Fail Me (Florida Flowers Book 1) Read online

  I put on the handbrake and kill the engine. The air is pregnant with the need for sexual release we’re already chasing in our minds, but I wait for her to bust down the invisible wall of inhibitions between us. I’m out of practice, so I might have read the signs wrong, even if it’s plain as day when one strap of her dress slides down her shoulder, and she makes no move to pull it up. Guess Mommy chooses candidates without ripped shoulders like mine that make her little daughter wet at the sight.

  “Well, thanks for the ride, Matthew…” she drawls, reaching out and gliding a hand down my tan forearm until she reaches my hand resting on the gears.

  “How about another ride?” I turn my palm up and tug at her hand. “I’ll take you to your destination in no time.”

  “Sounds like an exciting trip,” she whispers before she crawls over the center console.

  The springs in my seat creak as she parks her ass on my lap, and just like that, we’re all nibbling lips and fumbling hands. While I bite into her naked shoulder, she grabs my package so hard, I hiss, and I pull the lever underneath my seat to tilt the backrest and make room for her legs.

  Her hands push up the T-shirt underneath my button-up to get to a six-pack she’s probably only seen in the latest The Bachelor episode while she gyrates against my boner like an aspiring stripper eager to earn some cash she clearly doesn’t need. Her breasts are the size of mandarins with a spacious gap in between, but I like how I can suck them into my mouth like the leaf vacuum I bought last week.

  Eagerly, she rips open my zipper while I bury my hand beneath her thong to drive a finger into her. She moans into my mouth, chafing against my hand with such ambition, I don’t even need to wriggle my finger. Keeping our mouths fused, I stretch out my other arm to open the glove department and fetch a condom, when suddenly a bright light to my left floods the truck’s interior.

  Jillian tears her lips from mine with a gasp, her head whipping to the source in slight panic. No… The silhouette of a woman hurries out of the house, calling Jillian’s name.

  “Shit!” she cusses, hastening to push herself off my jeans and adjust her dress. Flashing me a guilty look, she grabs her jacket and clutch. “Wait a sec.”

  Then she hurries out, leaving me with a hard-on the size of a skyscraper and a sour mood. Three hours of cruising through half of the East Coast with the scent of sex ripe in the air, and that girl’s Momster has to spoil the party. Wiping my sticky finger on my jeans, I watch with irritation as Jillian argues with her mother.

  “Matthew Mallory?” I hear the woman saying in astonishment as she pops her red-dyed bob over Jillian’s frame to get a look at me.

  Her high-pitched voice is familiar. I blink. The street lamp throws shadows over her face, but I’d recognize the spray-stiff hairstyle and two thin slits of tattooed eyebrows everywhere.

  Christina Robinson. What are the fucking odds?

  She waves her hand, and I begrudgingly step out of my truck, my boner collapsing within a second.

  “Now, would you look at that,” she gushes when I approach, jutting out her breasts in a summer dress as flimsy as a night gown. “Matthew Mallory. What a surprise!”

  She hauls herself at me to give me an embrace I can hardly shy away from. I bend down so she can swing her arms around my neck, inhaling expensive perfume, the whiff of ozone from a solarium session, and the air of someone who’s unfamiliar with the term financial crisis.

  I break apart first. “Hi, Christina. Good to see you again.”

  Jillian’s gaze ping-pongs between us, her cheeks still red from the flush I’ve put there. “You know each other?”

  “Remember when I told you about Mallory Fruit Farms?” Christina says to her daughter before her gleaming eyes skim over to me, drinking me in from head to toe. “Matthew’s mother, Samantha, was a good friend of mine back in Tampa. Last time I saw you, you were still a kid. And look at you now, boy—grown to the size of a mountain!”

  Considering she was always tiny, the height difference between us is startling. And speaking of kids, I remember her rocking a toddler in her arms. Apparently, the same girl I was about to fuck in my truck. Awkward.

  “How’s Harry?” she wants to know.

  I munch on the inside of my cheek. “Been better.”

  She slowly nods, lips pressed into a thin slash. As Mom’s best friend back in the day, she might have witnessed more of Harry’s drinking binges than me.

