am sweaty. It happens,” he added, sweeping the back of his hand across his forehead, making his hair stand straight up. I had to physically block the neurons from my brain trying to get to my fingers with instructions to lift and nestle. Lift and nestle.

He stared down at me, his blue eyes twinkling. He’d make this painful if I didn’t go ahead and out the giant sex elephant in the room.

“So listen, about last night,” I started.

“What about last night? The part where you were berating me about my sex life? Or the part where you were sharing my sex life with your friends?” he asked, raising an eyebrow and raising his T-shirt to wipe his face. I drew in a breath that sounded like a wind tunnel as I stared at abs that could almost be speedbumps. Why couldn’t he be a soft, fat neighbor?

“No, I mean the crack you made about the sweet dreams. And the…well…the thin walls,” I stammered, avoiding all eye contact. I was suddenly fascinated by my new shade of toenail polish. It was lovely…

“Ah, yes, the thin walls. Well, they work both ways, you know. And if someone were to, say, have a very interesting dream some night, well, let’s just say it would be quite entertaining,” he whispered. My knees went a little wobbly. Damn him and his voodoo…

I had to get back in control. I backed up a step.

“Yes, you may have heard something I would have preferred you not hear, but that’s not the way things always go down. So, you got me. But you won’t actually ever have me, so let’s move on. You got that? And brunch, by the way,” I finished, concluding my diatribe.

He looked confused and amused at the same time. “Brunch, by the way?”

“Brunch. You asked where I was off to this morning, and my answer is brunch.”

“Ah, got it. And are you meeting your girls that were out with my guys last night?”

“I am, and I will gladly share the scoop with you if it’s any good,” I laughed, twirling a piece of hair around my finger. Nice. Flirting 101. What the hell?

“Oh, I’m sure it’s good scoop. Those two look like man-eaters,” he said, rocking back on his heels as he began to stretch a bit.

“Are we talking Hannibal?”

“No, more like Hall & Oates.” He laughed, looking up at me as he stretched his hamstrings.

Christ, hamstrings.

“Yes, well, they can definitely work a room when they need to,” I said thoughtfully, beginning to back away again.

“And how about you?” he asked, standing straight.

“How about me what?”

“Oh, I bet Pink Nightie Girl can work any room she wants.” He chuckled, his eyes twinkling.

“Eh, work this,” I fired back and walked away with a twinkle of my own.

“Nice,” he added when I shot him a look over my shoulder.

“Oh, please, like you’re not intrigued,” I called back from about ten feet away.

“Oh, I’m intrigued,” he shouted as I walked backward, shaking my h*ps while he applauded.

“Too bad I don’t work well with others! I ain’t no harem girl!” I yelled, practically at the corner.

“Truce still on?” he yelled.

“I don’t know, what does Simon say?”

“Oh, Simon says, hell yes. It’s on!” he shouted back as I rounded the corner.

I twirled about, actually doing a little pirouette. I smiled big as I bounced along, thinking a truce was a very good thing.

“Egg-white omelet with tomatoes, mushrooms, spinach, and onions.”

“Pancakes—four stack, please—with a side of bacon. And I’ll need the bacon very crispy, please, but not blackened.”

“Two eggs sunny side up, rye toast with butter on the side, and the fruit salad.”

After ordering, we settled in for a morning of coffee and gossip.

“Okay, so tell me what happened after we left last night,” Mimi said, placing her chin in her hands and blinking prettily at me.

“After you left? You mean after you left me with my jerky neighbor to drive me home? What were you thinking? And telling everyone the he-was-still-hard story? Seriously? I’m writing you both out of my will,” I snapped, swallowing coffee that was too hot and instantly searing off a third of my taste buds. I let my tongue hang out of my mouth to cool.

“First of all, we told that story because it’s funny, and funny is good,” Sophia began, fishing a piece of ice out of her water glass and handing it to me.

“Thanh ooo,” I managed, accepting the cube.

She nodded. “And second, you have nothing to leave me anyway, as I already have the entire set of Barefoot Contessa cookbooks, which you bought me yourself. So write me out of the will. And third, the two of you were being such downers there was no way we were taking you out with our new boys,” Sophia finished, smiling wickedly.

“New boys. I love new boys.” Mimi clapped, looking like a Disney cartoon.

“How was the ride home?” Sophia asked.

“The ride home. Well, it was interesting.” I sighed, now sucking on the cube with wild abandon.

“Interesting good?” Mimi squealed.

“If you call schtupping someone on the Golden Gate Bridge interesting, then yes,” I replied, calmly drumming my fingers on the table. Mimi’s mouth began to fall from her face when Sophia placed her right hand over Mimi’s left, which was about to squeeze her fork into something unrecognizable.

“Sweetie, she’s kidding. We would know if Caroline had been schtupped last night. She’d have better skin tone,” Sophia soothed.

Mimi nodded quickly and released the fork. I pitied any guy who pissed her off during a handjob.

“So, no dish?” Sophia asked.

“Hey, you know the rules. You dish, I dish,” I answered, eyes widening as our breakfast was served. After we dug in, Mimi fired the first shot.