The Bad Boy Next Door Read online

  Table of Contents

  Excerpt

  The Bad Boy Next Door

  Blurb

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Preview - Blowing It Off

  Note from Lexxie Couper

  eBooks by Lexxie Couper

  Excerpt

  Back. Go back.

  I knew where Lucas was. Or at least, where he was headed. Back home. From where we’d come from. Maybe, if I left now, I could catch him on the road. Maybe…

  A part of my brain wanted to focus on the he loves you so much. I wouldn’t let it. Not until I found Lucas and knew he was safe. Whatever he was going to do, we could do it together. He wasn’t going to do it alone. He didn’t need to. I was with him.

  In every way, I was with him.

  He loves you so much. Huh, who knew the feeling was entirely mutual?

  “Veronica,” Lila Winchester said my name like it was a warning. “Please don’t be thinking you can save—”

  “Thanks, Doc,” I cut her off. “I’ll take a knife instead.”

  I replaced the phone’s handset to its cradle before she could respond, hurried to the stainless steel knife block and yanked out the biggest. The same knife I’d first selected last time Lucas had gone AWOL in this house.

  The butcher’s knife was at least ten inches long and wickedly scary looking. It was perfect. Let’s see Officer Dewey and or Detective Kitchner come at me when I was wielding this.

  Knife in hand, I sprinted upstairs and grabbed a pair of jeans, a T-shirt and a pair of Chucks from the massive walk-in closet.

  It took me less than seventy-five seconds to get dressed. I counted each one, a desperate fear Lucas was going to get himself killed over me building inside me. By the time I tied my last lace, my hands were shaking.

  But I was angry. Seriously pissed.

  When I caught up with him, we were going to have a very long chat about making me worry. And then I was going to climb him like a pole and ride him like a pony until we both came screaming.

  Yes, I was that angry I’d resorted to tired clichés and mixed metaphors. Sue me.

  Dressed for ass kicking, I picked up the knife and then ran down the stairs. If I was really really lucky, Lucas would have left the Ferrari in the garage. Surely whatever misguided mission he was on required stealth?

  I didn’t need stealth right now. I needed speed. I needed to catch him.

  Stop him.

  I needed—

  A soft thudding noise sounded near the front door.

  My heart smashed up into my throat in one swift leap.

  Lucas. Had to be. With the security at this place, who else could it be?

  Knife still in hand, I ran to the door and pulled it open.

  I froze at the sight of the tall, beefy man with the most porn-star moustache I’ve ever seen standing on the other side.

  The Bad Boy Next Door

  Lexxie Couper

  Published 2016 by Book Boutiques.

  ISBN: 978-1-944003-28-9

  Copyright © 2016, Lexxie Couper.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of Book Boutiques.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, locales, or events is wholly coincidental. The names, characters, dialogue, and events in this book are from the author’s imagination and should not to be construed as real.

  Manufactured in the USA.

  Email [email protected] with questions, or inquiries about Book Boutiques.

  Blurb

  He’s dangerous.

  He came into my life when I was sixteen. Tattooed, ear pierced, ripped jeans and bloody knuckled. That was the day his family moved in next door.

  For six years, I’ve watched my bad-boy neighbor, never knowing when he’s going to be there and when he isn’t. Never knowing what he’s doing when he’s absent, only that it’s dangerous.

  And then one night I wake to find him in my bed. Naked. Bruised and bleeding. And hard. Really hard.

  He wants me. And he knows I want him too. But he’s dangerous. On every freaking level.

  Oh boy, this is going to end in pain…

  Acknowledgements

  Cover art: Valerie Tibbs, Tibbs Design

  Dedication

  For Heidi, my earlier riser and coffee drinker.

