Good Boyfriend: A Love Story (The Bad Nanny Trilogy Book 2) Read online

  Zayden doesn't answer right away, pausing next to the iPod dock with a triumphant look on his face.

  Oh. The every other day thing. Crap.

  “Check this, Brookie,” he says, blessing me with yet another nickname. “Unwritten by Natasha Bedingfield. You know this one, scrub?” Zayden snaps his fingers and points at the iPod as music starts to play. “We gotta turn this up; this is my jam.”

  “You have a lot of jams, Zay. Harsh truth alert: they all suck.”

  “Naw, you're just too young to appreciate this shit.” He starts dancing his way over to the fridge, making me smile as I let Dodger into the house. Guess Zay also took the time to let the dog out this morning. He might've acted like a douchebag the other day, but … he's seriously making up for it.

  “No, don't get me wrong. I far prefer this to most of the garbage you listen to. I mean, compared to Justin Bieber, this is Mozart quality excellence.”

  “You do realize,” Zayden says, looking like a villain in a horror movie as he glances over his shoulder at me, “that we're starting work on the duplex today—and it's my turn to choose music. You'd best find a way to butter me up or we're listening to a pop radio station all day long.”

  That fucker.

  I'm too busy fuming and cringing at No Scrubs by TLC to notice that he never answered my question.

  “Rob and I have been looking for a good set of couple friends to play Dungeons and Dragons with,” Mercedes says as she pours the rum raisin paint that Zayden and I picked out into a tray and pops her mouth in surprise. “Oh, that's nice. Your brother's a real hard-ass about decorating. The only color we can compromise on is hunter green. That's as crazy as Rob gets.”

  “Are you kidding? That's crazier than he usually gets. That's why I'm seriously questioning this whole D&D thing. Are you sure he agreed to play with you?”

  Zayden dips his roller into the autumnal glaze of the red-orange paint and then presses it against the longest wall in the living room, just underneath the window. Bella and Grace are next door, playing with Kinzie and the twins while Rob watches them.

  “He said if I could find a couple to play with us that he'd try,” Mercedes corrects, using a brush to edge along the top of the baseboards. We've already painted those with a layer of semi-gloss white and let it dry for a while. Mercedes says she doesn't need to tape off any surfaces; her dad was a professional painter and apparently taught her to cut in with a perfectly straight hand, no tape necessary.

  “I'm in if Brooke's down for it,” Zayden says as I step up next to him and start covering up the wall with color. We filled in the holes first thing, before we went to the hardware store. Some of the other areas of the house need more work—like those holes the shotgun dude probably punched in—but this room wasn't so bad.

  “I've never played D&D before,” I say and they both gasp dramatically. Mercedes sloshes a huge puddle of paint onto the carpet and then shrugs. She's promised to have it replaced by the end of the week, so we can move right in. I even got to pick the color. I thought that was pretty generous of Mercedes and Rob.

  “Aw, you're dating a baby, baby,” Mercedes coos, pinching Zayden's cheek and getting paint all over his face. Their relationship is pretty damn cute, I have to admit. She acts like a mother hen around him. Around me, too, apparently. She's called me baby more times than he has today. “That's okay. Rob's a D&D virgin, too.”

  Zayden pauses to look over at me and grin. Like that's not obvious.

  “Guess I'll be popping your cherry a second time,” he whispers, and I groan, trying to pretend that I don't hear Phil Collins playing in the background. If I have to listen to You Can't Hurry Love one more time, I'm seriously going to puke.

  “Please add pop your cherry to the list of stuff you shouldn't say,” I growl under my breath.

  “I can't believe this is happening,” Mercedes says wistfully, her hair twisted into a fluffy bun on the top of her head. It's staying about as well as mine is, little tendrils falling out to waft around the sides of her face. “Here this horrible, tragic thing happens to my parents and it ends up being this glorious transformation.” She lifts her arms up and spatters more paint on the carpet. “One minute, Zayden's being his usual stubborn, selfish, reclusive—”

  “Never been reclusive,” he sings, but his sister-in-law ignores him.

