Lexi Cocker - Faleena Hopkins
Chapter One
LEXI
“Lexi, come back here!” my lover/nemesis shouts from inside the abandoned bedroom as I shimmy down his drainpipe.
I’ve got my middle finger shoved through my keychain, keys jingling like a halting dog collar as I scoot lower and shout, “Fuck you, Brad!”
Thank God I hid my handbag in the trunk so my hands are free for this get-the-fuck-away move. I hadn’t planned climbing out his window but he blocked the door so…
Truth is I didn’t bring my handbag because not only had I no reason to believe I’d be spending the night at Brad’s (where I’d need the toothbrush, eye cream, and extra pair of panties I used to carry when we first started sleeping together) but it also didn’t match the dress I snagged from Zoe’s closet. The one lying in a heap next to Brad’s untouched bed.
She’ll forgive me.
The shoes, however, what a loss! I really loved those denim heels of Samantha’s! Oh well.
She’ll forgive me.
His brown mop of hair above the eternally trimmed-to-perfection beard juts out his second floor window, designer prescription glasses falling prey to gravity. Brad pushes them up before it’s too late, holds them in place on his perfect nose, gets impatient, and yanks them off as we glare at each other, me stopping to add a sneer.
Brad’s naked chest is visible, with a fresh, dark crimson hickey on his neck in full display, the one I gave him after I saw betrayal on his nightstand. For being so smart, he sure was stupid to leave that laying there.
“You are fucking crazy,” he barks, “Get back here! You’re going to fall off that drain pipe!”
Like a sexy anaconda dressed in white pajama shorts and matching halter, I’m gripping on.
But I’m no snake.
He is.
“Try and catch me, you old man!”
Brad chuckles, “Oh now I’m old?” losing the gleam to shout, “Now I’m old?! You didn’t think I was old five minutes ago when you were yanking down my zipper for the hundredth and ninety-eighth time!”
“You counted?”
“Of course I counted!”
I continue my escape. “That’s so...you!”
He barks, “Get back here, Lexi! I mean it!”
“Blah blah blah!” Scratching up my inner thighs wasn’t off the menu tonight but this isn’t how I thought it would happen. “I’ll tell you what, Brad, why don’t you warn the owner of that yellow hair tie that you count sexual encounters — probably have an Excel spreadsheet and Powerpoint presentation of all the positions, too, I wouldn’t put it past you — and see if she still has the hots for you after that!” Under my breath I add, “Can’t wait to tell Samantha about this. She’ll never believe it.”
I glance up.
Wait.
Where did he go?
Was I just talking to myself?
He heard none of it?
My heart sinks.
Oh come on!
Really?!
He gave up that easily?
My eyes widen as I realize, “Oh shit, he’s running downstairs!” and I scoot faster until I’m letting go, dropping onto his shrub from a higher distance than I should. “Ouch!” I cry out and grab my ankle. “Dammit!”
Brad bursts out the front door still wearing only pinstriped, baby blue boxers, raw lips panting as he plants his thick bare feet on the welcome mat to shout, “Lexi!”
I sprint-hop for my car parked just ahead on his sleepy, tree-lined, Georgia street. “Don’t run after me!”
“What the… Did you break your foot?!” He starts running.
I dash around to the driver’s door, key ready to slide in my lock.
Brad jumps onto my Subaru’s hood, rolling over it like an action star. He lands on the asphalt as I lock myself safely inside. The ignition ignites, seatbelt engaged and sliding around my scratched up, sprained, scantily clad body that he had his hands all over for the last fucking time - I swear it. “Nice move.”
Brad pants, “You like that?”
“Only that. I don’t like you.” I hit the gas, wincing at the intense pain in my right ankle. But that’s cool. Everything I do is intense.
Brad shouts after me a low blow, “You’ll be back, Alexis!”
Zig-zagging around a forgotten red ball laying in the middle of his street, under my breath I growl, “Bastard. He knows I hate being called that!”
Chapter Two
LEXI
I shout, “Sam!” hobbling into House-Three, as Ryder Hamilton likes to call the apartment I live in with my sister, Samantha, and our cousin Zoe in West Midtown, Atlanta, Georgia.
As I drop my retrieved handbag onto our cluttered coffee table, I call out impatiently, “Sammy? You home? You better be home!!!”
Samantha was born into this world to be my co-conspirator in all things