Going for Broke: Oakland Hills Friends to Lovers Romantic Comedy (Friends with Benefits) Read Online Free PDF Page A

disapproval. “It was nice of him to take it in.”
    “And then ate it,” Ian added.
    Billie broke out laughing. “God, he was weird, wasn’t he?” Maybe she was getting better about good-looking guys ruining her judgment. She hadn’t been even remotely tempted to flirt with Todd, not even for a second.
    After flashing her a grin, Ian slipped the bag off his shoulder and started to set it on the grimy floor before seeming to think better of it and hanging it on the closet doorknob. “She had a lot of cats, I take it?”
    “We tried to help her with the mess, but she wouldn’t let the cleaners inside. Only family.”
    “And Todd, apparently,” he said.
    “I doubt it. They probably did all their chatting outside. Going out for the paper and the mail was her big excursion of the day. She’d push her walker down the driveway, greet the neighbors, wave at people jogging to the park, pet everyone’s dogs, talk to the UPS guy, and if she didn’t see anyone, she’d wait. Her walker had a little seat on it. She’d perch there and hang out.”
    Feeling an intense urge to go out and talk to her that very minute, Billie held her breath, blinking back tears.
    “She sounds like a nice woman,” Ian said. “I wish I’d met her.”
    “She was awesome. Please don’t get the wrong idea when you see the house. It was just the one thing she couldn’t handle. Everyone has their thing, right?” Smiling, she sniffed.
    “At least one.” He pulled a square of white fabric out of his jeans pocket and held it out to her.
    She took it and stared at him. “You carry real handkerchiefs around?”
    “My mother,” he said. “She gives me a few every Christmas. They’ve uh, got my initials on them.” He cleared his throat and stood up taller, looking embarrassed.
    Amused, she looked down, patting her eyes with the handkerchief, reluctant to actually blow snot into a monogrammed gift from his mother.
    Something brown formed an L-shaped smear on the ex-beige carpet. Perhaps in the previous century—the middle of it—the material had been as light and fluffy as a newborn baby’s stuffed animal. But now the fibers were ground into a stained, patchy, clumpy mass, more like a skin disease than a fabric. “I snuck a vacuum cleaner in with me once while she was napping, and she got so mad she wouldn’t let me in again for a month.”
    Ian turned and went over to the corner near the front door, where he squatted down and began tugging at the edge of the carpet. It made popping sounds as he peeled it back. “Good news,” he said. “You’ve got excellent hardwoods under here.”
    She walked over. “Really? My dad said it was probably just cheap subfloor.”
    “I don’t know about the rest of the house, but here you’ve got hardwoods. They’ll need some work, but they’ll be an improvement over… this.” He plucked at the scabby carpet. “Whatever this is.”
    She leaned over his shoulder to get a better look at the planks under the row of rusty nails and splintered plywood strips. “Fantastic,” she breathed, squeezing his shoulder, imagining all the work his big muscles could do. “Let’s pull it all up right now.”
    He turned his head, bringing his nose close to her cheek. “Now? It’s usually best to do the floors last.”
    Another shiver, not from cold, ran through her. She’d always been smart about keeping casual around Ian. Their mothers were friends, they were friends. They’d grown up together, or as much as you can when you’re three grades apart.
    Although there had been that moment when she was twelve and she’d noticed the way his raven-black hair brought out the bright summer-sky blue of his eyes, and that he was as big as a man and looked more… interesting… in jeans than other guys did.
    She’d noticed.
    But when her sister announced that she and Ian were “going out” (although sometimes they stayed in doing things only grown-ups should do), Billie worked hard at not noticing anything