  “And the plantation? Did you take over the business?”

  “I did. It’s… tough right now.” My forced smile doesn’t fool her, but I’m not keen on diving into the subject right now. “Well, then… It was nice meeting—”

  “Wait,” Christina cuts in and stuffs a hand into her plunging neckline. Okay, if she’s about to present me her new boob job, I will need a shrink.

  She pulls out a roll of hundred-dollar bills, feathers through them, and presses a bunch into my hand without counting. I’ve counted, though. Seven-hundred bucks. Fuck.

  “For driving Jillian home all the way down here.” She sends me a genuine smile.

  With a head shake, I try to push the money back at her, but she wouldn’t let me.

  “Keep it.” She throws her daughter a glance, then directs at me as if something just occurred to her, “By the way… If you need a change of scenery, I could use a helping hand. My last gardener ruined my rose bushes, and I’m in desperate need of a new one.”

  She regards me with obvious curiosity. My eyes still cling to the gracious amount of bills in my hand while her daughter looks as if she wants to drop dead.

  “Mom, please don’t—”

  Christina holds up a hand to silence her. “Something tells me you need a time-out from home,” she says to me. “You can stay here for the time being. Three-thousand per week, your own room, food, drinks, and all amenities included. What do you say?”

  My jaw unhinges. What the hell? 3K per week for what? A job as a gardener, her daughter’s future husband, or Christina’s next swinger conquest? Frankly, I’m so neck-deep in the shit right now, I’m not above either option.

  Except for the latter. Anything less than seven figures isn’t worth a lifetime of sexual dysfunctions.

  I rub two fingers over my chin, one of them still smelling of Jillian’s juices that I can taste on my lips. “You know what? That doesn’t sound so bad.”

  Christina’s botox-leathery face lights up with glee as she extends a hand. “Deal?”

  “Deal.”

  We shake hands.

  Some might call it pitiful desperation.

  I call it a silver lining.

  Three

  Samantha

  My pen scratches on the paper, every swirl I make soaking it with blue ink, the sweat on my palms, and my growing anxiety.

  It’s the third list I’ve started. My third attempt to figure out how the fuck to foot the bills and not end up broke by the end of the month.

  But no matter what I blot out, no matter what I switch from this month to the next, the total at the end slaps me in the face Mike-Tyson-style every time.

  Huffing, I slap my notebook shut and hurl it to the side. It smashes against the shelf with a dull thud, hitting a framed picture that drops onto the maple floor boards. I throw my head against the musty pillow behind me, flashing a sideways glance at the picture on the floor. Dad has his arm wrapped around Mom while I stand in front of them, their hands on my shoulders. I’m the only one not smiling into the camera.

  “You don’t have a future with that job,” Mom said when I told her I wanted to become a freelancer. “An editor? Really? You want to slouch in front of your computer all day, completely isolated, for what—ten bucks per hour? You only live once, Samantha. Choose a profession where you can do something good in this world.”

  Closing my eyes, I take a moment to wallow in self-pity. I should work on my next novel but my creative well is empty today.

  “… looks like a squished egg from a dinosaur! I said round, you h
ear me? Round!” Christina’s voice hollers over the yard.

  “Oh, shut the fuck up,” I grumble as I heave myself up from the ratty bed and skulk over to the cut-out window. Wiping the makeshift curtain to the side, I peek over to the neighbor’s garden where Christina Robinson fires orders at the poor twenty-something gardener who’s getting a lashing from the brat for the second time that day. I swear her bellows are more annoying than the barking dog that woke me at six in the morning.

  I push away from the window and bend down to pick up the picture. I place it back on the shelf and rearrange the books, pulling a little here and pushing a little there to make sure they’re all neatly aligned with the edge.

  “What are you doing here?” I mumble, frowning when I notice a gardening book squeezed into my relationship guidance section. I must have put it accidentally into the wrong place yesterday. “There,” I say, satisfied when all books are in the right order again.

  “… Sam in the treehouse?” Ruby’s voice drifts up from below.

  “Yeah,” Kendra answers. “She must be sweating her ass off in there.”