  Chapter 1

  I was dreaming about Liam Hemsworth. I remember that. Naked and panting, Liam Hemsworth had entered the bakery where I work—I’m a final-year pastry chef apprentice, which translates to I make fuck all money, do most of the work and constantly smell like croissants. In my dream, the delicious Australian had hurried over to the counter, sought me out with those killer-blue eyes of his and said, “Ronnie, I need four bear claws now. And then I need to eat you.”

  That’s the kind of dream any girl is going to enjoy, unless Liam was a cannibal in my dream, but by the hard-on he was sporting when he’d entered the bakery, I’m pretty certain eat meant oral sex.

  I remember being very happy in the dream. Very ready to accommodate his needs. I’d just made the most incredible batch of bear claws as it were and had no issues at all with him eating them and me.

  I was about to inform him of that when something woke me.

  Something hot and hard.

  Something suddenly on top of me, all solid and growly and panty.

  A something that turned out to be a someone.

  My MIA, bad-boy neighbor who I hadn’t seen for over three months.

  Lucas fucking Pratt.

  He was naked.

  I could feel his incredibly muscled body that I’d spent six years trying not to notice sliding against my also naked body. I could feel his muscular thighs and chest and stomach rub against my thighs, my tummy, and my breasts.

  I could feel his cock and balls grinding at my inner thigh, dangerously close to the place his cock and balls should never be close to.

  His cock, my startled, befuddled brain was telling me, was hard.

  My body thought that was goddamn awesome.

  “What the hell are you doing?” I burst out, writhing and bucking and wriggling beneath him in the dark.

  His hot breath fanned the side of my neck as he tangled his hands with mine in the sheets. He made a sound, a growl-slash-groan that sent shivers of something very much like hungry desire through me, and then his groin slammed to mine and his hands pinned my wrists to the bed beside my head.

  Whoa.

  “What the fuck have you done to me?” he snarled the words in that same growl-slash-groan as he ground my wrists to the mattress.

  I still couldn’t see his face in the darkness of my room, but I could hear the slur in his question. And I could smell the coppery tinge of blood on the air. Along with his sweat and something that may have been whiskey on his breath.

  Was he drunk?

  I’d never seen him drunk.

  If he was drunk, what the hell was he doing here? In my bed?

  Trying to…do whatever the hell he was trying to do to me?

  “Lucas.” I thrashed beneath him, trying to dislodge him. His naked body slipped and slid over mine. My brain registered the fact my nipples were dragging against his chest. My body registered the fact his cock—suddenly much more rigid than it had been a second ago—was grinding at my sex.

  I wanted to scream.

  Not in fear, in anger.

  The trouble was all I could do was pant his name and writhe beneath him. This was not how I’d
expected to be woken.

  I should give you some backstory. Here’s the crib-note version.

  1. Lucas’s family moved in next to door when I was sixteen and Lucas was seventeen, six years ago. Our families had been close ever since.

  2. Lucas had been in trouble with the law before then. He had a juvvie record but I had no clue for what.

  3. Lucas mocked me every time we saw each other because he didn’t believe I was bi—I’d been bisexual since I met my best friend at fifteen. We hadn’t lasted as girlfriend and girlfriend, but we had stayed BFFs.

  4. Lucas would disappear frequently, with no word. Would turn up days, weeks, months later. Every time he did, he was bruised and looked more menacing than he had when he left.

  5. In my last year of school, there were rumors he was making money as some kind of paid muscle for a motorcycle club.

  6. The police would inevitably pay a visit to our house looking for him during every one of his mysterious absences.

  7. He always had money to burn. And I mean, serious money to burn.

  And 8. He would often confuse the hell out of me by randomly baking the most delicious brownies in the world and bringing them over to our house…usually after I’d had a crap day at school or work, and leave them with me without anything more than a silent nod and enigmatic smile.

  That was my life with Lucas fucking Pratt as my neighbor.

