The Dream Guy Next Door: A Guys Who Got Away Novel Read online

  “No. They like nuts, seeds, fruits, eggs, insects, frogs, and crayfish,” I answer seriously.

  She deals me an inquisitive stare. “Are you a raccoon-ologist?”

  “Sort of,” I say. “I’m a vet.”

  “I’m a carpenter.”

  My eyebrows rise as I point to her pocket. “That would explain the hammer in your pocket.”

  “Oh, no. The hammer is for when I lock you up in my basement.”

  I play along. “I was hoping you’d be game for that. Want to go now?”

  She laughs. “Actually, my daughter told me the best housewarming gift would be to offer to hang pictures or art for you. And, as is the case with most things in life, she was right.”

  “Hold on. You’re saying I get soap, flowers for Mum, and your picture-hanging expertise?”

  “You left out the radishes and cilantro.”

  “No. I just didn’t get to them yet. They’re for the raccoons. I’ll leave them out tonight for the bandits.”

  “Then I want a report tomorrow,” she says.

  For a second, I simply stand there, enjoying, much more than I should, the unexpected, delightful view of my gorgeous neighbor.

  My off-limits neighbor.

  Must not consider her an option for the dating plan.

  I glance around, trying to think of something else to do than stare at her lovely face. “Want to see the inside?”

  “I would love to.”

  I show her into the house as two guys leave the bedroom and pull a mirror from a box.

  “Any idea where you want this, sir?” one of the guys asks.

  I glance around, not quite sure. “You can just leave it against the wall.”

  January lifts her chin, nodding at the guy. “Hey, Joshua. How’s Maggie? She just turned one, right?”

  “She’s walking now,” the guy says with a pleased-as-punch grin.

  “Excellent. I bet she’s a handful.”

  “And we love it.” Then he addresses me, pointing to the front door. “We’re going to grab some more things. Almost done. You don’t have much.”

  “I’m a minimalist,” I say.

  “Cool,” the guy says, and strides out.

  I turn to see January has a hand on the leather couch, and she’s nodding knowingly. “I notice you’ve got a whole man-pad vibe going on here.”

  “You think so?” I ask, as if the thought never occurred to me.

  “I mean, it’s hard to tell with all the black, white, and chrome. But if I had to guess . . .”

  “Hmm. What do you know? Seems I do.” Then I shrug. “Honestly, I think it might be time to ditch it.”

  “You don’t like the look?”

  “It seems . . . impractical,” I say, gesturing to the yard to indicate the kid. “I was thinking when we left New York that maybe it was time to torch all the furniture.”

  “Go furniture-free? Sleep on the floor?”

  I laugh. “No. I meant finally get something that doesn’t scream I’m single.”

  An eyebrow lifts. “Are you not single?”

  “I am definitely single. Very much so. But I don’t think I need the whole black-and-white-and-chrome look anymore.”

  She peers around my monochromatic home. “Yeah, there is definitely a bachelor aesthetic working here.”

  “Tell me about it. Even my son has black bedding. We don’t own anything that isn’t black or white.”

  “What about gray? Do you have anything gray?”

  I screw up the corner of my lips, considering. “We might have a few gray items. But gray is just a variation. New Yorkers aren’t actually allowed to own furniture that’s not black-and-white.”

  “Oooh,” she says with an exaggerated nod. “I’ve heard, too, that single men are limited to items made only of chrome, steel, or titanium.”

  “Don’t forget iron. That’s a very manly substance, and we like to have lots of iron tables, spikes, and stakes.”

  “So manly.” She glances again at my black furniture. At my glass table. At the entirely colorless scheme that doesn’t fit in this bright yellow bungalow. “Are you truly thinking of going furniture shopping?”

  “Yes, but I fear I might never emerge from IKEA. I’ve heard tell of a secret fast track to the exits, known only to the most experienced shoppers. The rest of us have to follow the winding trail like sheep, and somehow I always get caught behind a slow-moving family with all day to shop when all I want is a desk lamp.”