  I do. During summer, it’s as hot in here as in Christina’s in-door sauna, but with the multiple breakdowns I’ve been suffering lately, the treehouse is the only place to cry my heart out in peace.

  Accepting that I won’t get any work done today, I duck my head to scramble over the squeaking floor boards and open the small door. A gush of fresh air cools my sweaty forehead as I lock the door behind me, shove the key into my shorts’ pockets, and climb down the rope ladder dangling against the oak tree.

  “There she is.” Kendra side-eyes me with a smug smile as I approach her and Ruby lolling on their beach towels. “What have you been doing up there all day?”

  Stomach first, I plop down on the vacant towel next to them. “Enjoying my solitude. By the way, you were showering for half an hour this morning. Cut it down a bit. The running costs are going through the roof.”

  Ruby looks up from her psychology book, squinting at Kendra. “What are you doing in the shower for half an hour?”

  Kendra shrugs. “Shaving my legs, peeling my skin, letting the conditioner soak my hair, admiring my tits…”

  “Admire your tits in the pool next time,” I grumble as I push up my top to let the sun tan my back, but Kendra’s focus has already shifted to her magazine featuring her favorite DJ in this month’s edition. Her earrings jingle as she shoves her headphones over her auburn hair and turns on the music on her old-school iPod.

  She’s the only girl I know who bothers with jewelry, a designer bikini, and styled locks at home. Come to think of it, I’ve never seen her running around the house without makeup and an eye-catching outfit.

  “Hey, did the mechanics already repair your car?” Ruby asks me after a minute.

  I swivel my head to her with a sigh. “Yeah. Cost me six hundred bucks,” I gruff out, cursing the asshole that rammed into my Chevy, ruined a headlight, and gave the paint a striped pattern in the form of red scratches. The entire neighborhood must have heard my hysterical breakdown after I saw the destruction in my driveway.

  “Shit,” Ruby mutters.

  Fate is a bitch to me lately. Last week, I drowned my phone in the toilet. Kendra gave me her old one that she dropped so many times, it looks as if someone overran it with a semi.

  “Are you good? Financially, I mean?” Ruby asks. “Do you need us to help you out?”

  I give her a solemn smile while I marvel at her hair in the sunlight. Chocolate brown and so smooth, you wouldn’t get a better style with a flat iron. In addition to her porcelain skin and plush pink lips, she’s blessed with a unique beauty that makes her Elena Gilbert’s double from The Vampire Diaries. “Thanks, I’m good.”

  I’m not, but I won’t run into debt, not even between the five of us. My next novel will be the gamechanger I’ve been waiting for. I know it. Hope dies last, right?

  The door to the porch creaks open. Leo emerges, clad in nothing but an oversized tee with the slogan, ‘I want you to know that someone cares. Not me, but someone.’ Yawning wholeheartedly, she collapses into a chair. Her dark, shoulder-length hair is ruffled, her eyes are still half-closed, and marks of a pillow are ingrained into her cheek.

  “Wow, you’re up early,” Kendra remarks with a dramatic glance at her watch. “It’s not even four in the afternoon.”

  Leo flips her the bird, showing off the colorful butterfly tattoo on her middle finger. Drawing her knees to her chest, she sips at the steaming mug of coffee in her hands. I don’t bother to point out that her pussy lips are flashing me a smile. The girl has zero modesty and runs around the house naked all the time.

  “Don’t you want to come down here, get a little tan? You could use some color,” Ruby addresses Leo while she highlights a paragraph in her book in neon yellow.

  “Do I look as if I want to get a tan?” Leo gestures to her legs covered in tattoos along with two-thirds of her entire body. I’m glad her face is ink-free. Her fair skin pronounces her turquoise eyes that I love so much.

  “Did you get a new tattoo?” I ask when I spot a black raven on her calf. I’m sure it wasn’t there a few days ago.

  “Yeah. You like?” Beaming at me, she stretches her left leg, her morning grouchiness gone all of a sudden.

  “Uh…” I play with the little loop earring in my right ear. That girl has so many tattoos, she’s a canvas. They suit her, in addition to the row of piercings adorning her right ear, nose ring, lip ring, and rings in places I don’t want to know about.

