Seeing Red (Bliss Peak #2)

by Shon

Noah was undeniably attractive, but Greyson…holy fuck, that man was the type of fine writers cr...

More than anything, I was surprised at how opposite he and Noah seemed to be. Noah had been dressed down in faded jeans and a T-shirt while Greyson had been wearing brown tweed trousers, a white button up with the sleeves rolled up over his forearms and a pair of suspenders.

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen a man rocking suspenders, let alone rocking them well. And his glasses…the way they drew attention to those stunning dark brown irises, and…

No. I was not fantasizing about that man. Neither one of them, actually. They were my neighbors. That was it. I needed to drill that reminder into my psyche.

To: Promise 8:22 PM Me: Bitch, not my neighbor seeing me naked the first day I’m here.

I couldn’t leave him hanging when all he wanted was a familiar body to sleep beside while he battled whatever demons he didn’t speak about.

Whether he wanted to admit it or not, he was subconsciously seeking connection. The same connection he was seeking when he showed up on my doorstep two years ago and asked if he could stay with me while he got over his breakup.

Noah didn’t do well with being alone. Especially when he was going through something. He needed to...

Maybe it was a side effect of being the eldest sibling, but I liked being...

“True St. John.” Ruby Jean’s granddaughter. Liked Sade. Liked to dance. Now I had something new to add to that list. Dating my best friend.

To say my family was unconventional would be an understatement. Thirty years ago, my mother was supposed to be doing her married best friends a favor by carrying their child. The child they wanted turned out to be twins, and she moved in with them for eight months so they could shower her with care and attention. Somewhere over the course of that time, they all fell madly in love. So my sister, Promise, and I were born into a three-parent household filled with more love than most people ever saw in their lifetime.

I loved my best friend, but variety was the spice of life or whatever my sister tried to drill into my head.

It was impossible not to stare at her when we were in the same room. That hair. Those lips she liked to paint in varying shades of crimson. Her thick, hourglass frame. I loved how tall she was. And I loved how she let laughter consume her whenever she thought something was funny.

She snorted before a loud cackle erupted from her throat, and I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it since the night she laughed in my face for the first time. Hearing it had become a norm in just two weeks and I would never get tired of that.

Well, at least he’d worn a shirt every day since that first time. If I had to torture myself by being in Greyson Wolfe’s presence every night, at least he was playing nice. Kinda. There was nothing nice about the way this man took up space. He was all consuming and infuriating. And so. Damn. Fine.

Did I feel like he was silently judging me every time we were in the same room? Yes. Was it enough for me to stop entering the damn rooms? No.

And whether he knew it or not, Noah was the perfect buffer. He was so easy to read. So kind. And also, so. Damn. Fine.

Why had the universe cursed me with neighbors who looked as alike as night and day but elicited the same response from me?

Noah’s lips quirked. “You zone out a lot. Must be a writer thing. Because you’ll be looking right at me and not hear a word I said.” He laughed softly and the sound made my stomach flutter. How did I tell him it had zero to do with me being a writer and everything to do with the lust burning my blood at this point?

Noah with his attentiveness and need for quality time. And Greyson with his broodiness and silent acts of service.

I didn’t know much about Greyson aside from the fact that he was fucking rich. He owned a resort even though we were the same age and I knew for a fact it wasn’t new money funding it.

Right. That was the plan. Bliss Peak wasn’t my forever home and I didn’t care if Greyson came or went. Right? The sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach said otherwise.

If I’d learned nothing else in the past year it was that there was no such thing as permanence. So this hypothetical future without either one of us in Bliss Peak shouldn’t be throwing me for a loop.

Greyson may have had his own way of showing it, but he’d seen his best friend at his lowest and didn’t want him to go back to that. That was love, in its simplest form. Wanting the best for someone. Sometimes even if they didn’t want the best for themselves.

I swore I wanted to be aloof and mysterious, but I’d never quite mastered the art of shutting the fuck up.

If you looked up the word “rambling” in the dictionary, there would be a picture of me, grinning like a fool.

I liked her. And I wanted her to know me. Even if it came out as a rambling trauma dump while she did her makeup in my passenger seat.

The timing was wild, and I still couldn’t bring myself to regret opening up to her. I should probably talk to my therapist about that.

She was married to my father and watched him belittle me for most of my life.

“The same thing that always happens.” My father makes a plea for me to move home and sell cars. I say no. He insults me and tells me I’m less than a man because I don’t wanna do what he wants. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

Mama: You need to get laid Me: Ma. Mama: I’m serious, True. Me: Ma. Mama: You need a release. Trust me, it’ll be cathartic and you’ll be over this writer’s block in no time.

Mama: Every time I get stagnant or experience a creative block, it’s because I need to release something in order for the new thing to sprout wings.

Why was our neighbor talking to her about dating apps when my mom had two husbands?

Good lord, the last person I wanted to think about firing a rifle was Ruby Jean St. John.

Mama: Ah, yes. The pretty boy next door. My jaw fell. Me: I never told you he was pretty. Mama: You didn’t have to. You told me long hair and tattoos and I got the picture.

I needed to make a friend. Or ten. My mama knew too much about my daily encounters with Noah and Greyson.

Me: If you must know, one of them did ask me to go to a wedding reception with them. But we’re going as friends. Daddy: I remember when your mother and I were friends.

Mama: And don’t forget to bring your own condoms. You never know what these men will try. I groaned. Why had she sent that in the group chat? My dads had two very different reactions. My phone notified me that “Daddy” had emphasized my mother’s message and “Dad” had left the group chat.

Was my family heavy handed with a side of meddlesome? Yes. But I loved them for it.

Operation: Get Laid and Write This Damn Book was officially underway.

“Is it fucked up that I kinda don’t want her to get over this writer’s block?” “Yea, nigga,” I laughed. “It’s fucked up.”

I had a propensity for obsession. A need for control. A knack for watching things from the sideline until I knew without doubt how things would unfold. I studied people’s patterns until they were ingrained in my brain. Observed people’s tics until I knew every trigger that produced the same minuscule result. Over and over again.

This had always been who I was. Silent and observant. Distant but never truly detached. I spent so much time in my head that people complained they never felt like they truly knew me. And honestly, I was okay with that because it had never been my goal to be known by everybody anyway.

Outside of my family, only one person got a different version of me. And he slept down the hall from me every night. But recently, five weeks ago to be exact, a new obsession—I mean, exception had wormed her way into my psyche. True St. John invaded my thoughts from the time I woke up to...

I thought about tangling my hands in her thick hair more than I should have. I thought about kissing her until her lipstick was ruined and her mouth was swollen from my possession. I thought about laying her at the ce...

I wanted to make a mess of True and from time to time, she looked at me with a heat in her eyes that told...

Day after day, I watched her and Noah get closer. They had a cadence between them that grew stronger every day. An ease of being around each other that even a s...

I couldn’t think of True without thinking of Noah. And I couldn’t think of Noah without thinking of True. The thought of them together made heat pool in my veins and fantasies unravel faster than I could catalog them.

It was unhinged, getting off on the thought of my best friend and our neighbor. But every time the thought snuck into my head, I followed it until my dick was empty and my breathing was ragged. What the fuck was wrong with me?

As much as I wanted True, I wanted Noah to have her too. I wanted to watch them. To study the way they made each other come undone. I wanted her to have us and I wanted us to h...