  She stands and brushes her hands over the front of her shorts. “Why don’t I give you a better housewarming gift? I can take you shopping, Liam.”

  “For furniture? You’d do that?”

  She smiles. “You’re my neighbor. Of course. It just so happens that I know the secret route through IKEA. Also, it only seems fair—because I hate your furniture as much as you hate radishes.”

  “Is it possible to hate something that much?” I counter, enjoying her sarcasm.

  She pats the couch. “Yup. I detest it.”

  “Well, my furniture is the new brown.”

  “Then I’ll be your furniture Sherpa. Are you free tomorrow?”

  “As a bird,” I reply, and she laughs.

  “Ah, a vet who makes bird jokes. I’m sure that wins you many clients.”

  I laugh too, a bit surprised at how well this move is going so far.

  That is, if living next door to a pretty, sarcastic, helpful woman I’d love to ask on a date but can’t is a good thing.

  But I can make the best of it.

  I’ll be friends with the world’s sexiest neighbor with a tool belt and short shorts.

  That ought to be easy.

  Said. No one. Ever.

  5

  Liam

  As I turn the rental car onto a curving road in neighboring Lucky Falls, Ethan tosses out yet another option for a permanent set of wheels.

  “Hovercraft? That slaps. Have you considered it?”

  “I have not. Tell me why it slaps,” I say, filing that new slang away in my drawer of Things Kids Say These Days. “Because I’m totally open to a dope hovercraft, but I need to know exactly why that should be at the top top of my list. Why should it be above, say, a Subaru?”

  He rolls his eyes and huffs, possibly puffs, with the disdain of youth. “Please tell me you’re not getting a Subaru, Dad.”

  I maintain a straight face as I drive. “Why should I not get a Subaru? Isn’t that what dads do? I could also get white trainers and a braided leather belt.”

  He recoils in the seat, a full-body shudder I catch in my peripheral vision. “No. Just no. That is . . . You can’t come home if you do that. Also, just call them sneakers.”

  “Yo. Sneakers. How’s that?”

  “Sort of better.”

  I laugh. “So, tell me more about the hovercraft and why it’s better than a Subaru.”

  He taps his fingers on the dashboard, full of energy. “Because they’re cool. Reason enough.”

  Flipping the turn signal, I slow at the corner. “Cool is, indeed, reason enough.”

  “Then can we get a Bugatti?”

  “Sure. Want to buy it today?”

  “Yes!”

  As we slow at a fork in the road, I wiggle the fingers of my right hand. “Crack open the piggy bank, then, and fork over some coin. Do you know what they cost?”

  He arches an I have no clue brow. “A few thousand?”

  I point high up. “A little higher.”

  “A hundred grand?”

  My hand stretches toward the ceiling of the car.

  “A million?”

  “Something like that.”

  He glances out the window for a moment, then back at me. “Then how about a Batmobile? Maybe we should just get one of those.”

  “Why didn’t I think of that?”

  As we near my parents’ house, his expression turns serious for a second, earnest. “I have something to tell you.”

  “What do you have to tell me?” I
ask, keeping it light but feeling cautious, in case this is the moment when he confesses that he hates this move.

  “It’s weird seeing you drive.”

  Laughing, I answer him, “It’s weird to drive. I didn’t drive for years in New York.”

  “I never once saw you drive in the city. Wait, did you drive that time we went to Saint Lucia?”

  “No, that was your butler. Of course that was me. Who else do you think drove us?”

  He shrugs helplessly. “I don’t remember.”

  “Well, it was me,” I say as I turn into my parents’ driveway. “Your father.”

  “You drive really slow.”

  “It’s safer. Also, driving is like eating radishes.”

  “You hate it?”

  “So incredibly much. It’s the worst.”

  “You should just get a bike, then. Well, another bike. You can’t use your racing bike,” he says.

  True. My racing bike is for just that, though I don’t race to place in the centuries I train for. I race for exercise, to hit goals, and for the accomplishment—to crest five mountain passes, traversing one hundred miles in a mere eight hours.