  There were joint camping trips to deal with, neighborhood barbeques in the summer, Thanksgiving Day dinners spent together. He had this unique ability of making me feel like he was sneering at me even when he wasn’t even looking at me. Any boyfriend or girlfriend I brought to any event spent most of the time under his intense, brooding snarl of a glare. That glare was intimidating. And unfortunately, fucking sexy as all hell.

  When I was sixteen, all my friends wanted him to fuck them. Everyone thought he was dangerous and brooding and arrogant and hot.

  Even I had to admit, he was incredible to look at. He was all sinewy muscle and broad shoulders and perfect six-pack. He was chiseled jaw and piercing blue eyes and tattoos that seemed to somehow emphasize the sculpted form of his biceps and triceps. When I talked about him to my friends I used the term “walking cliché” with dripping sarcasm. When I was with previous boyfriends, I fought hard not to compare them to Lucas. That was a difficult thing to do. None of them had looked like him.

  And I’d never been woken by any of them in the middle of the night. Naked. Groping me while they were obviously sweaty, drunk and bleeding.

  That’s not the kind of thing a twenty-two year old girl should get turned on by, right?

  So why the fuck was I turned on? By Lucas? My neighbor. My male neighbor. Who I despised.

  What the hell was going on?

  Struggling against his grip on my wrists, I bucked upward. Not a smart move, given we were both buck naked, slicked in sweat and his rigid cock was rammed to my waxed-smooth pussy.

  I swear to God, I felt the tip of his erection part my lips for a moment.

  For a moment, my head spun and my heart smashed like a hammer in my throat.

  “Lucas,” I shouted, wishing to fuck I didn’t prefer to sleep in pitch blackness. If I could see his face, I’d feel like I had some kind of grasp of the situation.

  He didn’t sound…right.

  He sounded…dangerous. Really dangerous.

  “Get off me,” I snarled, thrashing wilder.

  His grip on my wrists grew painful. His face mashed to my cheek. His knee rammed to the inside of mine and shoved my thighs wider. His cock nudged harder at my pussy.

  “What,” he growled, his breath hot on my face. “Have you done. To me?”

  “Nothing, you prick,” I snapped back. “Except put up with your shit for years.”

  He grew still. His hands on my wrists loosened. He lifted his head. “Ronnie?”

  Confusion filled his voice. I noticed once again he was slurring.

  I shifted beneath him. His cock was still nudging my sex, inching a little deeper with every move we made. “Yeah?”

  With a speed and strength that was both impressive and scary, he shoved himself off me and then off the bed. “Fuck.”

  His mutter tore at the darkness in the room a second before I scrambled across the mattress and smacked my palm against the switch of my side lamp.

  My bedroom exploded with light.

  Lucas hissed, squinting against its harsh assault on his eyes. He raised his hand to protect them against the light, giving me a very clear view of his body.

  “Jesus, Lucas,” I breathed, staring at him, my heart thumping fast. “What the fuck happened to you?”

  He dropped his arm, the charged energy I was used to seeing in him suddenly turned up to a million. His blue stare locked on mine. His fists bunched at his sides.

  I ran my gaze over his torso, too stunned to do anything about covering my own naked body.

  Angry purple bruises the size and shape of fists peppered his ribs and abs. Cuts and gashes that could only come from knife strikes did the same, some weeping fresh blood that trickled down his body. Over his hips, down to his—

  Fuck, he’s huge.

  Jerking my stare up from his erection, I let out a gasp at the battered state of his face. His jaw and lips were as pounded as his body. A deep cut ran the length of his cheekbone below his left eye and also trickled blood.

  It was his eyes that messed with me the most, however.

  His eyes had always mesmerized me. There was a secret world of danger and violence in them I’d never been able to comprehend. I had even admitted to Mads one night, when we were sixteen and tipsy on my Dad’s secret bottle of Wild Turkey, that his eyes were sexy.

  Right now, his eyes looked crazy. Scary crazy.

  “Are you on drugs?” I asked.

  There were a lot of things about Lucas that made him fall into the bad-boy category, but using had never been one of them.

