Irresistible (Neighbor from Hell #11) - R.L. Mathewson Page 0,11
reminding him that he couldn’t fuck this up, again.
“Not long,” Aidan said, deciding that five and a half months wasn’t long enough to unpack all his shit.
“It’s, um, nice,” Melanie said, rubbing the bridge of her nose as she looked around, taking in the half-empty boxes, discarded grocery bags, magazines scattered everywhere, empty water bottles and soda cans covering the counter and filling the sink along with-
Well, it wasn’t important what was in his sinks. What was important was that they had a baby on the way, which was why he’d dragged her back here after announcing that she was back on bed rest. That, and he had absolutely no plans of letting her walk away this time.
*-*-*-*
“I really don’t think this is going to work,” Melanie said, although she was touched by his offer, she honestly couldn’t see how this was going to work.
“Why?” Aidan asked when it should have been painfully obvious why this was a bad idea.
“We don’t even know each other,” she said, shifting to get comfortable even as she couldn’t help but wonder if there were any Swiss Rolls left in that Little Debbie’s box on the counter.
“I don’t think that matters, do you?” he said with a pointed look at the reason why she was here.
He had a point.
So, she moved on.
“There are stairs,” Melanie said, deciding to use the top reason that he’d used against her earlier to convince her that she couldn’t stay above the Fire & Brimstone anymore.
“Where?” he asked with a frown.
“The front step,” she answered lamely, making his eyes narrow suspiciously.
“There’s only one step,” Aidan said with a smug look that definitely reminded her of his brother.
“Fine, how about the fact that it should probably be condemned?” Melanie pointed out, wondering if he’d thought this through.
“Easily fixed,” Aidan said, still looking a little too smug for her liking.
“Overnight?”
“Probably not,” he admitted with a sigh before adding, “but definitely within a few days.”
“And until then?” Melanie asked, wondering if he had an answer for everything.
As it turned out, he did.
Chapter 6
“This is it,” Aidan said with flourish as he opened his bedroom door only to have the damn thing get stuck on the disturbing towel that he’d used this morning.
Throwing her another one of those reassuring smiles that was starting to make him feel like a jackass, Aidan discreetly shoved the door harder as he tried to kick the towel out of the way until the door finally flew open and-
“Shit!”
Slammed into the wall, breaking the doorstopper in half and allowing the doorknob to embed itself in the wall and officially making the very long list of things that he needed to do, which he couldn’t help but notice had tripled since this morning. Hoping that she hadn’t noticed, Aidan gestured for her to go inside.
He wasn’t exactly surprised when Melanie leaned in, took a good look at his bedroom and shook her head before turning around and making her way back to the front door. Since letting her leave would only be counterproductive to his plans, he quickly caught up to her, wrapped his arm around her shoulders and turned her around.
“I think you’re going to like this,” Aidan murmured as he kicked the towel out of the way and brought her inside the room that would be hers until he finished fixing the other apartment. For a moment, Aidan considered giving her this apartment and moving in upstairs with his brother, but quickly dismissed the idea since it would only make things more difficult than they needed to be.
“And why would you think that?” Melanie asked, sounding genuinely curious as she took in his bedroom.
“Because it’s spacious?” Aidan suggested, taking in the room filled with half-empty boxes, dirty laundry, discarded food wrappers, the messy bed, and wondered if she’d be willing to step into the hallway for a minute so that he could clean this up.
But he knew that if he gave her even half a chance that she would leave and since that would only make things more difficult, Aidan led her to the bed. “Why don’t you have a seat?” he suggested, giving her an encouraging smile.
When she just stared up at him, he mumbled, “Right,” nodded to himself, and made quick work of picking up all the shit on the floor and shoving it into whatever box was closest. In a few minutes, Aidan had the floor picked up, all his shit shoved into random boxes, and the bed somewhat made.