  Or something like that.

  “So just a regular bike?” I ask. “A tooling-around-town bike?”

  “Yeah, you should do that. Since you like to ride, and so do I.”

  That’s not a bad idea. A bike sounds kind of perfect. I cut the engine and look at him. “Should we go bike shopping together later?”

  He shrugs happily. “Works for me.”

  It’s almost too easy, the way this move is working for him.

  But I want to make sure he’s okay with all the changes. “Hey,” I say, setting a hand on his arm.

  “Yeah?”

  “You doing okay with everything? With being here? With missing New York?”

  He nods, but there’s still a hint of sadness in the curve of his mouth. “Sometimes I miss Florida too.”

  “Do you remember much about it?” I ask, bracing myself for whatever he might tell me. There was a long span of time when he missed his old life terribly.

  “No. But I remember I liked it there.” He waves toward my parents’ house. “But I like it here too. Because of Nan and Pop, and everything else, and the baseball camp I’m going to, and the pool. And Spencer,” he says, naming one of his cousins.

  “Good.” I punch him lightly on the arm.

  “And because we can adopt a dog now, right?”

  Ah, there it is. He’s wanted a dog for as long as he’s been in my life, but my place in New York was pet-free.

  “Do you miss Katrina?” I ask. That’s the dog his mom had when he was younger. She told me as much when she showed up.

  He likes books, baseball, and dogs. He’ll eat nearly anything, but he does love sweets. Don’t give him too many. He falls asleep instantly at night, so make time to read during the day. Use a night-light, since that’s what he’s accustomed to. Also, he still misses Katrina, an Australian cattle dog mix I had who went to the Rainbow Bridge last year. And he likes to talk, and to laugh. That’s about it.

  Oh, one more thing. He might be a fish. You’ll never get him out of the water once you let him in.

  That’s what she told me—the care and feeding of the son I never knew I had.

  I’ve been ready for the dog request ever since I told him we’d be living in a house and not a flat.

  “I don’t remember Katrina,” Ethan says. “But that picture of her and me makes me think I liked her a lot. So, I want another.”

  “It will be after school starts, but the answer is yes.” Fact is, I’d like one too. Because . . . dogs.

  Also because . . . it’s about fucking time.

  I won’t have to wonder what the days were like when he hugged a dog, threw a ball to a dog, or played with a dog. I’ll see them all, experience them all.

  Something I didn’t have before.

  Something I want desperately.

  “Yes!” He pumps a fist. “I love it here, then.”

  Perhaps that’s the joy of being his age. You’re not too entrenched in your life. You’re still open to change. You’re malleable and flexible. And you’re still wildly confident, enough to walk up to peers, determined to be friends.

  It’s harder when you’re a little older. As I stare at my parents’ red home with white shutters and window planters, a crest of nostalgia clobbers me like a rogue wave in the ocean, slamming into me out of the blue. It sweeps me back in time to when I was an angsty and emo sixteen-year-old forced to relocate from England to the States because my father had landed a chance to teach at a veterinary school here and practice in the States as well. Such an opportunity for him, but hell for me.

  I’d lived in the same small town in Surrey my entire life, and the last thing I’d wanted was to move six thousand miles away to a small town in California. I’d hated being uprooted, so I’d handled it by tucking into my room, slamming the door, and blasting bands like The Cure and The Smiths. I’d worn black and cultivated an air of fuck off, world. I went on like that for months—head down, teeth gnashing, thoroughly pissed off.

  Until an outgoing girl with frizzy brown hair and big green glasses noticed my scores on science tests and invited me to join the Science Club. The club members figured out I was uncannily good at all things chemical and biological, plus numbers and data as well, and they recruited me. For experiments. For projects. For general geeking out.

  At last, I had found my people.

  Fellow animal lovers, science geeks, and book nerds.

  Some of them are still here in Lucky Falls, one town over from Duck Falls, but some have scattered to San Francisco. Others are farther afield across the United States. Some of them I’ll no doubt see in the coming weeks and months. Others I may never see again.