  Shouts from the neighbor’s garden drift over the fence once again, and we all swivel our heads to Christina hurling insults at the lackey who seems to have used the wrong tool to sweep her porch.

  “Can we get a shotgun and silence her forever?” Leo mumbles over her mug.

  “I’m sure the gardener she just fired would gladly do you the favor,” Kendra says, pulling down her headphones.

  Leo cocks an eyebrow. “She fired another one?”

  “The third this year,” Ruby throws in, keeping her eyes on her book.

  A familiar jingle of keys announces us to Skyla fluttering into the backyard. With a contented sigh, she throws her surfboard on the ground and plumps down on it.

  “Guys, the waves were incredible.” Her blue eyes twinkle with excitement as she munches on the lollipop sticking from her mouth.

  “You’ve got something in your hair,” Ruby points out.

  Frowning, Skyla pulls a piece of algae from her beach waves. I don’t envy her for her daily hair washing routines. I do, however, envy her for everything else, including her incredible tan and her Sport’s-Illustrated-model ass.

  And that’s our crew. The Rhones sisters—Skyla and Ruby—were the first who came to live with me after I started searching for roomies to share this huge house I ‘inherited.’ At twenty years old, Skyla is the youngest in our gang, the one with the good, carefree, seize-the-day attitude. Never moody, always a sunshine.

  I hate her surfing stuff, though. Every day, I stumble over her surfboards or wetsuits, and I have to vacuum twice a week to get rid of all the sand. Tidiness isn’t her virtue. In fact, only Ruby is as neat as me. She’s going to college and has ambition beyond belief, with her nose stuck in psychology books day and night.

  Ruby is our referee. The do-gooder who grounds us, comforts us, and settles our fights. Also, the only one in our quintet who’s in a steady relationship. Pretty sad, if you ask me.

  Kendra Farris moved in shortly after. She lives for fashion, style, and music. She doesn’t go anywhere without her iPod. A pity she doesn’t use it at home. We’re butting heads frequently because she likes to turn up the volume of her stereo until the floor starts to shake.

  Actually, I wanted to keep it at that, but Kendra had a friend, Leo, who landed on the streets after a family tragedy, so it came down to the five of us. Leonara Alvarez is originally from Spain, with a knack for arts and an obsession for tattoos. Hand the girl a pencil,
and she creates the most amazing drawings. They decorate a good portion of the house, giving it at least a whiff of character.

  She designed all her tattoos herself and snagged a job as an illustrator at an advertising agency where she works mostly at night. She’s a night owl. You usually don’t see her up before late afternoon, and she tends to go to sleep around the time I start my day.

  Leo is the bad girl. Rebellious, audacious, and shockingly blunt. It took me some time to warm up to her, but her honesty can be refreshing.

  And then there’s me, Samantha Kent, average everything, forever single, and owner of this house. Well, sort of. The property belongs to my parents, but they visit Florida once in a blue moon. They run an NGO in Kenya with focus on gender equality and health care. At first, Mom flew off to South Africa for a couple of weeks while Dad stayed to look after me. Weeks turned into months, months turned into years. At some point, she got Dad on board, and the next thing I knew, they got themselves a one-way ticket to Nairobi. Since then, we’ve only been seeing each others’ faces in Zoom calls.

  Fine by me. I built my life here with a family I love and share the house’s responsibilities with four girls. I’ve been on my own since I turned eighteen, so college was never in the cards for me, and my parents won’t send me more money than they deem necessary. Hence why I took the chance and became a Romance writer. Yes, the kinky stuff. My secret obsession. The girls think I make a living as a freelance editor. No one knows I’m bringing my vulnerability and dirty fantasies to paper under my pen name, Sam K. Sapphire.

  Ruby’s phone buzzes with three incoming texts in a row, and I peek at her from under my lashes. A cheeky grin spreads her lips as her fingers fly over the keyboard. She’s probably sexting with her boyfriend again. Jesse Chandler—charismatic, down-to-earth, and incredibly handsome. On the downside, he’s lame-ass boring. A geology student, so what else would you expect? I hardly see the guy. With all their studying twenty-four-seven, Ruby doesn’t see him a lot, either.