Boom - Sabrina Stark Page 0,73

really a thing? I shook my head. "What?"

"Oh, stop acting all innocent," she said. "I see the way you look at him."

"Oh really?" I scoffed. "Is it the same way you look at him?"

Her smirked disappeared. "I have no idea what you mean."

"Sure you do," I said. "You've been drooling over him since the beginning."

"I have not!"

"You have, too," I said. "Maybe you should hate-fuck him."

Her chin lifted. "Maybe I will."

"Good." But even as I said it, I knew that the idea of them together didn't make me any happier than I was now. And that was saying something.

After a few more barbs back and forth, Waverly huffed back into her bedroom and slammed the door behind her.

In the now-silent hallway, I shoved a hand through my hair and tried to think.

By now, I was so tired of everything – Brody's attitude, Waverly's sniping, and most of all, my own thoughts. The sad truth was, I had been thinking of Brody in ways that weren't totally innocent.

In fact, some of my thoughts were guilty as heck, especially in the dead of night when my imagination wandered and my fingers roamed. During the last week in particular, he'd been starring in all of my hidden fantasies.

How pathetic was that?

It made no sense. I really did hate him, most of the time anyway. Sure, we'd been getting along better lately, but so what?

Obviously, he hated me just as much as I hated him. Otherwise, why would he act like such a jerk?

Now I felt doubly unsatisfied.

I hadn't been able to give him a piece of my mind and I'd expended a sad amount of energy in trying to deny that yes, I might be attracted to him just a little.

Okay, more than a little.

Damn it.

With a sigh, I wandered to the living room, intending to sulk on the sofa.

I never made it.

And why?

It was because when I happened to glance out the front window, I saw Brody's truck in the driveway across the street.

So he was still around?

I flicked off the living room lights and edged closer to the window. Across the street, the lights were on, in spite of the late hour.

What on Earth was Brody doing?

Working?

It wasn't completely impossible.

In spite of my anger, I had to admit, Brody worked incredibly hard – and long hours too. But that didn't change anything. He was still a jerk.

And damn it, I wanted to tell him so.

Almost before I knew what I was doing, I'd already thrown on my sneakers and was heading straight across the street.

He was so going to get it.

And boy did he ever.

Chapter 41

Arden

Dumbfounded, I stood staring at the bathroom door. Brody wasn't working.

He was showering.

But why here?

It made no sense. Back at the crew house, we had two perfectly good showers. Okay, one of those showers was in my bedroom, but that was beside the point.

The whole thing struck me as just a little bit strange.

I was standing in the same upstairs hallway where I'd begged Brody on my knees to save the house. And he was in the same shower where he'd surprised me on that very same night.

At the memory, I crossed my arms and glared daggers at the bathroom door.

It was shut, and probably locked too. It's not like I'd tried the knob or anything, even if I was tempted.

It wasn't for lust, or even curiosity.

It was for justice.

What Brody needed was a taste of his own medicine.

I should barge in there and see how he liked it.

Unlike so many walls throughout the house, the walls surrounding the bathroom remained intact. Soon – probably tomorrow – the plaster would be stripped away, and new drywall would take its place.

No doubt, the old plaster would've been gone already, if not for the fact that it would render the bathroom unusable to anyone not wanting to put on a show while conducting their personal business.

Privacy – we all needed it, right?

But Brody hadn't cared about my privacy. No. Not him. What he'd done was make a hole in the wall to spy on me. And then, he'd busted through the door like some sort of axe-wielding psycho.

Axe or no axe, he'd scared me half to death.

And had he ever apologized?

Not hardly.

The longer I thought about it, the more irritated I became.

Inside the bathroom, the shower was still running. I could hear it, even if I couldn’t see it. Still, I could imagine what it looked like in there – or rather, what he looked like in there.

If