My Beautiful Neighbor (The Greene Family Book 1) by Piper Rayne (android based ebook reader txt) 📗

“My stepbrother, Cade Greene, has been seen multiple times with Sunrise Bay’s newest resident, Presley Knight. Knowing Cade the way I do, I’d say he’s smitten. Especially when it was reported they were at the bay last night and a little birdie from one town over in Lake Starlight told me that Miss Knight had to check out of Glacier Point Resort due to a water leak. I’m sure none of us are surprised that my brother, Cade, rescued her and she’s now staying above the garage at his house.”

“Didn’t you stay there for a while?” Chip asks.

I should write him a thank you note for changing the subject.

“I did, and let me tell you, no woman would want to stay there, so I have my own theory that Goldilocks is sleeping in someone else’s bed.”

“Which bear’s bed do you think she’s in?” I have no idea how Nikki’s partner-in-crime plays along as though they have a script. Hell, maybe they do. I don’t know.

“Not the Ranger Bear or the Sheriff Bear. We all know the Charismatic Bear is wondering why he hasn’t scored with her, but I’m willing to bet the Gentleman Bear is the one getting Goldilocks’s honey.”

Chip laughs and I roll my eyes. She’s insane, but I can’t deny her ratings are big because of this shit.

“I haven’t seen my brother so enamored since he was with Reese and that was back in high school. So why don’t we play a song that fits the happy couple perfectly?”

“I can’t wait,” Chip says.

“This is ‘Perfect Strangers’ by Jonas Blue. Enjoy, everyone,” she says, and the song plays.

I turn off the radio and go through the back door over to Presley’s store. Adam is in the storage room, stocking boxes, and I catch Presley out front, trying to put up the awning herself.

“What the hell are you doing?” I say to Adam. “Why is she on a ladder?”

I run through the store and out the front. She’s inching up on her tiptoes to pull down the upper part.

“Why on Earth are you trying to do this yourself?” I demand.

“What? I’m fine.” But she loses her footing when she looks down at me and I catch her in my arms.

Adam comes out of the store. “She didn’t tell me she was doing it.”

“Because you’ve got music in your ears twenty-four hours a day,” I yell. He’s gotta get out of this funk and back in the world of the living.

Presley wiggles out of my hold and I realize I’m holding her as if she’s my bride and we’re about to walk over the threshold. Chuck comes out of the butcher shop, bloodstains on his white apron, to see the commotion. His bushy eyebrows rise when he sees me, and a customer whispers something in Chuck’s ear while walking past him into his shop. Luckily, Chuck follows her in. I’m in no mood to hear his sarcastic comments.

“I would’ve helped if she’d told me. I was stocking the storage area,” Adam argues.

“Exactly my point.” I put Presley down because if I don’t, she’s going to fall with the amount of wiggling she’s doing in my arms.

“Just stop, both of you. I can do things on my own.”

Here we go again, her proving a point.

“You should at least have someone spot you,” I say in a loud voice, grabbing the attention of two middle-aged women walking out of The Grind.

“Just relax,” Presley says in a hushed voice. “Is the segment just moments ago not enough?”

So she heard it.

“Nikki’s up to her usual tricks?” Adam asks, putting his AirPods back in and walking into the store.

I throw up my hands.

“I can do things myself without you yelling at your poor brother for not helping me.”

I stuff my hands in my pockets. “What is with you and my brother anyway?”

She stares blankly at me. “Seriously? Your brother?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I ask.

“You’re jealous of your brother.” She leans in close and whispers, “I don’t think it was his mouth between my legs last night.”

Just the memory of her taste makes me want to take her over my shoulder and carry her into the Truth or Dare office. If only I had condoms at the brewery. Which reminds me, I need to carry one around with me as if I’m sixteen again and believe the false notion that the opportunity for sex is always around the corner.

“Come, let me feed you lunch, then we’ll finish the awning.” I grab her hand and she actually lets me take her over to the brewery.

“Are you going to feed me a hot dog?” She laughs, our fight over, I suppose.

I open the doors of the brewery with my keys in my pocket, lead her in, and lock it back up. “Come on now. You know it’s a Kielbasa sausage.”

She laughs, but my hands are busy roaming up the hem of her T-shirt as I guide us to my office. Just as I have her ass on my desk and my hands on her tits, I hear the back door open then Jed humming as he turns the doorknob to the office.

I lean over Cade’s shoulder, pretending I’m looking at something he’s showing me on the computer.

“See,” Cade says, pointing at a blank cell on an Excel spreadsheet.

“Oh, I get it.”

Jed walks in and stops in his tracks, taking in our positions. “Figures you two would get all hot over numbers.” He rounds Cade’s desk, never looking at the screen before plopping down in his chair.

If he only knew that Cade’s dick is very hard under this desk because moments ago, his hands were on my breasts. I’d very much like them there again. His whole heroic act of saving me while I was doing the awning shouldn’t turn me on, but call me a damsel because it kind of warmed me that he was protective.

“I’m starved. Want me to make you something in the kitchen?” Cade asks.

Since Jed’s presence never sits