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“It’s ten thirty.”
“Shit, really? I meant to wake up…” Dylan rubbed his eyes. “I’m a heavy sleeper when I’m zonked. My brothers are loud, and we all shared a room until Anderson moved out.”
“Four boys in one room?”
“Two bunk beds. It was loud. And so many sticky socks.”
Derek wrinkled his nose. “Your mom must be a saint.”
“Not with the way she yelled at us to ‘Stop bloody wanking, or I’ll be throwing every fecking sock in the house in the bin’ .”
“Can’t wait to meet her.”
Dylan’s gut tightened. Right. “You’re still coming to the Grill-Out?”
“Planning on it. If you’re still okay with me coming, that is?”
“I am. My family’s just a lot is all.” Dylan tugged at his collar. “It’s just—”
The front door creaked open an inch. “I’m not coming in until I’m assured that all parties have their respective dicks put away.” Felicity’s tone threatened violent death.
“One sec, Felicity.” Derek leaned close to Dylan’s ear. “Can’t let her see the bare hardwood.”
Dylan groaned. “Go put some goddamned clothes on.”
“You’ve been saying that since day one.” Derek winked. “I still don’t believe it’s what you really want.”
Felicity banged on the door again. “Can I come in yet? Uncle Liam’s people accidentally locked me out of the apartment, and this nutty old lady in a flamingo shirt just called the cops on me, so I feel like that’s more important than your gross sexy talk.”
As if on cue, sirens blared outside.
“Shit,” Derek and Dylan said at the exact same moment.
Chapter 25
Dylan’s eye-rolling muscles were practically cramping from overuse. They’d been standing on the sidewalk outside Derek’s apartment in the sweltering heat for an hour with the cops and Carol Taylor. It hadn’t helped that Derek’s apartment did look ransacked, so initially the officers had been skeptical of Felicity’s story. The confusion was compounded by Carol’s continued insistence that “any woman willing to mark up her body like that probably was into all sorts of substances—you know,” meaning that Felicity’s intricate tattoo sleeves, visible since she’d tied the top part of her jumpsuit at her waist, were somehow symptomatic of a drug problem.
Reluctantly, Dylan tuned back in to the conversation.
“… fishy going on in the apartment. Mr. Chang is gay so why would he have some strange woman here dressed like a workman but with the body of a 1950s pinup girl?”
“Aw. Thanks so much.” Only Dylan’s younger sister could dramatically preen and bow while being insulted by a woman who looked like the physical embodiment of the state of Florida.
God, if only they could find a convenient sinkhole.
“You think this girl is doing actual construction work in that bright-red bra?” said Carol with a scoff.
“It’s a crop top underneath my jumpsuit.” She gestured to the sleeves tied around her waist. “It’s ninety degrees outside, and I was unloading the drywall—”
“Do I look like an idiot?” Carol glared.
No one seemed to want to touch that question with a ten-foot stick.
“You’re all sneaking around because you’re running some sort of sex and drugs ring. I hear that man leaving his house at all hours.” She gave Derek a sweep of stink eye. “I’m going to be living in a crack den soon, and you have to do something. Check behind that new so-called drywall. You’ll see. I refuse to believe that this four-foot tall, busty, carrottop bimbo is here to—”
“Five feet tall. Ish.” Felicity scowled. “You know carrottop is literally offensive to people with red hair, right? And crack den is pretty gross just generally.”
“Jesus fucking Christ.” Dylan immediately regretted vocalizing his bewildered exhale since it drew the unwanted attention of Carol. Dylan had, up until that point of the conversation, been leaning against a lamppost, minding his own business.