  “—self,” she continues, as if he'd never spoken, “and the next, I'm sitting in the car on the way home from the airport watching his heart break right in front of me.”

  Now it's my turn to pause my painting and stare over at her.

  “Total overshare, Mercy,” Zayden says, but he has this stupid little smile on his face anyway.

  “I'm so glad he came to his senses and decided to go after you. Only an idiot would let a girl as nice as you go without a fight.”

  Now I'm smiling stupidly.

  “It seems a little surreal,” I admit, feeling more comfortable in this room with Zayden and Mercedes than I have with anyone else for years. Not even my friends in Berkeley, most of whom I'd known for years, made me feel this … included. Wanted. Accepted. Most of them can barely take the time to text me back. “I can't believe we're already over here painting.”

  But once I'd decided to move into the duplex, I wasn't about to wait around for the first of the month to roll by. I barely have enough to cover the rent let alone all the utilities, food, gas, etcetera. Why waste the cash over there if I can keep it and move in here?

  I've already spoken to the landlord. Luckily, he's a nice guy. He's agreed to let us move out by the first, even though that's only about seven days away. In exchange, I told him he could keep the security deposit. Fortunately, it's only about three quarters of what rent would've been anyway, so it's not a huge loss. Besides, that lease was in Ingrid's name. She left. So why should I struggle to hold onto that place for her? The girls can stay at the same schools, so there's no reason not to move in here.

  “Family is everything and everything is family,” Mercedes says, like she's quoting something.

  “My parents used to say that,” Zayden tells me, drawing a heart with his roller and then writing I Heart You, Brooke on the wall. As lame as that is, it makes me remember last night. He cried. He totally cried.

  We both end up smirking at each other.

  “Did they ever tell you that sometimes you have to choose your family? We're not all born with it.” Mercedes stands up with a long, tired sigh. “I'm still jet-lagged. I'm going home to grab a nap while Rob plays with the kids. Wake me up if you need anything.” She pauses on her way out to give me a kiss on the cheek. “Welcome to the family, baby.”

  Mercedes disappears out the front door before the blush takes over my entire face.

  “Welcome to the family, Brooke,” Zayden repeats with a wide grin.

  “Shut up,” I tell him, but inside, I'm secretly pleased.

  Zayden and I spend the next few days trying to get the duplex ready, so we can move my sister's abandoned furniture in before we leave for Las Vegas on Friday. We scrub the hell out of that place, bleaching the bathrooms and the kitchen, replacing a broken faucet, installing a new light fixture in the master bedroom.

  He pays for it all with his credit card, promising me that his condo will be easy to rent out, and that he'll have no problem paying it off, but I still feel bad. I chip in where I can, buying groceries, getting pizza, toilet paper, cat and dog food.

  If I let myself think about it too much, I get a little dizzy. My life has changed so fucking much in such a short time period. Sometimes I still wake up and think I'm in my dorm back at UCB. It takes me a couple of blinks to realize that I'm not staring up my roommate's massive poster of The Rock.

  And that I'm not alone.

  “I like working on the house with you,” I tell Zayden as we lie on our backs on the trampoline, feet pointed in opposite directions, our heads pressed together, ear to ear. I can see each breath he takes turning into a little white cloud above us. “Even if I'm
still a little weirded-out that we have one to work on at all.”

  “Right?” he asks, tilting his head to the side on the pretense of studying the stars. In reality, I think he just wants to bury his face in my hair. “I keep thinking that one day I'll wake up alone in the icebox of my condo, Hubert on my lap, a box of moldy pizza on my nightstand. To tell ya the truth, doll, I'm a little relieved when I don't.”

  “You don't miss it at all?” I ask, watching the blinking light of a plane trace across the navy darkness of the sky. Staring up at the stars like this, I feel like I can sense the curve of the earth, the atmosphere, like I'm balanced on the edge of a ball. It's a little trippy, I won't lie.

  “Nope.” Zayden pauses for a second. “Well, I guess I kind of miss the pool at my condo. I sneak down there at night sometimes and skinny-dip.”

  “Isn't that a tad … illegal?”