  Lucas liked being in control too much. I knew that.

  But his eyes…

  He stared at me, his chest heaving, his eyes…

  Bright red fresh blood began to flow from his nose, and suddenly he staggered sideways.

  “Jesus, Lucas,” I burst out, clawing myself off the bed.

  I grabbed at his arm before he could collapse to the ground, steadying him with a flat palm on his chest—right above the tattoo of a raven inked over his heart. “What have you been doing?”

  His gaze found mine. For a second, they were as direct and piercing as always, and then they fogged over with what I assume was pain but might be…something else.

  “Ronnie?” he mumbled, raising a hand—bloody-knuckled, I noticed—to cup the side of my face. “What are you doing here? I’ll fucking kill them if they’ve hurt you.”

  I frowned, alarm bells ringing in my head, my blood roaring in my ears. “We’re in my bedroom, Lucas,” I said calmly even as my tummy knotted. “You woke me in my bed. What happened to you?”

  He brushed his thumb over my lips, fresh blood oozing from his nose. “Ronnie. I’ve wanted you since I first fucking saw—”

  His eyes rolled back into his head and he crumpled to the ground.

  I couldn’t stop him. He was too heavy, too solid. Too boneless.

  By the time my brain registered he was going down, and that I was still gripping his upper arm with a firm hold, he hit the floor, taking me with him.

  We hit it hard. I heard a sharp crack as his head smacked the floor. My right knee did the same and pain shot up my leg. I tried to bite back a gasp, but it escaped me before I could stop it. I’ve had surgery twice on my knee for anterior cruciate ligament damage, the last operation only a year ago. Suffice to say, my bare knee striking my floor wasn’t fun.

  “Goddamn it,” I muttered, wincing at the shards of pain spearing my reconstructed knee as I tried to shift Lucas onto his back, or at least get him into a better position on his side.

  Worry ate at me. Worry and fear.

&n
bsp; I hadn’t seen my mysterious bad-boy neighbor for three months, and this is how he turns up? And who were they? Who did he think had me? And what had they done to him?

  Ignoring the screaming agony in my knee, I finally managed to move him into a position I hoped was more comfortable. I stole a second to run my gaze over him.

  Jesus, he was beaten black and blue. There wasn’t a part of his body not bruised or cut in some way.

  I tentatively feathered my fingers over the worst-looking wounds, uncertain what to do.

  Did I call 911? I had no idea how injured he was. What I did have was an idea about how often the cops came looking for him in our house during the times he was AWOL. If I called 911, would he hate me for it? Would I be putting him in more danger?

  Should I ring his folks?

  I needed to ring someone. Jesus, if I could afford it, I’d call a doctor at least. Someone to come check him out.

  Frowning, I ran a gaze over him again. The fact he was at my house tightened something in my stomach I didn’t expect, something I hadn’t experienced since the night I’d realized I really, really wanted to go down on my best friend and make her scream my name.

  That thing in my tummy tightened some more, radiating a heat lower into the place between my thighs that hadn’t reacted to a guy for a long time.

  What the hell?

  Was I seriously getting aroused? By my neighbor?

  My unconscious, mysterious bad-boy neighbor who’d spent years teasing me and driving me all kinds of crazy?

  What. The. Hell?

  “Screw this,” I muttered with one last look at Lucas as I began to climb to my feet. “I’m calling 91—”

  A hard fist wrapped around my wrist, jerking me to a halt.

  “Ronnie,” Lucas’s hoarse growl scraped at my fraying state of mind.

  My stare snapped to his face. He looked up at me, his eyes clear, bright. Too bright. Too intense.

  “Lucas,” I said, tugging with pathetic force at his grip on my wrist. Or maybe I whispered his name. I don’t know. I felt…confused. My heart was racing. My head was roaring. “You need—”

  “You,” he snarled, the word thick with hunger, before he yanked me downward and captured my lips with his.