  But even so, meeting them, realizing my strengths, started me down the path I’m on today—the glass-half-full one, the optimistic one, the found-what-I-want-to-do-in-life path.

  The one where I followed in my father’s footsteps.

  That’s what I’m doing now, only it’s a little bit harder this time because everything is harder for him, and it’s becoming more so by the day. He can no longer run his practice, and he’s kept that fact under wraps. That’s why the realtor kept my name confidential. If it got out that I was the one who had nabbed the house—Liam Harris, DVM, son of Edward Harris, DVM—word would spread around both towns that my father was no longer able to tend to their furry friends.

  That truth will come out in a few more days, but on our terms, when we can formally announce the takeover and I can answer any client questions and assuage their fears and concerns.

  Now, my mother rushes out the front door, chased by her two border collie mutts, black-and-white blurs of bounding paws and thumping tails. Ethan jumps out of the car, drops to the ground, and offers his face for kissing.

  Being dogs, Elphaba and Galinda seize the chance to lick his cheeks, lips, and eyes.

  “Make sure they clean your teeth too,” I say as he laughs and falls to the grass, letting the dogs conduct a thorough tongue-lashing, like I bet Katrina did to him back in Florida.

  “Girls, come now,” my mum calls. “Off!”

  “Too late.” I shut the car door and head toward her. “He slathered himself with steak this morning.”

  “Well, he’s won their allegiance for the rest of time, then,” Mum says. Seconds later, Ethan pops up and gives her a hug. “Why, if it isn’t my fifth-favorite grandson!” she declares, and he cracks up.

  “Why can’t I be first?” he asks.

  She parks a hand on her hip, taps her chin, and seems to seriously consider his question. “Maybe you can, but you’ll have to prove why you should be my favorite.”

  As the dogs circle his feet, he stares at her weatherworn face, her blonde hair gone silver, her blue eyes still bright and knowing. He has her genes, her fair complexion.

  “What do I have to do to become your favorite?” />
  She peers around the yard. “You could start by mowing the lawn, then perhaps by weeding it.”

  I join them, thoroughly approving of her tough tactics. “You drive a hard bargain, Mum.”

  “Of course I do,” she says, ruffling my hair.

  I bend to pet the dogs, paying homage to their adorableness, then I point a finger at each one, and instantly they drop into proper sits.

  “You’re the dog wizard.” Ethan sounds a little awed.

  “And if I’m not, they should take away my license.”

  Mum flashes me a smile. “It’s good to see you again, Liam.”

  “You saw us the other night,” I point out.

  “And I still like seeing you. Didn’t anyone ever tell you to be nice to your mum?”

  I roll my eyes. “I am nice. I’ll show you how nice.” I head to the back seat of the car, open the door, and reach inside to grab the bouquet of daisies.

  I offer them to her, and she clasps her hand to her chest in delight and then takes the flowers. “I love them.”

  “They’re from the woman next door,” Ethan chimes in. He drops the mic after that and scampers into the house, the girls behind him, nipping at his feet.

  “You’ve already met someone.” My mother arches a tell me all the details brow.

  “I’ve met my next-door neighbor.”

  “A woman?”

  I stare off into the sky, bright and blue. “Yes, that does seem to be her gender, it’s true.”

  “And you have your eye on her already?”

  I chuckle, shaking my head—a lie, a big lie, a big, fat lie. “She’s just my next-door neighbor. I don’t know why you would say I have my eye on her.”

  “Because you’ve always had your eye on pretty women,” she says.

  Busted.

  Her eyes shoot laser beams my way. “I’d like more grandchildren. So please get moving on that.”

  “Be grateful for what you have. I didn’t even plan on giving you this one, but it worked out quite well, didn’t it? Stop being so difficult,” I tease, planting a quick kiss on her forehead. “Would you take a grand-dog instead?”

  She swats my shoulder. “I swear, you and your sisters. Always so quick.”

  “So that’s a yes to a rescue dog? Excellent.”