  “Is it?” he asks like he doesn't give two fucks, making me laugh. After a moment, he turns all the way toward me, lining our gazes up so that we're staring into one another's eyes. “Hey, you said your folks lived in a gated community, right?”

  “Yeah, so?” I ask, realizing I've forgotten about the poor, neglected houseplants again.

  “I bet they have a pool …” he starts, flashing me this debonair smile that spells mischief in a very clear, legible sort of way. I watch him poke at his lip rings with his tongue, making the silver studs slide back and forth through this skin. This morning, he shaved his face nice and fresh for me. It's a little stubbly now, but I've had trouble keeping my hands off of it. Even if it's not as soft as it was this morning, I still can't keep my fingers to myself, trailing them along the edge of his jaw and tracing the shape of his mouth.

  “It's probably closed,” I say, tugging at the small silver ring in his nostril, poking at the one on his brow. I'd rather be playing with the piercings in his cock, but I suppose these are nice, too.

  “Let's go check it out. Fences can be jumped.”

  “It's an indoor pool.”

  “Locks can be picked,” he tells me, sitting up and making the netting of the trampoline sway and bounce with the motion.

  “God, you're persistent,” I breathe, but why the hell not? We're sans kids tonight. Bella and Kinzie begged for a sleepover at Mercedes and Rob's, and then Grace threw a fit until she got to go, too. I felt bad for leaving them over there when we're already planning to go out of town, but Mercedes said it wasn't a problem. I guess if Zayden and I could handle the brood by ourselves for two weeks, they can deal with it for a few nights. “Okay, fine, let's go.”

  “Fuck yes, baby cakes. That's the spirit.”

  Zayden grins as he helps me to my feet, looking sexy as hell in a tight white t-shirt and loose holey jeans. The whole outfit's spattered with different colors of paint—the red-orange from the living room, the yellow for the downstairs bathroom, the pink that Grace picked out for her room, and the, uh, black that Bella chose. Yep, black. We only painted one wall and we did it with chalkboard paint, so it turned out pretty fucking cool, but still, a very interesting choice for a seven year old.

  All of those colors, they seem to mimic the swirls of tattoos across Zayden's skin, like his clothing's as much a canvas as his skin. I can't stop staring at him as he hops down into the grass and then holds up a hand so I can jump down next to him.

  “I can't believe we're going over to an old folk's community for a little B&E,” I mumble as he pulls me inside, pausing to give Hubert a pat on the rump. The stupid hairless rat is wearing a dress today—a cat dress. Like, there are actually companies that manufacture clothing for cats. I know, I didn't believe it either.

  Anyway, Hubert's sporting a black and white dress with polka dots. It's all made out of soft cotton, and the skirt part only drapes over his back, leaving his legs free to move. Still, the poor thing looks pissed the hell off, and I don't blame him. When he takes a swipe at Zayden, I almost feel bad that he misses.

  “One day, he's going to go for your balls while you're sleeping or something and then you'll be sorry you ever stole his kitty dignity with dresses and sweaters.”

  Zayden just chuckles at me and pauses in the living room with this stupidly triumphant look on his face.

  “Check this shit out, Smarty-Pants,” he says, gesturing with his chin at Dodger. The hairless dog—what I wouldn't give for a Pomeranian in that moment—is curled up on the couch dressed in a knitted sweater of his own. Actually, I think it's one of Hubert's but it fits him almost perfectly. It's got a smiling Santa Claus face on the back. “I ran out of political statements to make,” Zayden explains as I give the dog a raised eyebrow. Unlike the cat, I don't feel sorry for him though. I'm tired of getting my leg humped. Well, I'm tired of getting my leg humped by Dodger. Zayden Roth can hump it any day.

  “Aren't you clever,” I tell him as he shoves his feet into a pair of black boots, and I slip on some marmalade colored flip-flops. They probably look ridiculous with the black and red a-line dress I'm wearing, but I don't care. This, too, used to belong to Ingrid. Apparently my sister holds onto everything—including outfits she wore in high school. It's a little satisfying to see that I can finally fit into them. I was a little heavier back then and I had a hard time borrowing her clothes.

