Page 58 of Breaking All The Rules
Bea smiled at herself, loving how her eyes seemed to sparkle more and how the fine lines on her brow seemed to have disappeared and how her boobs seemed perkier. She thrust her chest out and shimmied a little. Yep, definitely perkier.
Who needed implants when there was rebellion? And Austin.
She left the bathroom and crossed to the end of the bed where she’d stripped her shirt off last night, then picked it up and threw it over her head before hunting through her drawers for her Thursday panties. Not because it just happened to be Thursday, but because she loved them best.
When she crossed to the sink for a glass of water, Bea noticed that Austin must have fed Princess before he’d left. She leaned her elbows on the edge of the sink and filled her glass under the faucet, watching the slow pace of Credence tick by down on the street. A big clunker of a car that looked decades old pulled up against the curb opposite her building, followed closely by a police cruiser pulling up in front. Ooh. Bea perked up. Was that Austin’s car?
An elderly man got out and stood by the vehicle, waiting for the police officer to join him, and—bingo—it was Austin, striding in that long, lazy way of his, touching the brim of his hat as he greeted the man. Bea grinned, thinking about wearing that hat as she’d ridden him like a cowgirl last night.
The old guy beamed at Austin, giving him a friendly kind of pat on the forearm, and Bea watched with fascination as the two chatted all friendly and cordial. Austin’s body language was one of deference as they spoke, but there was obviously a problem with the man’s tires, since Austin pointed several times to the left front one. He smiled and nodded a lot but also kept pointing like he had all the time in the world to explain the problem and was perfectly happy to do so.
Suddenly, mid-conversation, his gaze flicked up directly to her window, and although it took him about a second, he smiled as he realized she was standing there. The grin was slow but got bigger and bigger and, even from across the street, her girlie bits hummed in response to the obvious message.
I know what you look like naked.
The older man, who was talking now, cut off mid-sentence, frowning as he looked in the direction of Austin’s gaze, obviously realizing he didn’t have the police officer’s full attention. He squinted as he looked up, which drew his impressive eyebrows together. They were more unruly than even Bea’s had been—they had to be if she could see them from across the street—and she wondered if he knew about Mirror Mirror.
She didn’t know what the old man said next, but there was a big smile on his face now as well, and he turned to Austin, giving him one of those elbow nudges. Austin laughed, totally unabashed as his gaze stayed fixed on hers, and Bea swore she could read his mind. And it was very, very dirty.
The old man, however, was clearly intent on continuing the conversation as he pointed at the tire again and made his case. Or whatever the hell he was doing. Bea didn’t know and for damn sure she didn’t care as Austin’s eyes stayed on her, and a naughty spark of inspiration struck.
Her conversation with him at Annie’s the other day came back to her, and before she could second-guess herself, Bea straightened and whipped her T-shirt off over her head. The old guy was oblivious as he continued to talk Austin’s ear off, but Austin’s face was an absolute picture. It went from shock to disbelief to blatant ogling all within seconds.
From holy fuck to Jesus Christ to how you doin’ in the space of a few heartbeats.
She smiled triumphantly, her boobs feeling sixteen again as she wiggled her fingers at him in a cheeky kind of wave, then blew him a kiss. He shook his head and narrowed his eyes, but she’d have felt more chastised had that secretive smile not been tugging at his mouth.
Still grinning, Bea stepped back from the window—just in the nick of time, as the old guy turned his head again, obviously realizing he still didn’t have Austin’s full attention. She threw her shirt back on as she made her way back to the bed, a glow in her belly and a lift in her step.
Lack of feminine modesty for the win. Sorry, Grandmother. Except, not sorry.
She grabbed her laptop and phone off the floor beside the bed and sat half propped against the wall, her knees bent slightly to accommodate the laptop, the covers pulled up to her waist. Princess joined her, turning around three times before flopping down on top of the duvet beside Bea at about hand level. Princess may have not been favored in the looks department, but she was no dummy, as Bea’s hand automatically reached out and started to pat.
Her phone vibrated and she smiled to herself, knowing who it was even before she glanced at the screen. Austin. He’d put his number in her phone last night and vice versa.
You’re lucky I have serious police business to attend to now or I would have to come and arrest you for violation of bylaw 367 part A schedule 9.
Bea laughed as she read the text. He was so full of shit. She texted back. But, Officer, I thought public nudity didn’t apply in the confines of my home?
His response was swift. This is for deliberate distraction of a police officer while on duty.
Yeah, well, he definitely had her there. But he wasn’t going to have this all his own way. *I’d* like to report a peeping Tom spying on me through my window. Tall. Uniform. Hat. Really big dick. She added an eggplant emoji.
Peeping Tom? In Credence? Impossible. But rest assured we take all complaints seriously. I can take your statement this afternoon. Does 3-ish work?
Three p.m. seemed like a million years away now, but Bea was sure she and Princess would survive until then. She tapped out another text. 3 is fine. I’ll be waiting here for you. In my Thursday panties. *Just* my Thursday panties.
Another fast response. Tease.
Bea grinned. Pervert.
A licking-lips emoji appeared on her screen. See you at 3.
Smiling to herself, Bea dropped the phone as she snuggled down beneath the covers a little lower. “Let’s see what’s happening in the world, big kitty,” she said as she opened her laptop. She’d taken to perusing the headlines for five minutes every morning before switching to whatever show she was binge-watching.
It was almost ten when she logged in to CNN and immediately wished she hadn’t. What she saw there sucked away all her happy.
“The brilliant and talented young LA advertising executive Kevin Colton, who was recently promoted to the board of Jing-A-Ling, one of the top ad agencies in the country, was arrested this morning for fraud and misappropriating company funds.”
