Get a Life, Chloe Brown (The Brown Sisters #1)(9)

If someone asked her what his tattoos looked like, she wouldn’t be able to describe the images they displayed or the words they spelled out. She’d speak about the dense blackness, and the pops of color. The faded ones that seemed ever so slightly raised, and the ones that flooded him like ink spilled into water. She’d speak about how strange it was to choose to bleed for something, simply because you wanted to. She’d speak about how it made her feel and how she wanted to want something that much, and on a regular enough basis, to build her own equivalent of his countless tattoos.

But no one would ever ask her, because she wasn’t supposed to know.

The first time she’d stumbled across this view, she’d turned away instantly, squeezing her eyes shut while her heart tried to break free of its cage. And she’d shut her curtains. Hard. But the image had stayed with her, and curiosity had built. She’d spent days wondering—Was he naked? Naked in front of his window? And what had been in his hand? What was he doing in there?

She’d lasted three weeks before looking again.

The second time, she’d been hesitant, shocked by her own audacity, creeping toward the window in the dark and hiding behind almost-closed curtains. She’d peeked just long enough to answer her own questions: he was wearing jeans and not much else; he was holding a paintbrush; he was, of course, painting. Then she’d stared even longer, hypnotized by the sight. Afterward, she’d crossed Do something bad off her list and tried to feel good instead of guilty. It hadn’t worked.

And this time? The third time? The last time, she told herself firmly. What was her excuse now?

There was none. Clearly, she was a reprehensible human being.

He stopped, straightened, stepped back. She watched as he put down his paintbrush, stretched out his fingers in a way that meant he’d been working for hours. She was jealous of how far he could push himself, how long he could stand in one place without his body complaining, or suffering. Or punishing him. She twitched the curtain wider, her envious hands moving of their own accord, a little more light spilling into her shadowed guilt.

Red turned suddenly. He looked out of his window.

Right at her.

But she wasn’t there anymore; she had dropped the curtain back into place, spun away, slammed herself against the living room wall. Her pulse pounded so hard and so fast that it was almost painful at her throat. Her breaths were ragged gasps, as if she’d run a mile.

He hadn’t seen her. He hadn’t. He hadn’t.

Yet she couldn’t help but wonder—what might he do, if he had?





CHAPTER TWO


Why would a woman who all but hated Red spend her evening watching him through a window?

He couldn’t say. There was no good reason. There were bad reasons, reasons involving fetishes and class lines and the shit certain people considered degrading, but he didn’t think those applied to Chloe Brown. Not because she was above lusting after a man she looked down on, but because she didn’t seem the type to lust at all. Lust couldn’t exist without vulnerability. Chloe, beneath her pretty exterior, was about as vulnerable as a bloody shark.

So maybe his eyes had deceived him. Maybe she hadn’t been watching him at all. But he knew what he’d seen, didn’t he? Thick, dark hair pulled into a soft bun; the sky-bright glint of those blue glasses; a lush figure in pink pin-striped pajamas with buttons marching up the front. Cute as a button, neat as a button, always dressed in buttons. He knew exactly who lived in the flat that faced his across the courtyard, and he knew—he knew—that he’d seen her last night. But why?

“Red,” his mum barked. “Stop slicing so loud. You’re ruining my nerves, you are.”

The distraction, ridiculous or not, came as a relief. He was sick of his own repetitive thoughts, a murky, khaki color in his mind. He turned to face his mother, who was perched at the table wedged into one corner of her tiny kitchen, right beside the window. “You want to complain about my chopping, woman? When I’m over here to make you lunch?”

“Don’t get cheeky,” she said, giving him the death stare. She was legally blind in one eye, but lack of sight didn’t stop her irises from stabbing him.

He tried to look innocent. She huffed grandly and turned back to the window, twitching the net curtains aside. She ruled her cul-de-sac with an iron fist and spent most of her time waiting for supplicants to arrive.

This time, the supplicant was Shameeka Israel, a doctor at the Queen’s Medical Center. When she came for Sunday lunch with the great-aunt who lived three doors down, Dr. Israel became Our Meeka, or alternatively, Little Gap. She arrived at the window with a pot of oxtail curry and said, “Here, Ms. Morgan. Auntie made you some for the cold.”

Mum’s glower softened at the sound of the doctor’s voice. “Gap. You’re a good girl. When are you going to marry my Redford?”

“Soon, Ms. Morgan. All right, Red?”

He winked at her through the window. “It’s a date.”

She grinned, flashing her gap teeth, then put the oxtail inside the windowsill and said her good-byes. As soon as her Lexus pulled out of the car park, Red whisked the pot away from his mother’s grasping hands. She’d already lifted the lid, stuck a finger into the curry, and sucked.

“Oi,” he scolded. “You’ll spoil your lunch. I’m making you pistou soup.”