Naughty Neighbor - Lauren Runow Page 0,54
hide how soft you are inside.” He runs a thumb over my lips, and I kiss the pad of it. “You sure you’re down to spend the weekend with me?”
I laugh. “I should be asking you the same thing. Don’t feel like you have to bring me if you don’t want to. I know you didn’t really invite me.”
He lowers his hands to the counter, placing one on each side as he pins me with his body and his stare. “Lacey?”
“Yes, Jake?”
“I’m not inviting you to the cottage.”
“You’re not?”
“No. I’m telling you to go. So, pack a bag. We’re going to the lake.” He kisses me, deep and soulful, making me whimper lightly. “And if you have any lingerie, I suggest you bring it.”
“And if I don’t?”
“Then, naked will do just fine.”
He kisses me again and pulls away as the front door chimes, and a customer walks in.
My heart pounds for so many reasons, yet here we go. I guess I’m going away for the weekend with Jake and his family. Ideas pop in my head, and I get so excited that I grab my backpack, open my laptop, and start typing as fast as my fingers will allow me.
Chapter Sixteen
An hour outside Chicago, in the state of Wisconsin, is the resort city of Lake Geneva.
After leaving the flower shop, Jake and I went home and packed weekend bags, getting back into the car when it was already dark out. I might not be able to see much of the town on the drive, but the Gilded Age mansions are illuminated at night, showing the old-world charm of the beach town.
I should be nervous, but as we head up the long, circular drive, I find myself more in awe at the Victorian home in front of me than anything else.
“You said we were going to a cottage.” My jaw is slack as I stare up at the three-story mansion with a four-car garage and, if I’m correct, a lakefront view.
“Yeah, the term is a bit deceiving. It’s our family home outside of the city.”
“Well, this certainly makes an impression.”
He quirks a brow. “Are you saying you’re now only interested in me for my family’s money?”
I nod my head as I continue to stare at the shaker-style shingles and bright white molding around the windows. “You’re lucky you have a big dick because that’s the only thing more impressive than this house.”
He blanches for a second as I step out of the car. “Wait. You can’t drop the ‘big dick’ comment and then just walk out like that!”
With a laugh, I head to the back of the car to get my bag. “You bring girls here a lot?”
“I have, but I usually wait until we’re a few months in. I wouldn’t want her more impressed with the house than my cock,” he teases.
I shake my head and kiss him on the lips. “Just so you know, you have nothing to worry about with me. You had me at the seafoam-green towel. Everything after that is gravy.”
I walk toward the front door and hear him cheer behind me, “I knew it!”
We walk into the cottage together. The inside is equally as impressive as the outside with a two-story entry with floor-to-ceiling wainscoting and a large living room ahead with wall-to-wall windows overlooking a patio that’s filled with people.
“She’s here!” a girl’s voice calls out from the patio.
Two girls, about my age, walk toward us.
“You have no idea how excited we are to finally meet you,” one says.
“Yes, we were starting to think this guy was pulling our leg and you didn’t really live next door to him,” the other adds.
“Lacey, these are my sisters, Tweedledee and Tweedledum,” Jake says with a smirk.
They slap his arms as they hug him from either side.
“Good to see you too, bro,” a woman with long light-blonde hair and porcelain skin says to him and then leans into me for a hug. “I’m Milène.”
“And I’m Penelope.” The other sister with shorter, curlier hair bounces to me. “Come on in. We have a bottle of wine open with your name on it.”
I smile at Jake as he winks and then heads into the kitchen, where his mom is preparing food.
The deck in the back of the house sits right over the lake, and with the sun going down, it’s the most surreal setting of both beauty and nature.
They walk me to the side where a U-shaped couch is set up with a table that has a firepit in