The Best of Winter Renshaw - An 8 Book Collection - Winter Renshaw Page 0,613

pales in comparison to the one I had before in the penthouse with Hunter, but I’m perfectly fine with that. In fact, I love that it’s cozier. I love how it’s comfortable and updated without being pretentious and over the top. The complete opposite of the one I had before. A dainty, flush mount chandelier hangs above us, and I step into my ballet flats while Tierney stuffs her swollen feet into a pair of red-bottomed heels.

I don’t tell her she’s crazy—she might bite my head off like she did when I asked her if it was okay for her to drink coffee while pregnant. It was an honest question, but she referred me to Google and then gave me her obstetrician’s phone number in case I wanted to confirm with her myself.

Screw it.

“We’re walking,” I remind her. I gave up the driving service when I moved here. Everything I need is within walking distance, and if I want to shed that old LeGrand skin, that means parting ways with unnecessary luxuries like chauffeurs and imported SUVs. “I can loan you a pair of sneakers if you want?”

Tierney looks at me like I’m insane for so much as suggesting that she’s incapable of waddling to the corner in five-inch stilettos whilst seven months pregnant, and then she reaches for the door knob.

Following her to the hall, I pull the door closed and lock up, only when I turn to leave, I see the door across the hall swinging open. A moment later, out steps a shirtless Jude dressed for a summer run in the park—at least I presume. Navy athletic shorts rest low in his angled hips, the inverted muscles of his lower abdomen pointing down before disappearing beneath his waistband. When he rests a hand on his hip, I catch a glimpse of the bulging veins in his arm … my mind immediately going somewhere else completely.

Our eyes catch and my heart stutters without permission.

Redirecting my thoughts is the easy part. Keeping my body from reacting to a sight like this is the part that’ll give me a run for my money.

“Oh. My,” Tierney says in a deep Joan Crawford-esque manner, lifting her palm to her chest as she drinks him in. Subtle is a language she’s never been able to master.

I mouth the word “sorry” to my neighbor and link my arm into hers in an attempt to drag her away.

“Excuse me,” she says to Jude as she jerks her arm from my grasp. “You two are neighbors?”

He looks at me then to her before his full lips pull into a smirk. He’s amused.

“We are,” he says.

“Have you met yet?” she asks, her finger pointed as it moves between the two of us.

“We have,” he says. “Last night.”

Turning to me, Tierney’s liquid blue eyes widen and she fights a smile. I’m sure the second we’re out of here, she’s going to go off on me for not mentioning him, but there’s nothing to mention.

I have a hot neighbor. So what?

“You know she’s single, right?” Tierney says.

“Oh, my god.” I turn away for a second. “Tierney. Stop.” Glancing back, I say to Jude, “I’m so sorry. She’s pregnant and crazy hormonal and she has no filter.”

“Are you trying to imply in front of this ridiculously beautiful specimen of a man that I’m a hot mess?” Tierney asks, one auburn eyebrow perched.

“Yep,” I say.

“Don’t sweat it,” Jude says, pulling his phone and earbuds from his shorts pockets. He speaks to her but looks to me. He’s still a stranger, but there’s something going on behind those olive-green eyes of his that seem to intensify the longer he stares at me. “Love, see you around.”

Turning away, Jude heads toward the elevator, but I stay back. It’d be awkward if we all piled in now.

“I can’t believe you said that,” I say once he’s gone, lightly punching her arm before clapping my hand over my mouth. “What are we? Fifteen?”

Tierney laughs. “Lighten up. Your neighbor is hot as hell and you’re single as hell. I was just putting that energy out there. If it’s meant to be, something will come of it.”

“I don’t want anything to come of anything,” I remind her. I’ve told her this a hundred times this year alone. I don’t want to date. I’m focusing on myself for a while and then I’ll see what happens. “What if he asks me out now?”

Not that I think he would …

And for all I know, he’s got a wife or