  “Aren't I?” Zayden asks as I hand him the keys, so he can drive us over there. It's not a sexist thing—I can't stand it when women act like if there's a man in the car, then he should be driving—I'd just rather be the passenger. It's easier to watch Zayden's expressions and mannerisms while we talk. And believe me, there are a lot of them. He communicates more with his face and hands than he does his voice, although that's expressive as hell, too.

  We climb in, our hands crashing as we both go for the music. Neither of us can remember whose turn it is, but he acquiesces with grace (thank God).

  “You take it, baby,” he tells me with a wink, starting up the car as I scroll through bands with my thumb. I decide to make it somewhat of a compromise, choosing The Haunting by Set It Off. If there's anything that has a chance of us both equally liking it, it's this. I'd call this song rock meets pop-punk.

  By the time we get to the gated community where my parents live, Zayden's already requested the song on repeat and learned the chorus. Watching him sing it? Pretty fucking cute. I remember him telling me about the garage band he sang in as a kid; I would've liked to see that.

  We stop at the front gate and I give him the code to open it, his inked finger punching in the numbers with gusto. Everything the man does is like that, animated and exciting to watch, even something as meaningless as typing in a key code.

  I guide him down the quiet streets and over to my parents' place, using the key they left me to get us inside.

  “It's not much to look at,” I say as Zayden takes in the white and beige living room/kitchen area and then pauses to glance into the downstairs bathroom. I notice neither of us bothers to turn on any lights. It's like the darkness somehow makes this place less sterile, more mysterious. I feel like we're doing something naughty.

  Of course, that's probably what Zayden planned all along—to bang me in my parents' house. I should've seen this one coming.

  “What is it with old people and bathrooms with lighthouse wallpaper borders?” he asks, putting his palms on either side of the doorway. “And the soap's shaped like a starfish.” He pauses for a moment. “You know, since it's been used some, a few of the arms are missing and … it kind of looks like a pink dick.”

  “Get out of there,” I say as I duck underneath him and grab the doorknob, yanking it closed. “My mom was forty-three when she had me, and my dad's only four years younger than her. They're in their sixties, and they like nautical themed bathrooms, okay?”

  “Nothin' wrong with that,” Zayden says as I take a step back and he turns to face me. He cocks a brow as I study him, bathed in shadows. The butterfly tattoos on his neck look like bits in the dim light. “Is there a, uh, bedroom we could scope out upstairs?”

&n
bsp; “You're awful,” I tell him, reaching down and taking his hand. “I thought we were here to go swimming?”

  “Yeah—naked. I thought you knew that sex was implied in that. When do your parents get back anyway?”

  “Couple of days,” I say, trying to remember what my mom said in her last text. “While we're in Vegas, I think.” I feel bad that I won't be here when they get into town, but there's no way I'm skipping out on this trip. I want to see Zayden's condo; I want to see the life he's leaving behind to be with me.

  I take him through a winding garden pathway, the foliage thick and lush and perfectly manicured. I don't worry about the security guards—there're only two of them and I know for a fact that they're both lazy pieces of shit. I went to high school with them both.

  We work our way to the fitness center and pause outside the locked front doors. The pool's just inside and to the right, down a long hallway. Every first and third Saturday of the month is 'Family Day' where residents can bring whoever they want to enjoy the facilities. I hung out here with Bella and Grace just before my parents left for their trip.

  “You're lucky this is old people central,” I whisper as I use a silver key from the ring in my hand to unlock the door. “They tried to switch to electronic key cards last year and the residents threw a massive fit. Over ninety percent of them signed a petition saying they'd stop paying their HOA fees if the management didn't reconsider.”

  The lock clicks open and I turn the knob, half-expecting an alarm to sound.

  There's nothing.

  “Cameras?” Zay whispers as we step inside and carefully close the door behind us.

  “The night guards are lazy fucks; they won't be watching. As long as we don't give them any reason to check the feed later, we'll be fine. The tapes rewrite themselves on a loop every two days anyway.”